~~~@~~~ THE RAKHI INCIDENT ~~~@~~~

       
(PART 4)

            Senthil and John were intently listening to their conversation and excitedly leaned forward to what’s going to happen next. They were certain either Harini or Aman was going to go back on their agreement and they would confess their hidden love. They were eagerly waiting for it to happen and prove that they always knew something was there between the two star crossed lovers who needed a push, which they had provided. The excitement within them was increasing minute-by-minute, their eyes were glued on the arguing couple and ears were finely tuned to their voices.

           Meanwhile, in the heat of the moment, at the back of Aman’s and Harini’s mind, the awkwardness of the Raakhi had crept-in.

Aman’s mind was like “How, how did I get into this situation? That you too, in front of everyone, I can’t escape also. What to tell to escape out of this situation. Only solution is if that teacher comes and we have to break this conversation. Where is that teacher? Why is she taking so much time to come today, every time she comes bang on time? I always hated her for it but now when I need her to come, she doesn’t come. Hate her! She has never helped me with putting extra marks for me but this simple thing also she couldn’t do. God only help me from this, please God please! Rakhi ! That too from Harini !!??!! God Please! Please!”

           Though all the pleading was going on in Aman’s mind voice unreached to anyone’s ears over there, he had pulled up a straight face. No one could imagine that he was restlessly thinking of a way out. Harini was no way different, only thing was, she was scared the teacher would enter when she would be tying the rakhi and that made her more anxious to get it over, however half-minded she was about the rakhi.

Harini’s mind was not following the words she had blurted out few minutes back. It was going on, “Really Harini, you are going to tie a rakhi to AMAN, Aman ! Seriously? Great ! You yourself, with your very own hands, close the doors. Great going! Keep it up! Not like as if something great was happening between you and him but still there was room, both of us know if we wanted it, it could have grown into something. Now you are going back to square zero with no one. There is no scope of love in your life now or in near future. Congratulations Harini!”

          Seeing them lost in their thoughts, the boys behind all this were quite certain that Aman might break and open up about his feelings towards Harini.

           Suddenly one of the classroom’s window closed with a loud bang due to the wind, this noise woke them up from there zoning out and they looked at each other with eyes questioning, “ So what’s next?”

Aman took a deep breath and said ok and extended his hand as before, “ok, go ahead, do it.”

           Aman’s words had shocked Senthil, John caught his wrist with a comforting touch insisting not all is lost. Harini’s reaction was still pending and that could save their mission, which had just got a jerk from Aman.

Harini still trying to believe the reality, replied, “Do What?”. She was so into her thoughts and zoned out completely in a matter of few minutes that she took some time to come back.

“Rakhi, Harini!”, he reminded her.

“Oh yes! Rakhi! Yes yes. Just a second. Let me check where it is”, Harini fumbled and trying to search where she had lost that Rakhi which had created all this commotion.

“Found it”, she exclaimed but not so happily.

              She was catching both the loose strings of the Rakhi in each hand; she didn’t want to see the Rakhi also. Aman had given the green signal and she had to go ahead with it.

“Can you come a little closer?” she requested with leaning forward from her desk and trying to reach his hand.

“Harini! Harini! Harini!”, she could hear someone shouting out her name.

             The whole class was seated in the classroom, as 10 mimutes had passed since the class was to start but due to the absence of the teacher, everyone was jitter-jabbering away and adding up the noise level. Even through all the noise, Harini could hear her name being called out, it was faint in the being but it had become louder. She looked back thinking Senthil or John was calling her, but she was wrong. She couldn’t recognize the voice in the noise so she turning her head left and right, trying to figure out who it was.

