“I loved you yesterday, I love you still. I always have, and I always will.”

~ Unknown

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No! No! No!

That had seriously not happened?

Could her life get any worse?

All Swara wished for now was the Earth to break open and swallow her whole. She just did not want to face anyone. How could she do that?

Mumbling all to herself, Swara kept pacing to and fro in the main hall of Home Sunshine, and the entire Bachcha Party Gang, along with Ragini, were almost on the verge of having a headache as they tried to keep up with her pace. Sitting on the floor itself, all of them had their faces rested on their palms as their heads moved like a pendulum and Swara still kept pacing up and down the hall.

Had she gone crazy?

“Does anyone know what exactly is wrong with her?” Ragini finally asked and the whole BPG shook their head in denial. No one had any idea as Swara had refused to speak anything. Like literally! And if Swara Bose had refused to speak, it was ought to bring a calamity. Aarvi sighed, “She has been acting strange ever since she has returned from the college.”

“I think I know,” Rimjhim spoke up garnering everyone’s attention in a moment. “Looking at the way she is trying to rip off her hair from her head, I feel… Do you think she has punched someone? Or maybe she has broken someone’s nose? Or someone’s head?”

“I don’t think so,” Golu hardly managed to speak with all those chips stuffed inside his mouth. And that earned him a slap at the back of his head. Nanhe frowned at him, “Either eat or speak. Don’t sputter and throw the food out of your mouth like a fountain.”

“Instead of this guessing game, why don’t we ask her only?” Aahna, the youngest one among them finally spoke and everyone nodded their heads in unanimous agreement. Though just seven years old, Aahna was the most sensible one among them and rarely spoke her mind out, and whenever she did, everyone readily agreed.

“It has not even been a week ever since she joined. What could she possibly do in such a small duration of time?” Ragini could already feel her head reeling at all possible prospects of her actions. For sure, if she was acting this weird, whatever had happened could not be something small. Getting up from the floor, she walked up to her but even before she could open her mouth, Swara walked past her as if she was not even standing there.

Excuse me! Did she just ignore her?

Ragini picked up the pace, held Swara by her upper arm and turned her around. “Ouch!” Swara shrieked instantly rubbing her arm as she glared at her best friend. “What is wrong with you, Ragini?”

“What’s wrong with me? What is wrong with you? Why are you behaving like this? Has anything happened at the college? Did anyone say anything to you? And… wait a moment… Why is there a wound at your head? Did you… did you fight, Swara?” asked a shocked Ragini whilst inspecting a red blotch on Swara’s forehead who flinched just at a slight contact.

“W-What? I-I did not!”

“You stuttered, Swara. You are lying.”

“No. No. No. I’m not lying. I really, honestly, did not fight with anyone. I promise.”

“Then what is it?”

“Ugh! I am hopeless. Just hopeless.”

“Swara, what did you do?”

And the whole scenario which she just wished to vanish from the bundle of her memories flashed right in front of her eyes as if her worst nightmare. Why was life so unfair to her?

✨

He is your professor!

The words that had just escaped the dean’s mouth appeared like invisible slaps on her face. Could someone be kind enough to get her a wall? All she wished was to bang her head right now. How could she be so stupid? Now, she realized why everyone asked her to think before acting. She had called the doom upon herself!

Great! Happy realization, Swara!

“Prof… Prof… Professor?” she was just too stunned to form any coherent response and Sanskaar seemed too shocked to even realize what was happening around. His hand involuntarily covered his cheek and she almost felt that she had noticed a light tint of pink on it.

Was he blushing? Or had she pulled it much harder than she should have?

“Ms. Bose. Pay your respect to Dr. Maheshwari. He will be joining us officially from tomorrow.”

Perfect! She had left such a great impression on her professor even before he could join the college. They should felicitate her with the national award. No one could be as fitting as she was.

“G-Good morning, Sir,” and even before Sanskaar could open his mouth for the reply, Swara realized that she had enough dose of embarrassment to last for the entire day. She hurriedly turned around but apparently the goddess of luck was still furious for some unknown reasons. Within a fraction of second, she got her leg stuck amidst the books lying pitifully on the floor and even before anyone could realize she landed straight on the floor, banging her head on the concrete rather painfully.

Silence! Absolute silence!

She could not hear even a single word for everyone was too flabbergasted to react. And for Swara… She was too thunderstruck to even scream with pain. She was still not able to decide whether she should cry or scream. Talk about embarrassment!

“Are-Are you alright?” Sanskaar finally broke the silence as he bent down to help her up. And his words instantly brought her back from the land of embarrassment.

“I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine,” she shouted like a maniac and rushed out of the place even without giving them a look. She just could not take it anymore, and she did not even want to see what expressions he had at the very moment. Was he concerned? What if he was laughing at her? She could feel tears threatening to fall down from the corner of her eyes. Could life be any more remorseless?

