Engineering Love Chapter 1 : Part V

I stood lifelessly on the bed thinking if there was any possibility of turning this around. A morbid clock on the wall hinted that I'd been sleeping for four hours. If a child were unconscious for four hours in school, the authorities would call up the parents, parents of parents, next to kin and the neighbors, and not necessarily in the same order. Colleges were more casual about it. No phone calls really. They were glad though that I'd woken up. 

The only possible silver lining out of the whole fiasco though was that there were no more classes to attend for the day. It was time to go straight back home. I was relieved that the ignominy of facing all any object living or dead, who/which saw me faint in the class, was avoided. 

With a hurried sense of unbelongingness to the clinic, I picked up my bag, gave a conceited glance to the nurse and walked straight out. No pleasantries exchanged.

The walk back to the metro station seemed much longer than the walk in. I had never earlier been in a position to sympathize with myself this much. Never had I felt so deranged about how I was supposed to face people the next day. As much I felt urge to talk to somebody about it, I also felt the helplessness of having only Sumit to hear me out. I cannot talk to him about it - I said to myself. I knew he would just rub it in further.

I walked with my head down, kicking the minutest stone on my way. I was conscious that she still lingered in my neural networks.

'Saswati' - I recalled. Now that I knew the name, I couldn't but help build a perception about her. 

She belonged to a middle class family. Her dad must be a mid level employee in some government organization. Mom - a teacher in a government school. She must one of the three daughters that the family has. She's perhaps the eldest, even the brightest. And now that she's made it to NSIT, she's the one last hope of her parents that she earns her dowry all by herself. Never had she managed to strike an independent conversation with a member of the opposite sex, unless it was strictly academic.

I had her all scoped out. At least I thought I did. Although this was all mindless extrapolation. I truly wanted to believe that there was more to her than that. For all I knew she could've been a sex goddess put simply. All boys like to think of an alternate persona of the women they persistently think about. It's an extremely entertaining possibility to believe that there's more to a girl that meets the eye.

And while I was still imagining the extraordinary and in all probability, the improbable, a familiar female voice called out from behind - 'Hey, aren't we in the same class?' 

Engineering Love Chapter 1 : Part IV

The very next moment a dark, geeky looking man entered swiftly into the classroom. Barely two steps inside, he turned back and closed the door. He shouted from the inside - 'Those who were standing outside shall remain outside for the rest of my class'. I would have loved to see their expressions, but alas I was inside. My sense of pride reinvigorated me.

'I am Professor B.K. Mishra and I will teach you mathematics. Now if everybody can stand up and introduce themselves. I would like to know your name, the city you hail from, and your marks in mathematics in the board exam.'  You could see the curiosity in his eyes. He was eager to form a judgement. Eager to pick the eagles.

He pointed to the only girl he could find sitting in the classroom - ' We can start from you'. The girl, caught a little off guard, stood up - 'Yes sir. Okay sir. Saswati. Delhi. 99.' The professor looked satisfied. She'd set the format for everybody. It was rather convenient blurting out three things in three words, that you wouldn't not know about yourself unless you were retarded. 

The class introduced themselves one after the other, till it finally came to me. Although it was just three words, I was a bit nervous. After all this was my first formal introduction in any place of significance. Opinions were being formed. May be I was just over thinking. I put myself together to stand up and introduce myself.

A body like mine made standing up look like a conspicuous piece of exercise. By the time I managed to transfer my weight from the chair to my feet, I had already won the pinching glare of the entire class. Of all the faces, there was one that unnerved me the most. She looked right at me, expressionless. May be she didn't recollect. Or may be she did.

My throat dried up. Infinite parallel thoughts started running inside my head. So consumed I was by my embarrassment that I totally forgot the reason for which I stood up in the first place. The professor looked at me with keen eyes.

I recollected only so much when I woke up in the medical room. I could overhear some students talking about the really fat guy who fainted in class today. Okay, at least everybody knew me now - I said to myself.