mayur sajan ff-cupids play part 13 pg 33 - Page 20

The next few months passed in a blink, as more projects, lectures and coaching took up their time. They were allowed to leave the hostel to nearby coaching centres, and gunjan was one of the first few alongside nupur to indulge into the practice.

Late at night when they were returning from coaching, nupur and gunjan would take the pleasure of having jalebis and halwa at the nearby bakery. Not only did it help them empty their head of the pressure, it also gave them some time with each other, which was more of a rare occurrence these days, when prakriti and samrat occupied nupurs day, for notes, help or just a little push up, whereas gunjan was mostly preoccupied because her parents' divorce.

The prototypic names of the groups more or less vanished, as they realized how lame they sounded in the senior block of their school. Instead the group began to break slowly, as people busied themselves in their own lifes.

Gunjan mostly stayed alone or with sheena, in whom she found a new friend, since her parents were divorced too, nupur would hang around with prakriti and samrat, who seemed to have really grown on each other. Prerna on the other hand, didn't seem to want to waste even a minute of her present without sahil, even if it meant rishab, shantanu and rv as a pack up gift, and mayank changed his section from X-A to X-C, so he could be around his old classmates.

But that wasn't enough, it was suddenly as though the whole junior life had changed.

Isha and maansi suddenly became best friends, and isha was included into the geek gang, maansi, malti, nishtha and kranti, except now they weren't the geek gang, they were more of the popular gang in the senior block. Nearly all the guys knew them, and all the girls wanted to befriend them, farhaad stopped talking altogether, which surprised nupur completely, since he used to be one of the most jovial guys of the class. Benji for the first time was stuck between two girls, dia and annie. He fancied dia, but then annie was his first crush. Tarun was suddenly a part of the school football team, and turvi, she was more inclined to talking to uday.

The only thing that hadn't changed, thought nupur as she sat in class doing her practical work, was shruti and sneha. They were still the same. They still didn't need anyone else apart from each other, they still didn't move on in life to be popular, and they still made no effort to be noticed. And nupur loved that bit about them, she somehow felt respect and pride for them.

They had done something which she couldn't, they had not changed. But she? She had changed more than anyone else in the class, she was more hot tempered now, she wore more classy clothes and a new habit of getting her eyebrows and upper lip done propped out of nowhere. She would take praks with her when she went and would only come back when she had made sure that she looked certainly more classy.

On the other hand, gunjan became even more introvertish.

She made it a point to ignore samrat, no matter what happened, she knew her pains were too over whelming to understand. And samrat, he needed to live. If gunjan told him about her problems, he would burden himself with them, just so she would smile, and she hated seeing samrat carry her load inside him.

So therefore even though she missed him pulling her cheeks, and playing with her bangs, and cuddling with her, she still made sure, she remained indifferent to him. No matter how hard he tried to make her talk to him, she made sure, she did not respond back, and if she did, it would be without a single blot of recognition.

Slowly, samrat moved on too, he started to move on more towards nupur and prakriti, and soon, samrat stopped calling her, messaging her and trying to get her to talk to him. It was as though he didn't know her at all.

And somewhere the empty hole inside him started to fill. And it was only because of praks(prakriti). Her boyish talks, her stupid jokes, her crazy puffed up screams filled with sarcasm, it all made him laugh. And soon he grew so used to her, it seemed strange to want to go back in time.

All the affection he had for gunjan vanished with time, instead it turned into hatred, hatred for her being so bossy, for her etching apart from him because she wanted to be popular. He hated it, and he hated her. And in the senior block, it was one of the known facts.

And nupur had been an important witness to these changes. She hated seeing gunjan so low, with no one to talk to. Nupur wanted to talk to her, but most of her time would go off in the coaching classes and homework.

Nupur regretted not being able to talk to gunjan, but she made up for it when they started with the coaching. Every day after coaching, gunjan and nupur spent 2 hours all to themselves, roaming around the place, discussing everything and anything they could think of.

A few months later, as nupur walked down the corridor with gunjan, she saw a notice.

A selection for the basket ball team would be taking place, since 2 members have left school.

If interested, assemble in the field, at 4 30 after school.

Coach Dhawan.

It instantly made nupur smile, she had always wanted to be a part of the basketball team, it was one sport she had ached to play. And now that she was getting a chance, she wouldn't let it go.

Meanwhile gunjan was more interested in something which was taking place on the staircase in the corridor on the left. Mayank and isha sat on the stairs holding hands, ishas head resting on mayanks chest, as mayank cradled her head with his fingers.

The sight astonished her, the thought of mayank and isha being together was a complete shock to her, since she had thought mayank liked nupur.

