6.The New Epicenter

The next week went dull. I found a few friends at the hostel mess hall, who shared similar interests. It became a hot topic, when the news of a 1st year guy proposing a girl of his class came out.

It might not sound too arousing, but then amongst us first years it stirred an interest more like the 9/11 or the moon landing conspiracy. A guy who had got the girl’s number had sent her a sms “I love u”.

For an entire week talks on this topic never ceased. Various rumors of the two being friends right from school, being neighbors et al popped up. 

Not just my kind of girls, everyone participated in these gossips. Even Divya, who had almost stopped talking to me since the 1st day, when I told her about the ‘red shirt’, asked me “Do you know; who the girl is?” With a smile I replied, “I don’t know, but she must be damn lucky” she gave another scandalizing look, and turned back.

One by one our faculty started issuing the assessment papers. I had scored above average in the 1st three subjects. Whenever a teacher distributed the papers the classroom looked like a stock exchange office at market opening.

People peeking into others’ papers; comparing their marks with expected toppers; satisfying themselves with words like, ‘Oh Deepak has himself got only 15 and no regrets on me getting 12’. But the feeling of being hurt was obvious in their tone.

Then the magic happened, when our math lecturer announced that Prashant and Elvia got 25 on 25. As soon as she left the class, girls besieged me.

In the break, my paper was flying across the class. I didn’t know what they were looking for! The secret formulae!! Or Mistakes!!! 

In the evening Divya came to me “How did you do that?” I just smiled.