Jivika~

"Inter-class sports competition starts from today! Leg cricket and Kho-Kho for girls. Cricket and Football of boys! But if anyone of you break your bones, it's not my problem! This is being conducted on your insistence, otherwise with your boards round the corner, I would've never taken this risk!"

The coach announced. The screech of his whistle shattering my ears, was necessary on his part to emphasize his point.

"Sir, which class forced you?"

"D section."

Of course. The class with the most unpopular opinions. That whole class, the green section, was bonkers. The only partially sane one being Pratik. To be frank, I'm not sure about that as well. The soon to be school topper of our batch, Purnima Anantakrishnan, was from that class. I won't be surprised if she ranks first in the whole country. And then came the majority of their class, who by themselves could form teams for all the sports in the school.

"Come on, its gonna be fun!"

This new character? Me not telling you about her was intentional. Srishti Pandey was many things. Popular, annoying, the one with the sugary voice. She was not mean, no. But somehow, she manages to irritate people. She was from section A, the red house. We were from B, the blue ones. And blue being the calm and quiet ones, we bear her with a smile and an eye-roll.

Six hours of school and two hours of tuition classes. So, one-third of the day I had to tolerate her.

She was that girl who was frowned upon by the teachers on her birthday regarding her choice of dressing. She was that girl who's relationship status was always public. She was that girl who had lots of admirers and haters as well. She was that girl who had mass followers on Instagram. She was that girl who was called attractive and a slut at the same time.

She was also the girl who asked a Sociology professor during career counselling session, 'What was the scope of a good career in Socializing?' where the poor old fellow had to correct her that it was Sociology, not Socializing.

The coin flipped and it was declared.

A against B.

C against D.

Or in other words, red against blue. Yellow against green.

Srishti easily fit into the role of being her class's leader. "We will defeat B!" her shrill voice echoed in the school ground, making us and her classmates cringe. Okay. We were pathetic. There, I admitted it. But not that pathetic that we would lose against them, of all the people.

"Who is she dating now?" Laysa asked Amaya, her best friend.

"No one. She and Karle ended it, after he failed eleventh."

"Who is Karle?" asked Rhea, combing her fingers through her hair.

"Arrey Karle, Yash Karle! The football captain of school under whom we lost all U-17 matches, you don't remember?"

"I still don't know how you are a SGFI swimmer dude. You don't even know this school's players!" snorted Kiara, keeping an eye out for Pratik. She was constantly glaring at her boyfriend who was laughing with Purnima.

"Dude, there are so many Karle's! And we always talk about Noopur, who dances like a buzzing bee around Pratik, right Kiara?"

Before the person in question could reply, Lavanya cut through her sentence, "Wait, Noopur Karle, the girl who dated Krish for a day?".

"Relax Lavanya. He dated her because I asked him to. I wanted to keep her distracted so that she won't get all mingly-mingly with Pratik," Kiara spoke out, understanding what was going through her mind. Being the centre of our attention was something which Lavanya loved, but not this time.

"So what happened to Srishti and Karle's three months and forever?" she spoke up, diverting the topic. Off went Amaya and Rhea, enlightening her about a gossip which she already knew.

Well played my friend, well played.

*

Turns out, we are pretty pathetic. We lost Kho-Kho to Srishti's class and our first leg cricket match to D section. Months of cramming up for boards had made us forget how to run. And now we were being coached by our boys on what was to be done. That front was being led by Amaan and Shreyansh.

"Arrey just play like Hitman! You are sure to win!"

"I say, tumlog apna kaam karna aur hum apna," suggested Amaan, simultaneously blinking at Shreyansh.
[You do your work, and we'll do ours.]

And they rushed to the other guys, whispering and mumbling, leaving us confused.

"Okay. Lets gear up to face 'A' again and hopefully not lose, again."

Hmm. Lets do this.

*

We won the toss and decided to bowl first. Srishti and Maya entered as the openers. Our girls positioned themselves on the field. Boys of both the classes flocked around, forming the spectators. C and D were playing their match right next to us, and so, coach had to rush to their place. Of course, he had to be there to support his favorite class, the greens.

It was just a five overs match.

Srishti was on strike. And the first over was bowled by Kajal.

4,1, W, 1, 4, 4.

Fourteen runs and a wicket of the first over. That's bad, really bad. Sure we got a wicket, but it was not Srishti's. And she had scored thirteen runs from four balls. She's still standing. This was a bad news. Not to mention, in such a pressure situation, we were bound to be reckless.

After a group huddle, Rhea headed to bowl the next over.

One run was scored of the first ball by the new girl, resulting in the handing over of tthe strike to Srishti. Just as she was preparing herself at her crease, we heard loud hoots and shouts.

"Oye Karle, oye Karle, oye Karle! Tujhse nahi hoga!"
[It's not your cup of tea!]

"Oye r*ndi!" shouted Sachin.

"Abey madarjh*t!" screeched the other guys.

Now, now, now. Those actions of theirs were not something I supported. It was immature and too degrading. But at the heat of the moment, I did not know how to react and neither did the other girls. Our coach while focused on the other match, pretended to ignore the whole thing.

