Chapter 10 – Windfall
“Ugh! I am never going to touch this book again! It’s so full of gore and violence” Chavi remarked as she bookmarked Lasting Fondness while the three girls waited in the school infirmary where Pawan was treated for a fractured elbow by the school doctor and a cast was placed and a sedative had been injected to relieve Pawan of the agonizing pain for a while.
“Shh” said the nurse in the infirmary with the customary finger on the lips and bulged out eyes that were supposed to intimidate the noise maker.
“Oops, sorry” said Chavi just as Praneethi giggled and Disha looked up at Chavi with a downcast face sitting beside injured Pawan.
“First the horse incident and now this, my parents are surely going to pull me out of this school!” frowned Disha.
“Mine too maybe” said a now concerned Praneethi.
“I guess many of the parents will be genuinely concerned, it’s not like they do not love us, it’s just that most of us are here because there were no good schools back at in our towns and villages” Disha explained.
“But I am in the middle of my last year and no school will accept me now, if my parents take me out now, I will lose an entire year” Disha worried.
“And so will all of us if this issue gets any bigger, we must find out who’s behind all this” told Chavi.
“Shhh” the shhh had gotten longer this time as the girls were fast getting into a debate mode.
“Aall of yew jest go out nou or I will caal yewr prinncy” warned the nurse.
“Ok! Ok! We are sorry!” Praneethi apologized to the nurse.
“mmm…mmm…” Pawan was coming to his self as the effects of the sedative were wearing off slowly.
“Pawan! Can you hear me?” Disha called out to Pawan who was like her brother.
“Doon’t disterb him Disha, I will caal the Doctor nou” went off the nurse to alert the resident doctor.
“How do you feel Pawan” Dr. Ram Shankar walked in with Aadarsh Prasad
“It still hurts” Pawan replied
“ha ha; of course it will my boy, I will write down some pain killers for you which must keep the pain down for a few days”
“How did this happen? Who is responsible?” asked Aadarsh Prasad.
“We don’t know Sir, it was a loose tile which hit from above” Chavi answered cutting short of giving out more details as Praneethi’s and her eyes met.
“Had it not been for Chavi, the tile would have hit Pawan straight in the head” Disha wore a worried look on her face.
“Good work indeed, Chavi” said Aadarsh Prasad and his statement had no special emotion attached towards it. Chavi responded in silence. It was no time for her to feel happy while her friend lay in pain.
“You must inform his parents Mr. Prasad” said Dr. Ram Shankar
“I already have, his dad will be here by tomorrow afternoon. God knows what will happen with this school” grumbled Aadarsh Prasad.
“Is he going to take you away Pawan?” asked a concerned Chavi.
“Don’t know yaar, may be for a while, who knows” replied a still drowsy Pawan.
“That’s enough girls, better leave him alone for a while” Aadarsh said tersely.
Even as the girls turned away from Pawan’s bed in the infirmary, they saw Aadarsh covering the portable partition blocking their view from Pawan.
“I saw Peeya on the 3rd floor; so did Chavi! Tell her” Praneethi said tensely to Disha
“Yes, I think I saw her too” Chavi agreed
“What are you girls talking about, when did you see her” asked Disha to find Chavi and Praneethi were exchanging glances again.
“It was when Pawan got his hand fractured, we saw Peeya on the 3rd floor corridor from where the tile fell. We think she dropped it on purpose” Praneethi told Disha about their suspicion.
“She wouldn’t dare to!” Disha was furious.
“We are not sure Disha, we just saw her walk away fast from that spot, and it could have been just a coincidence. It could have been really an accident” Chavi tried to be more reasonable and unbiased.
“We must complain this matter to Princi, he will enquire about it. It is wrong to hide things” Disha’s anger was growing by the second.
“No Di, he won’t believe us, they never do, we must catch her red handed, we must…” Praneethi paused just as the trio saw Peeya standing in front of them with a face so sad that it would have stopped the earth from turning.
“Please listen to me, I have something to tell” Peeya’s tone and behavior had changed so drastically that all the three were taken aback and stood their ground completely speechless, may be in anticipation of what she had to say.
Back at the infirmary, Aadarsh Prasad had completely disregarded Dr. Ram Shankar’s words to allow Pawan much needed rest. Pawan was hurt and the sedatives were making him drowsy. He was running a light fever and he was in no position to be up and sitting for a barrage of questions.
“Mr. Prasad, you must let him rest, now is not the time to ask questions, please” requested the concerned resident doctor.
“Let me do my work Doctor, I did not interfere in yours, I expect the same for me” Aadarsh cut the doctor off rudely.
“His father is coming here tomorrow and I do not want him to be bad mouthing the school and accusing us of harassing his boy here” the doctor tried to warn the callous principal.
“There will not be a school left for anybody to bad mouth about!” Prasad barked at the shocked doctor.
“Do whatever you wish, I am not going to sit and take this load of crap from you” the doctor left the scene in a fit of rage.
“Tell me Pawan, what were you doing in the internet room? What notes were you making? Where have you kept them? No use lying, I know what pages you were browsing” Aadarsh threatened an injured Pawan.
Pawan was confused. He had made sure that no one saw him do what he was doing and he had shut down the browser immediately after he left the internet room.
“I was just going through the online encyclopaedia Sir, I.. I was just noting down some specifications of a sports car I like” Pawan tried to bluff his way out.
“I am asking you one last time. Your father is coming tomorrow and he will meet me before he will see you. Do you want your father to feel ashamed of you? Trust me, he will hear things from me about you, that he will not be very proud of!” Aadarsh Prasad’s threats were tasteless and unbecoming of his position and stature.
“But Sir, what did I do?” Pawan was almost in tears. He could not believe that his good run in the school would take a U turn in just one afternoon. First a broken hand and next a broken image. It was too much for the young ninth grader to digest.
“I will tell your father what you do, always hanging out with those three girls, I understand your test results have not been all that great this time. Your father can make out the rest of the story, I need not even elaborate” Aadarsh was keen on making Pawan’s life miserable.
Pawan broke easy; a threat of humiliating him in front of his father was just too heavy for him. He divulged everything that the foursome thought about the omens and Peeya and were investigating about her.
“Do you kids come here to study or do police business!” thundered Aadarsh Prasad. The foxy man had noticed that Pawan was suspiciously observing the monitor for a long time and murmuring to himself and making harried notes on his scribbling pad. The test was long over and the next one was a long time from now.
“You boy are not going to hang out with those girls any more, I warn you” Aadarsh wore an angry face and had a finger pointed at Pawan’s face. It was extremely intimidating.
“And as for that nosy girl, She will be punished” Aadarshed promised himself and he had Chavi in his mind.
“It’s not safe here, shall we all go to the auditorium” Peeya asked the gawking girls.
“We have classes now, we can’t bunk them!” Disha corrected Peeya.
“Ok, but we have to meet later, Chavi, meet me at the room this evening, I will tell you when and where to meet” Peeya had taken Chavi’s name for the first time and without contempt and all Chavi could do was nod her head in agreement and total disbelief.
The post lunch session was most difficult for all five of them Pawan, Peeya, Praneethi, Disha and Chavi.
But nevertheless, their investigation was about to get a supreme boost as their assumed nemesis Peeya was willing to talk to them or was it just one of her other plots to subjugate them. It was definitely a windfall of events at ACE that afternoon and new hues and colours were brought to the fore. The dust covering the truth would soon be unsettled.