And if that wasn't enough, recently nupur had confessed to have some feelings for him. And it was all because of gunjan, dia, anne, cj and sheenas teasing.

Gunjan felt subdued at the sight, and she left the place in order to find some peace. Surprised, nupur followed after her to see what was wrong, but at that very moment, samrat and prakriti emerged out of the corridor which led to the cafeteria. At first they were laughing their heads off, at some in-jokes, as nupur called it, but then their smiles vanished as they saw gunjan.

Gunjan stared at the pair of them loathingly, and then turned to leave, simultaneously samrat pulled praks away with him in the opposite direction.

Nupur looked at them, and shrugged. It wasn't her business to meddle into, and if she even did meddle it would just cause a mutual enemity for the pair of them with her.

Her head pounded with pain, as she recalled all the good times they had had. How sam had taken care of gunjan in their room when she had fainted, how he always played around with gunjans bangs, how his arms were always around gunjans shoulder, and how he always wiped away her tears when she was sad.

Nupur leaned against the wall behind her and stared ahead into the open space in front of her in despair, there were so many little kids playing coco, a few of them sitting with the teacher being the teachers pet, on the far side of the ground in the tennis court, a few guys from class 11^th were playing lawn tennis, and in the basketball court stood karan.

Tired of pondering, she decided to talk to karan.

As she reached him, she saw karan drenched with sweat, trying to get the ball into the hoop, which always missed.

Nupur smiled at him, and said, 'what are you doing here karan?'

Startled karan looked up, and started to leave, embarrassed at being caught, but nupur was too quick.

'you don't need to be embarrassed karan!', nupur said softly as karan turned around, his cheeks red.

Karan shrugged mindlessly, and turned to look at the 11thies who were playing tennis. They hadn't noticed as yet.

Relieved karan smiled, 'tu idhar kaise?'

'aise hi. Bahut din ho gaye hai na tujhse baat kiye hue, socha thodi der aake tujhe pareshan karoon!'

'haan yaar, aaj kal to waqt ka pata hi nahi chal raha hai!', said karan as he had some water from his sipper.

'waqt? Mujhe to logon ka hi pata nahi chal raha karan! Everybody's changed so much!'

'i know yaar! Life ek bahut badi kutti hai! Faad di sab ki!'

'hmmm. Sab log kitna badal gaye hai na karan. Ab sam aur gunjan ko hi lele. Pehle to alag rehna ka naam nahi lete the! Aur ab? Aise behave karte hai jaise ek doosre ko jaante bhi na ho!'

'sam aur gunjan? Unko chod! Mayank ko dekh! Pehle kitna innocent sa rehta tha! Aur ab? Ab jis corridor mein gusta hoon, udhar us chudail ke haath mein haath dale baitha hota hai!'

'chudail kaun?', nupur asked in a low whisper.

'tere ko nahi maloom?', karan asked, suddenly realizing that he had said more than he ought to have.

'tu kis ki baat kar raha hai karan?', nupur asked, numbness filling her words.

'kuch nahi nupur! Main to wo us chudail, hostel ki maam ki baat kar raha tha.'

'tu mujhse kuch chupa raha hai na karan?'

'nupur! Tu bhi na ku-'

'mayank ki girlfriend ka naam kya hai karan?', nupurs heart pounded furiously against her chest, as she suddenly realised the truth.

'chod na yaar! Apne ko kya?'

'please karan! Tujhe meri kasam!'

'YAAR YE TU KASAM VAS-'

'karan?'

'isha.', said karan, as nupur dug into the ball with her nails her heart break apparent on her face. She slowly walked upto the huge stairs on the left side of the court and placed her self on the bottom most stair, with extreme delicacy.

She closed her eyes, and felt all the pain that had been stuffed up inside her for the last 2 months suddenly come up. It filled her eyes with misery and hatred.

'tu thik to hai na yaar?', she heard karan ask her, but she kept her eyes closed. She didn't want anyone to see her misery.

'karan please mujhe thodi der akela chod de.'

'lekin nup-'

'please karan.', she said it so softly and so breathlessly, he could not do anything but oblige.

Quietly he turned around, and left the court, mentally kicking himself for the revelation.

Meanwhile nupur felt her nails dig deeper into the basketball. She wanted to scream and shout and break her head on the wall, but then she could do nothing but sit still and let it sink.

A few minutes later, she heard someone clicking his fingers in front of her face.

She looked up to see a guy wearing low hip pants, and a out of the place shirt looking at her with concern.

'You OK?', he asked her, to which she nodded and wiped her tears on her shirt sleeve.

'what happened?', he tried again, to which she simply shook her head.

'exam mein fail huyi hai kya?', he asked this time his hand brushing back the hair which was stuck onto the tears on her face.