Within five seconds, the match became a sledging ground between Srishti and the boys of our class. The amount of cussing exchanged between them and Srishti, Yaar, Dilli ki yaad aa gayi.
[Damn, makes me remember Delhi.]

With the boys of A section and us laughing our asses off, we admired the unified support of our class. By now, the sledging was still going on but the vulgarity reduced drastically. Just then I saw coach heading towards us. Motioning the others, we slowly started with the game and gradually the swearing turned lighter, if possible.

Rhea bowled the first ball.

Miss. Srishti missed it. She missed the second one as well.

On the third ball, she took a quick single.

Slowly our boys started it again. But one look from coach, and we realized that it was going to be a difficult task. The other three balls were dots.

The scoreboard read 15/3. Three more overs left.

I went out to bowl.

Once again as Srishti started gearing up, the hooting started.

"Karle! Karle! Karle! Karle!"

What surprised me was that, it was led by Amaan and all the boys joined in, giving out loud cheers. As for Srishti? Something about her ex's name irked her a lot. Not giving a damn about our coach, she hurled the ultimate insult:

"GAND MARAO TUM SAB!"
[You people go fuck your ass!]

Somehow the guys calmed down a bit and stopped. She was frustrated, clearly. I think, that was their motive. Realizing that this was the chance, I proceeded with my bowling. Srishti was busy glaring daggers at the boys of her class for not speaking up.

Rejuvenated, I bowled the first ball.

Dot ball.

Second ball.

Dot ball.

Third ball.

Dot again.

Fourth ball.

It hit the stumps. She was bowled out.

The roar of "Wicket!" was heard throughout the school. See, this is what happens when you lose your focus. The other two balls were dots again.

Maiden over and a wicket.

Yaar. Mai toh hu hee itni kamaal!
[Damn. I'm so amazing!]

The rest of the two overs, I don't know what happened, but in the end the scoreboard was 29/6.

Hmm. Decent enough.

*

It was our turn to bat.

I was tired because of my amazing spell, and so had decided to play lower down the order. I strolled around the ground for sometime. Standing on the other side the ground, I watched the game of C section and D section. Another reason why I hated the latter. Their girls were so ... rowdy at times.

"Oye Dhano! Be ready at that corner, this bitch is gonna send the ball there!"

"Oye Vaishu! I'm always ready!"

Dhano? Vaishu? What were they? Cows?

By the time I returned to our own match, 3.5 overs had gone by and we were losing.

Pathetically losing.

10/8 in 3.5 overs.

Srishti bowled the last ball of the over.

Run out.

So 11/9. With one over to spare.

Kiara got out trying to take a double. I entered. The last one standing. Me and Rhea, we knew it was a losing game. But at least we should lose a bit respectfully. I was on strike.

First ball.

Dot ball.

"Jivika! Take singles at least!" I heard a familiar voice yelling out loud.

Second ball.

A single. That's it.

Third ball.

A bit risky one, but Rhea signaled a single and I ran for it. The keeper gave an appeal but it was turned down by our umpire. Guess who our umpire was? Pratik. And trust me, that was totally beneficial for us.

"Yaar! If Rohit Sharma was here, then we would've won!" zoned out Shreyansh, loud and clear.

Pssst. Hitman can't be better than me.

Fourth ball.

I hit it for a six. A bit high but safe.

A huge cheer was heard from the crowd. The board read 19/9.

Fifth ball.

Jivika think. Yuvraj Singh was a Punjabi. I am a Punjabi. Agar hum mai dum nahi toh kisme?
[If we can't, then who can?]

I kicked the ball with the clear intention of a six, and I guess the ball got my message clear. The scoreboard read 25/9.

Last ball.

Only one thing could happen on the last ball. Either I would mess up or the bowler would mess up.

Just five runs needed of the last ball. I looked up at the sky.

Please?

As each second ticked and I felt the ball come closer, for the first time I could memorize its each and every move. With the hope, power, might and instinct, I kicked the ball.

It was definitely gonna be a four or six. Cause whatever shall happen, they will drop it anyways. That was my only reassurance. Our umpire raised his hands.

Not for a wicket, but for a six.

That's it.

Pratik blew the whistle, indicating that the game was over. Well, he had taken the whistle-while-you-work policy quite seriously.

We won.

31/9.

We won.

The crowd burst into cheers.

We won.

Srishti was crying.

We won.

I can't believe it.

And our boys? How long can they be put on a leash? And so, they lashed out. Cheers, hoots, laughs, applause, cussing, everything got mixed. And I did something I never thought I would. I walked up to Srishti. A crowd gathered around creating a circle. I spoke loud and clear:

"Srishti, ab tooh gand marraa!"
[Now, you go fuck your own ass!]

The cheers increased. But I could spot the smile on that one face. Not staying back, I walked away, letting the class deal with Srishti.

"Jivika!"

"Hmm Chandel?"

His eyes. Many emotions, no words. The glee of victory was painted on his face more than mine.

"Thank you," I said, after thinking for sometime.

"For what?"

"For convincing Pratik that the last shot was a six, when it was a four."

He stood there, stunned.

I looked.

He looked.

We looked away.

And we looked back again.

~