Trrrng
..Trrng.
Thus rang the phone on the momentous day at the ungodly hour(for me)
at 7:30 in the morning. I dragged myself out of bed to answer the
phone little knowing that I was about to receive a shock. I picked
up the phone.
"Hello", I said sleepily into the phone.
"Hi",said my friend, "the results have been announced".
I was too stunned to speak. What a horrible way to begin a day.
"Stop talking rubbish", came my response a few seconds after
the initial shock ,"I don't like such things early in the morning".
"I am not joking!, my friend protested indignantly, "its
true and what's more, I can't seem to find my Roll no. in the paper.
What's yours, I'll check".
Now, I was about to shift into a new house, so for the past week I
wasn't receiving the newspaper at home. So naturally, I was anxious
to know about my result. I was not sure whether I would pass or not
in my first year engineering exams so I was naturally a bit apprehensive
and quite pessimistic about my results. Still, I gave him my roll
no..,50236. "It's there, total:750.",he said.
That means that I had passed in all my subjects. My roll no. was in
the newspaper. I couldn't believe my ears.
After commiserating with him and extending my sympathy to my friend
who hadn't managed to pass, I put down the phone and started to gather
my thoughts. I still didn't believe that I had passed. For all I knew,
maybe my friend had seen someone else's number or maybe he was pulling
my leg or maybe
a thousand maybes were floating about in my
head. The only way I could clear my doubts was to see a newspaper
and see my roll no. in black and white in the newspaper. I had to
be careful here. If I could not find my name in the paper and my mother
came to know of it, I would have some explaining to do. So I decided
to first check if my roll no. was there and then, if it was present,
I would triumphantly tell my mother that I had done well in the exams.
Typical behavior of a nervous student and human being.
So, armed with a definite plan of action, I moved to the hall from
my room. I unlatched the door.
"Where are you going?" asked my mother.
I had to be cool here and act as if nothing was wrong or she would
suspect something. "Just going downstairs to get the newspaper",
I replied with what I thought was perfect coolness and nonchalance.
"Have the results come?" asked my mother immediately.
So much for my coolness and nonchalance. I couldn't even hide a simple
fact from my mother. How was I going to survive another 3 years in
engineering? I had to admit the fact now that there was a direct question.
"Yeah, it just came today", I replied trying not to look
too ruffled. Yup, I was still in control. "Did you pass"?
This was getting tough. I just shrugged, put on a vague expression
and said that I didn't know and that I was just going to check and
would just borrow the newspapers from downstairs and then I practically
leaped down the stairs. Now that my mother was waiting upstairs, I
was praying to all the gods that I really had passed or the alternative
was too scary for me to speculate on. I rang the bell downstairs and
glanced upstairs where I saw that my father and mother were now standing
out on the balcony waiting for me to tell them my results. I borrowed
the paper with the intention to go upstairs and look up my roll no.
but once I had the paper in my hands, I couldn't do it. I had to check
my result there and then. I rested the newspaper on the seat of my
two-wheeler and opened the result page and began searching for my
number.
50236
..50236, I kept mumbling, searching for my results.
My number had to be there. It just had to be there. I kept looking
for it till I realized that I was looking in the wrong column and
college. "Cool down, boy", I told myself. "Go about
it in an organized manner". So I decided to go about it coolly.
I located my college and went through it column by column.
"Have you passed?" asked my sister who was waiting for her
school auto. I replied with quite a bit of tenseness that I could
not locate the number. I kept searching. There it was..50236.Whew!!!
What a relief. I checked again whether it was 50236 or 50238. Confirming
that it was my number, I shouted to my parents(the next door building
tenants would have heard it too) that I had passed. I then went upstairs
with a spring in my steps and my heart considerably lighter. What
a beautiful way to start the day!
to be continued.