Although I knew I had a sister, I had not yet seen her. I shared the news with Karthik, expecting him to give the same reply. It was nothing of that sort. He merely nodded and congratulated. There was no other reaction, nothing else. There was something queer in his attitude; a change in his attitude. I had noticed it, but failed to investigate it.
****
The winter vacations had started. Hastily, my father had booked tickets to visit my mother, or rather my sister.
My train journey was rather informative. It pointed to the future. It pointed to a change, I detested. It pointed to the fact that I shall never ever embrace change again.
Simply speaking, I had a sister. Karthik did not. I was a brother. Karthik was not. Lastly, our family had four members. His family had three.
My sister is the most beautiful girl in the world; I would claim anywhere, to anybody. I would perhaps never forget the first time I looked at her. I kept gazing at her face, her eyes closed and deep in sleep.
I was with her for most of the time I stayed at my grandparents’ place. We held her naming ceremony. New Year had dawned, and this time I conveyed my New Year wishes not only to my parents but to my sister as well.
Finally, the day had come; the day of our departure. My sister would be in Delhi. We packed our bags and left for our home. All way through I was excited to be with her. I had become possessive, I felt.
****
Karthik’s family very well knew of the developments in our family. They too were excited. But Karthik was different. I had come to know.
The school reopened after the winter vacations. I just managed to reach school on time. My sister’s presence had delayed me getting ready to school; by the way, I had wanted to take the day off, more specifically, every day off.
I should have listened to my instincts. If I had taken the day off, could that situation have been avoided? Or if Karthik had had a sister, could that situation have been avoided?
I don’t know.
All I knew was a catastrophe took place, something I had never dreamt of. It was perhaps a part of the play God made me an actor of. It was perhaps fate playing a game with me.
Mr. Fate. I don’t just like playing games, if you don’t know.
Will fate listen? Can destiny be changed? What happened had happened.
Karthik’s mere nod and an unenthusiastic congratulatory message the previous month should have set the alarm bells ringing in me. It didn’t. I had to pay the price for it.
Grapevines cannot be avoided within a group. Rumours spread like wild fire, especially amongst us, who were too young to actually think about the truth in other’s words. Whatever others said, we believed. No thinking, nothing.
All types of non-sense were spread about me in the class. What was truth and what were white lies, who were bothered to know?
I was bothered to know. But me being the cynosure of all eyes, would I be told about it or would anybody discuss it with me? No chance. I had become an easy fodder on which grapevines grew. I cannot escape the truth.
What shocked me was the person who had spread these rumours. He had been my fair weather friend, I was disclosed. It was difficult to accept the truth, but truths are always bitter. I had to swallow the pill. No choice.
I had confided in him so much, to be true. He had simply back-stabbed me. He was a stabber, a back stabber. It hurt. But thank God, I had not shown him my chest; else I would have been no more alive.
****
The day’s events haunted me. What had he done to me? I never expected this to happen to me, and certainly not from Karthik.
I could not sleep that night. The rumours had given me a bad boy image, something worse than that actually. I had lost everybody, every one of my friends. I shunned Karthik, he deserved it.
But what will happen to me? No friends in school, nobody to call a friend? I shuddered to think.
How beautiful it was to have a friend! A friend who spoke in my mother tongue; a friend who shared my feelings; a friend who shared my aspirations; a friend who shared my grief. This had all become past.
The days we spoke about anything and everything that was there for our age. The days we watched together our favorite cartoon Popeye, the sailor man. The days we spoke about how and why we fought with each other some day before, what each of us had got for lunch, how India fared in the cricket matches it currently played and why school was indeed for so long?
The days we discussed about how fun holidays were, waking up late in the morning, no studies, only play; the days we showed each other our eagerness for the school to get over. Everything was past.
The present was different; very different, indeed.
How much had changed! For all the happiest moments I spent with Karthik, this was a complete U-turn his behavior had shown me. Every coin has two sides, he too had two, and it was just that I did not recognize it before.
By the way, what big difference would it make? I had lost so much in life; losing friends may just add another event to the list.
I have been a loser throughout. Winning once or twice may be an aberration, which really won’t change your loser’s tag. Will it? As my eyes welled up, I knew I had lost that night’s sleep.
A loser always loses. I have been a loser throughout. What I feared most had come true. Before anything had started, I had lost. I had lost because of changes that had come about in my surroundings, with the people around me.
I wanted to remain the same. I wanted everybody to remain the same. I wanted time to be stand-still. I did not want change as it gave me losses. I wanted modification, not change.
I took a vow to never speak to Karthik again and to mind my own business in future. I had become a loner in school.
Change: The word that was my new enemy.