'nahi to.', she replied back, in a soft heartbroken accent.

'kissike saath ladai?', she again shook her head.

'boyfriend ne chod diya?'

'nahi.'

'crush kissi aur ke saath commited?', this question made her feel uneasy, she didn't want to share things with some stranger, specially not something so personal.

'naam kya hai us loser ka?'

'wo loser nahi hai', she instantaneously replied to him and then in a softer tone she said, 'mayank.'

'waise mayank jo bhi hai, ek bahut bada loser hi hai! Jo itni sweet ladki ko chodke kisi aur ke saath gum raha hai.', nupur sniffed and nodded in agreement, to which he chuckled.

'by the way im akhil. Akhil chaudhary.', he introduced himself, to which nupur meekly smiled.

'main nupur, nupur bhardwaj.'

'waise nupur, tumhara abhi free period hai kya?'

'hmmmm. Aap kaunse class mein ho?'

'main to 11^th. By the way please tum bhulao, warna mujhe lagega tum kissi aur se baat kar rahi ho', nupur suppressed her smile.

'akhil tum hostel mein rehte ho?'

'hmmm, yahaan tumhaare junior hostel ke paas humaara senior boys hostel hai. 11^th mein tum log bhi aa jaoge wahaan. I mean tu to girls hostel mein hogi, but waise senior section ke hostel mein hoge.'

'mujhe senior naam ki koi cheez pasand nahi hai!'

'kyu?'

'jab se is stupid SENIOR section mein aaye hai na akhil, sab kuch ultha ho gaya hai! Aisa lagta hai ki ye sab ek bahut hi ganda aur darawana sapna hai.', nupur groaned, as akhil looked at her with eyes both grave and serious.

'true.senior section mein aake bahut aake sab kuch badal jaata hai, par you know what? If things are meant to be, then end tak bhaggu sab thik kar deta hai!'

'i guess you're right akhil.'

'im ALWAYS right!'

'you're so conceited!'

'owwww!'

'kya hua?'

'that hurt', he said as he made a puppy face, to which nupur laughed and looked at her knees.

Akhil and nupur sat on the stairs quietly for a few minutes, relishing the pleasure they felt even in the silence, and then smiled meekly at each other. Nupur played with the thumbs of her two fingers, as she felt a strange calm in her heart after a long time.

A few minutes later, akhil got up from the stairs, 'nupur i have to go. Football practice shuru hone ko hai. Ill see you after practice?'

'that reminds me, whats the time?'

'its ummm 4 26.'

'then ill just stay here and wait.'

'you are going to wait for me for 2 hours?'

'ahem! For you? Im going to wait for coach dhawan, hes having the bb team selections.'

'You play basketball?'

'yup, i used to play with bhaiyya all the time!'

Akhil nodded sweetly, and then he waved a bye at her, and ran across to the football field. A few minutes later nupur saw a few people arrive here and there for the selection, looking nervous or scared at the thought of having to show of their skills.

Nervousness was one thing, but scared of being embarrassed was completely gunjans thing, thought nupur as she smirked.

***

Gunjan turned around and saw nupur sitting with purab, in front of turvi and rishabh. They were all celebrating nupurs entry into the basket ball team.

As gunjan looked at them, a strange withdrawnness filled her senses. She somewhere wished she could just rush to nups, hug her and join the celebration, but in the back of the mind, she felt she dint deserve any happiness or any friends.

She deserved solitude, and she would be content with it, thought gunjan, as she buried herself deeper into the chemistry chapter, acids, bases and salts. This was the chapter which carried maximum weightage in the entire portion of chemistry for the midterm examination.

Turning the page, she reached the topic which talked of the ph scale. Half way through the first paragraph, she felt a chalk hit her head. Scowling she turned around, and saw samrat and prakriti, smirking with their eyes fixed on the floor.

Gunjan sighed, and went back to her chemistry book, when she felt a heavier and huger chalk piece hit her ear, with a slash sound causing her a piercing pain on the upper portion of her ear. At a reflex, she covered her ear with her left hand and continued to read the chapter, tears filling her eyes.

A few moments passed when she felt a hand hit her head hard, she turned around and saw ranvijay and samrat sitting there reading a chapter of physics with utmost interest. Gunjan who's eyes were filled with tears, continued to look at her book, her hand still covering her left ear.

But that was not it, again someone from behind her, hit her hard on her head, this time her left ear which her hand covered over, hit the chair, causing her a stabbing pain in her ear, but not wanting to draw attention to herself, she kept mum.

Again and again, chance by chance, samrat and ranvijay kicked at her chair, or smacked her head hard, making sure it caused her enough misery.

Nearly 10 minutes later, when gunjan thought she would faint because of the pain of her left ear, the bell rang.