               After few minutes of searching who was calling her, she gave up and moved her attention to the task at hand – tying the Rakhi to Aman. She heaved a deep breath and looked at the rakhi and then her eyes moved towards Aman’s face. She was staring at his face and suddenly his face got blurred, her focus was lost and drifted to hands waving in the air impatiently. Like a camera lens focusing at the backend and blurring out the frontend image, her eyes was trying to capture the person whose hands were up in the air. Those hands were of a boy, who was seated at far end of the classroom near the door but was just visible only when her line-of-sight from Aman was shifted by an angle or two. Now she was able to match the face to the voice calling her out, it was Ramesh. Soon as it had registered in her brain that it was Ramesh calling her and waving her to catch her attention, she was puzzled.

              She didn’t know why Ramesh was behaving like that and what was so important that he was frantically waving his hand continuously to get her to see him. The urgency with which Ramesh was showing towards her was confusing her more. Even after he had seen her looking at him, it didn’t stop him from repeatedly saying, “Harini, No. No”.

Harini looking at Ramesh asked, “What no? Why are you calling my name like this?”

                Her eyes were frowning up when she saw someone hurriedly scuffling up his mouth and pulling him to avoid her from seeing him. That someone had actually gotten up from two rows behind Ramesh to come and sit next to him.

Ramesh was trying to break free from his capturer, when he got a moment of freedom, he screamed, “Harini, don’t do it. Look… at your… hand. Look… at the …. Ra...”

               He was struggling to free his mouth, so his words were coming out at broken intervals and his last word was left incomplete. This made it harder to figure out what he was trying to convey to her. Only three words she had heard – Don’t, look, hand. Harini then looked down at her hand but still puzzled turned to Ramesh and back to her hand.

Ramesh at last screamed, “R...Rakhi!”

               Harini glanced at the rakhi at her hand, her eyes were blurred, and she couldn’t find anything. She saw a shape at the center of the rakhi, all rakhis usually have a round center which has a design on it. She then intently looked at the rakhi again; she saw that it had a heart shaped design. Again she could hear Ramesh’s voice, but clearly now without any disturbance; the capturer had left him free now.

“Look at the rakhi first Harini before tying it”, Harini was checking it properly while Ramesh continued to say, “Read what’s written on it properly. Don’t tie the rakhi.”

              After Ramesh’s insistence, she found out that there was something written on the rakhi which was not usual. The design was very fine and delicate, so it made it hard to figure out the words. She brought it closer and found the words - “Will you marry me?” written inside the heart shape.

              Harini couldn’t believe the words and read once again. Seeing those words infuriated her like a dangerous rocket had been launched into the sky. She crumpled the rakhi inside the fist, turned towards Senthil and John and gave them a red hot blazing stare and threw the rakhi to the dustbin present near the blackboard. Surprisingly her aim was bang on even though it was far away.

In amidst all this, Aman was cluelessly looking at Harini.

Harini told to Aman, “No rakhi, Aman. You can turn back, in slightly rude tone, as she was angry because of what Senthil and John had done.

Aman gave a sarcastic look and said, “Hmph! What a waste of time!” He had turned back and was looking down at his open book and gave a sigh of relief and a smile.

Harini turned and scolded Senthil and John, “You two…. How dare you do this! I’m going to kill both of you!!”

             She understood that they had sent someone to stop Ramesh from revealing the truth to her. She had to thank Ramesh for being like a guardian angel for her and for successfully stopping her from making such an embarrassing step.

“Ramesh, thank you so much, for saving me today. Thank you for being a true friend”, Harini said from the bottom of her heart and gave a disgusting look to the so-called-friends-turned-schemers.

Senthil with a smirk said, “Harini, Sorry. But why Ramesh stopped you from tying that rakhi to Aman. Don’t you want to know, Harini?”

“You guys will not stop I guess!” Harini without turning to them laughed and exclaimed.

“Ramesh might not be just a “friend”, why should it affect him if you propose to Aman? Think Harini, he might have some feelings for you. Ask him why did told you the truth about the rakhi.”

Harini just chuckled and thought, “These boys are never going to change.”

Just then the teacher entered the classroom.

             <> (*-*) <> The End  <>  (*-*)  <> 