The only man she had come to like after all this while turned out to be her professor. And if that was not enough, every time they met, she kept embarrassing herself in front of him like never before. Someone, sitting above, definitely held some grudges against her.

✨

“So you pulled your professor’s cheek and called him cute?”

“And then you fell straight on your face right in front of him.”

“Your dose of embarrassment will last for a lifetime. Trust me!”

The entire BPG was left stupefied. They knew that their Swara didi was crazy but this… this, that had happened hardly a couple of hours ago was craziness to the level of infinity. And they did not even want to imagine how long her state of fluster and awkwardness was going to last.

“I don’t even want to attend the college,” Swara shouted and Ragini whacked her arm. “And what made you think that you have an option?” Ragini raised an eyebrow and Swara tried to give her the best puppy look she could muster to convince her best friend. She just did not even want to know what all the next day had in store for her.

But like always, the look did not work on Ragini again and Swara sighed helplessly. For sure, she would be thrown out of her room and of Home Sunshine to attend the college tomorrow morning.

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A tap of the duster on the classroom door had each and every mouth shut instantly and as every pair of eyes was trained towards the door, in came one of the most beautiful female faculty of SCMN. Dr. Kavita Roy was one of the emerging names in the region and was the dream of almost each and every guy around. The boys sighed the moment she entered and girls looked at her with envy, just a feeble attempt to find out what was so special about her.

“Good morning, our aspiring doctors,” she greeted everyone with a smile that could brighten up anyone’s day. “Today we have a new professor here. He will be teaching you human anatomy and I would request you all to be at your best behavior if you wish to have him as your professor for a long time. Dr. Maheshwari, please come in,” she requested with a smile yet again.

A gasp ensued the mouth of the girls the moment Sanskaar entered the classroom. And as Swara tried hiding her face, she could hear hushed whispers as the girls claimed him to be theirs and threatened others to stay out of their way. Swara would have loved to punch their faces, saying that she met him before anyone else, but she was in no mood for some extra embarrassment. So, she finally landed on the conclusion that staying silent for the time being was the best option for her.

“So, students,” Dr. Kavita’s voice had everyone’s attention once again, “He is Dr. Maheshwari. One of the leading neurologists of West Bengal and it’s an honor that he is here to teach you all. So, I want you all to treat him well and give him the respect he deserves.” She smiled yet again and then with a nod of acknowledgement towards Sanskaar, she left the classroom.

“Good morning, everyone. Now that you all know who I am, I would want you all to call me Sir or even Dr. Maheshwari would do. That is all for my introduction and for yours, we will have a small activity. A test!”

TEST?!!

On the first day itself?

Was he crazy?

Sanskaar smiled, “I know, you all must be feeling that I have a few screws of my brain loose. Trust me, if I would have been at your place, I would have thought the same. But this is not some serious test. Just a few simple biology questions. I just want to know how much you all know. That way it will be much easier for me to plan out the things. So, yeah?”

On receiving a positive response, the question papers were distributed. Twenty questions. Twenty minutes. Twenty marks.

Twenty minutes later, the papers were exchanged, and as Sanskaar dictated the answers, the students marked each other and exactly after thirty minutes, Sanskaar had all the answer sheets in his hand.

Calling out the names of the students, he announced their marks and briefed them about the points they needed to focus on a little more.

“Ms. Anaya Batra. Good. Fifteen out of twenty.”

“Mr. Rajat Sharma. You need to work a little more my friend. Ten out of twenty.”

“Ms. Vandita Murthy. Very good. Eighteen out of twenty.”

“And next we have here is… Ms. Swara Bose. Umm… three out of twenty. That would be the lowest, I guess. Ms. Bose?”

No response!

“Ms. Bose? Please come here and collect your answer sheet.”

No response yet again!

Sanskaar narrowed his eyes as he looked closely. And there she was. “Ms. Bose, I would really appreciate it if you could stop hiding behind that book and grace us with your presence up here,” said Sanskaar folding his arms across his chest.

Slowly, taking her own leisure time, Swara closed the book, got up from her seat and started walking towards Sanskaar at such a pace that even the tortoise could defeat her easily in the race.

Sanskaar sighed, “Faster, Ms. Bose. I don’t have the whole day.”

Swara sped up. But the very next moment everything went by in a blur. Her eyes widened in shock and even the time seemed to slow down as she realized that she was falling. Yet again! She wanted to reach out for something. Anything. But apparently, it was too late for that.

Realizing what was going to happen, Sanskaar sprinted towards her but before he could reach out to her…

Swara Bose had already fallen down in front of the man she liked twice in less than twenty four hours!

She was a disaster! Literally!

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