Instantly people started to pack their bags to leave for the hostel or their homes.

And finally she had peace, peace to close her eyes and forget the pain.

She put her head down on the table and all of one all the buried emotions inside her heart flustered out, she started to sob silently and tears trickled down her cheeks. Her skirt seeped in a few drops of those tears, and the palm of her hand felt moist, too moist. She quickly removed her handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her nose, and sniffed again to make sure there was nothing more to do, and then she picked up her bag to leave.

Half way down the building she felt her left ear ache like hell, she touched the top portion again, and this time something warm and wet touched her hand. She looked at her hand, there was a crimson liquid on it, which was spilling out of her ear.

Her heart started to beat faster, and she started to run towards the medical room.

***

It was nearly 530, by the time gunjan reached her dorm room, where she found nupur waiting for her in anticipation.

'where have u been gunjan? Coaching starts at 6! And tu ab aa-', nupur stopped midsentence as she saw gunjans left ear bandaged.

'kya hua kaan mein?', she asked rather sweetly, as compared to her first statement.

'kuch nahi nons, wo bas aise hi.'

'kisi ne tujhe mara kya gunjan?', nupur asked, now examining gunjans ear over the bandage.

'nahi nupur main to bas-'

'aaj hum coaching nahi jayenge'

'lekin nupur-', gunjan started.

'maine kahaan na gunjan! No matlab NO!', gunjan sighed and slopped onto her bed in her uniform itself.

'kissne maara tujhe gunjan?', asked nupur, as she sat down on dias bed, beside gunjans.

'pata nahi nons.'

'dhekh gunjan, jhoot to tu mujhse bol hi mat!', said nupur,as gunjan hid her face into her pillow.

Nupur slowly got off dias bed, and kept her hand on gunjans head, to which gunjan got up and hugged nupur tight, crying all her worries, sorrows and pain away.

As gunjan cried, she talked too, she talked of all the things that had happened, and everything that would happen. It was mostly about her parents, but in some bits, gunjan talked of samrat too. And when she talked of sam, she cried harder.

'dhekh gunjan, abhi bas 10^th khatam ho jaaye na, phir sab alag alag classes mein honge. Phir tu ek nayee shuruwaad kar sakti hai!', nupur said trying to comfort gunjan.

'nahi nupur. Tu samaj nahi rahi! Papa mamma ka divorce ho raha hai agle hafte! Matlab, mein yahaan nahi rahungi nupur! Mamma mujhe Bangkok leke ja rahi hai, where nannu and nanni live.', a strange eerie silence followed the sudden outburst, as nupur looked like she had just been told, she was going to die.

But before nupur could ask anything else, prerna came into the room and rushed to hug gunjan, which surprised both gunjan and nupur, since sahil was nowhere to be seen.

'prerna tu yahaa?', gunjan asked her, as they broke off the hug.

'oh i just heard from rishabh, what those 3 losers did! Im really sorry jj! Is it hurting really bad?', prerna asked as she examined gunjans ears.

'prerna you know who did this?', nupur asked, interrupting their conversation.

'yup! Tarun saw it!'

'who did this?', nupur asked, now angry as ever.

'samrat, prakriti and rannvijay!', prerna answered and hugged gunjan again.

***

That was long enough wasnt it? Okay so i want honest feedbacks Please.

And ill be concentrating on this one for a while. 😉

Love

Sindhya/Cindy

Originally posted by: Senny

Aww Sindhya,

Sennyyy 🤗 its suchaa giddy feeling talking to u after soooo long! 😳

Good to hear from you after ages.

Samee heree sennzz!! U were missdd.. badd!!

That was such a sad update, but many a times the person whom we love he or she doesn't that makes us sad inevitably but life doesn't stop and so we shouldn't.

Yes,,, thats the whole point... u shudnt give up on it.. juss coz someone broke ur heart.. or u werent loved! u need to move on! and thats what this update signifies 😛

I liked this guy akhil, he was fun hehe.

yeaaa... theres gonna be loads of akhil nupur gunjan scenes.. :D

Hope to see you continuing this soon.

yesss... as i saidd... this ff is going to bee my prime concern in writting for some time 😆

Keep it up!

luuuvv yaa

Originally posted by: aarthi.ramani

nice update ppls PM next one

Nice update Cindy!! U update once in a blue moon..not fair !! cos u write so well...

Actually the way everybody changed, thats what happens in life right, people, change and move on or hold on to old memories. You wrote that beautifully!!

Originally posted by: myownarea

Nice update Cindy!! U update once in a blue moon..not fair !! cos u write so well...

Actually the way everybody changed, thats what happens in life right, people, change and move on or hold on to old memories. You wrote that beautifully!!

Well done!! :)