~~~@~~~ THE RAKHI INCIDENT ~~~@~~~

         
(PART 3)

     

       Aman so obediently extended his hand, thinking that she was going to give him something. He did it as soon as he heard the first part of her sentence. Once the words “ I want to tie a Rakhi to you” had reached his ears and up through the neurons cells to the brain, his reaction to it was so fast that it was hard to differentiate if it was a reflex action or a voluntary reaction/response sent by the brain. Aman had quickly taken his extended hand back and hit his head with it and settled down properly in his seat.

       Harini didn’t realize what had happened, for one second his hand was right there and next he was hitting his head and pointing to her as if to indicate that she had gone mad. She turned back to see Senthil’s and John’s reaction. They were still encouraging her not to give up as if she had almost reached the finish line of a race fully devoid of energy and had to only take few steps to reach it. 

She air-mouthed to them telling, “He doesn’t want to tie it”. 

Senthil replied the same way, “Try once again, find out why he doesn’t want to.”

“I don’t care!” replied Harini bluntly. “I cannot go run behind him or anyone to tie a rakhi just because you two are compelling me to do”, was annoyed Harini’s angry reply to them while she was turning her head back to face the blackboard.

       John urged Senthil to add some oil to the burning flames coming out of Harini’s aura. His idea was before Harini calms herself  if they hit the red-hot-iron-rod- like Harini, only then she’ll break her I-don’t-care-attitude and take the next step to find out what Aman’s reaction meant. For those two guys it was like trying to solve a high profile mystery and they just wanted to reach to the end as fast as possible.

Senthil told John, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care. I know what to do.”

He pretended to be talking to John in slightly raised tone and said, “Oh! So it’s like that John! You are right, bro; there is nothing between Harini and Aman. But one thing I didn’t understand If nothing is there, why isn’t Aman co-operating with Harini, when he knows this can put an end to all speculation. Is he using HER!", indirectly calling out to Harini by making sure his voice was loud and clear enough to catch her attention

Now even Harini wanted to know why, she called, “Aman!”

After he turned with an I-don’t-give-a-damn look,  “I want to tie the Rakhi to you, don’t turn back, let me finish”, she started  off with so much determination and hurried up to finish the sentence before he retreats again.

She continued on to say, “See! Everyone’s pressurizing me to do it and anyways we don’t staunchly follow this custom, so why not just do it to get peace of mind?!”

          Aman’s face turned to a clueless look and Harini was unable to judge what he is going on in his mind. Aman didn’t give any herd to her blabbering and this annoyed Harini.

         She was already frustrated with those two boys behind her and now when she had made up her mind to do it, Aman was not co-operating. She just wanted to end it so that she can go back to her assignment work. The silence and the wait for Aman’s words or response was just increasing her tension of whether she had made a stupid move.

“H-E-L-L-O! Aman “, Harini impatiently blurted out.

“What?” , Aman questioned as if he didn’t know that she was waiting for his reply.

 Harini shrugged her shoulders implying she was still waiting.

“Uh! … I mean … What peace of mind are you talking about? Who’s pressurizing you? “, asked Aman.

        Harini with a jerk pointed her thumbs behind towards Senthil and John. Aman’s eyes followed the direction meet those two giggling boy’s faces and gave a sarcastic smile and small upward nod indicating “What’s up with you bro!” to them.

        He turned back to Harini and deject fully said, “You, YOU are falling into their words! I last expected it from you Harini. Do you think by doing all this drama, anything is going to change? I thought you were intelligent and clear minded. I thought all this didn’t affect you. Then, why all this is for?”

          Harini was not the kind to be sitting quietly and listening to all this lectures, that too from a boy like Aman or any boy. She had never seen him talking like all-the-sensible-grown-up-adult, then how the sudden change and why was he saying it to her. If any other girl had done it, she knew very well what his reaction would be; his chocolate boy charm and flirty nature would have come out. She was surprised to see this change in Aman.

So she replied, “If it doesn’t affect you, whether Rakhi or no Rakhi, you shouldn’t be so much bothered. Why are you all of a sudden behaving as if you are so grown up?”

Aman was about to open his mouth to say something but she cut him out and continued her train.

“So you mean to say you are having “peace of mind” with everyone time and again linking our names and pairing us up? Don’t you want all this useless teasing to end, once and for all! I can’t understand why you and I should be adjusting with it when we all know these are all just rumors with no smoke also. Or is it, that there is some truth behind what Senthil and John are telling me for your stalling the rakhi being tied on your hand? I hope you are clever enough to understand the underlying meaning.”

There was again that awkward silence, Harini thought again to break this ice-berg creeping up between them is going to take time.

But to her surprise Aman politely asked her “Hmm, you want to tie to rakhi to me, right?”

“Yes”, she replied and in her mind,” Yes you fool from the last 15 mins that’s what I’m telling.”

Aman after quietly listening to her outburst reply was sadly thinking, “She, really wants to tie a rakhi to me, then there is no reason for me to hang on.”

He took a deep breath and said ok and extended his hand as before, “ok, go ahead, do it.”

( Comment below What do you guys think, will they or won't they tie the rakhi? Will someone's hidden feelings curb up in the last moment? Watch out for this space for the last and final part :) There's a twist at the end ;) )