A Brown, Crinkled Leaf
| Posted in Brown Leaf, Fiction, Science, short story, Tuitions | Posted on 8:40 PM
[So.. Shreeparna Chatterjee sent me her short story and asked me to write a... MALE perspective to her story. And... I did. :D]
Part of my quilt was lying on the floor. The part that wasn't, covered all but the upper portion of my back. My drowsy, drooping eyes searched for the digital clock that lay on the side-table beside my bed. The mundane screen read 8:58.
Dammit.
9 o' clock.
Sunday.
Tuition time.
The van took me to the teacher's place by 9:30 sharp. Sometimes, the monotony of the whole situation just got to me. It wasn't one of those days, though. I reached the class, which in fact was our teacher's living room(the one on the ground floor; she lived in the first) re-decorated and re-furnished to resemble a classroom. She never really succeeded in passing it off as a classroom, but she taught and I studied - I guess that accounts for something.
Around her elliptical table, that could support at most six people, I never sat directly facing her. If that ever happened to be, I’d excuse myself to use her washroom, and while I was gone, one of the more sincere and devout students would invariably come and replace me. I’d done it quite a number of times just to get my seat changed, too. Nerds are awesome.
Today was different. From the moment I’d stepped in the class in my leather jacket with a messenger’s bag slung over my shoulders, something just didn’t feel right. First of all, our teacher wasn’t there, and why that wasn’t usual was because she’d always portrayed herself to one of those people with principles to whom punctuality was as necessary as regular intake of oxygen. To top that off, I was the only one in class at the moment, and that was unusual because contrary to the nature of my teacher, I was one of those people without principles to whom punctuality was as unnecessary and troublesome as pests were to farms.
I waited for somebody to come and enlighten me as I took my seat. The nipping cold outside couldn’t be felt as much inside the room, courtesy of the one who was adored more than our teacher herself - the heater. So, I took off my jacket and placed it on my lap, revealing my otherwise hidden checked shirt that I despised. Had I more time on my hands earlier this morning, I’d have chosen for myself something better looking than a plain red-white-and-blue checked shirt. It didn’t matter to me much though. Who cares about getting dressed for tuition anyway?
Before I could hold on that thought, it left my mind abruptly, as various formulae often tended to.
After all, she’d stepped in.
Sometimes, the cheesier version of the usually stingy, bitchy, unbothered, dripping-with-acidic-sarcasm self of mine came out. And she was always the reason. Always.
When she entered the class, she stood at the door and sighed. She was standing against a background that was lit up by the morning light and caressed by beautiful green trees. The sharp contrast that the scene offered got imprinted on my mind.
Her heart shaped face, which had a silent to look to itself, seemed to be magnified by her glasses, the frames of which were dark, shiny black, and her overall appearance seemed to be acknowledged by her barely loud sense of dressing. Her hair was tied in a small little bun behind her head, and on her face and ears fell long, slender bangs. Cute. I started biting my pen in anxiety, because even though I knew I could talk to her normally like a sane person, I knew deep down that I wasn't quite as I appeared to be when I did. I looked at her again, and in her glasses I could see myself, and if I looked harder, maybe even in her eyes.
She walked to the table, her motion as smooth and uninterrupted as that of a river, and sat down diagonally towards me. As she took her books out, I passed her a smile that to my dismay went unnoticed. She then proceeded to start solving some random questions from the science book. Random to me at least. I gave her a look that, had it been noticed would've clearly conveyed to her how unappreciative I was of the fact that she had enough sincerity in her to solve questions even in the absence of a teacher. And had she cared enough to look a bit more carefully, she'd have understood that it wasn't just disproval - it was respect.
As she continued to scribble in her notebook, I noticed something on her left shoulder: A brown, crinkled leaf. I waited patiently for it to fall gently off her shoulder, and when it didn't, I told her that she had something over her shoulder. She turned her head excitedly to where she thought the leaf was, but ended up turning towards the wrong side. I laughed at her innocent stupidity and exclaimed, 'No! The other shoulder!' She noticed the leaf on her other shoulder and brushed it off with an elegant movement of her hand. Before she went back to exercising her brain on random questions, she looked at her watch. Then she realized with a shock that our teacher wasn't in our class yet. She might've noticed the fact that it was just the two of us in the class too, but I couldn't really go that deep into her mind.
Part of my quilt was lying on the floor. The part that wasn't, covered all but the upper portion of my back. My drowsy, drooping eyes searched for the digital clock that lay on the side-table beside my bed. The mundane screen read 8:58.
Dammit.
9 o' clock.
Sunday.
Tuition time.
* * *
The van reached on time. As usual. I did too. The van took me to the teacher's place by 9:30 sharp. Sometimes, the monotony of the whole situation just got to me. It wasn't one of those days, though. I reached the class, which in fact was our teacher's living room(the one on the ground floor; she lived in the first) re-decorated and re-furnished to resemble a classroom. She never really succeeded in passing it off as a classroom, but she taught and I studied - I guess that accounts for something.
Around her elliptical table, that could support at most six people, I never sat directly facing her. If that ever happened to be, I’d excuse myself to use her washroom, and while I was gone, one of the more sincere and devout students would invariably come and replace me. I’d done it quite a number of times just to get my seat changed, too. Nerds are awesome.
Today was different. From the moment I’d stepped in the class in my leather jacket with a messenger’s bag slung over my shoulders, something just didn’t feel right. First of all, our teacher wasn’t there, and why that wasn’t usual was because she’d always portrayed herself to one of those people with principles to whom punctuality was as necessary as regular intake of oxygen. To top that off, I was the only one in class at the moment, and that was unusual because contrary to the nature of my teacher, I was one of those people without principles to whom punctuality was as unnecessary and troublesome as pests were to farms.
I waited for somebody to come and enlighten me as I took my seat. The nipping cold outside couldn’t be felt as much inside the room, courtesy of the one who was adored more than our teacher herself - the heater. So, I took off my jacket and placed it on my lap, revealing my otherwise hidden checked shirt that I despised. Had I more time on my hands earlier this morning, I’d have chosen for myself something better looking than a plain red-white-and-blue checked shirt. It didn’t matter to me much though. Who cares about getting dressed for tuition anyway?
Before I could hold on that thought, it left my mind abruptly, as various formulae often tended to.
After all, she’d stepped in.
Sometimes, the cheesier version of the usually stingy, bitchy, unbothered, dripping-with-acidic-sarcasm self of mine came out. And she was always the reason. Always.
When she entered the class, she stood at the door and sighed. She was standing against a background that was lit up by the morning light and caressed by beautiful green trees. The sharp contrast that the scene offered got imprinted on my mind.
Her heart shaped face, which had a silent to look to itself, seemed to be magnified by her glasses, the frames of which were dark, shiny black, and her overall appearance seemed to be acknowledged by her barely loud sense of dressing. Her hair was tied in a small little bun behind her head, and on her face and ears fell long, slender bangs. Cute. I started biting my pen in anxiety, because even though I knew I could talk to her normally like a sane person, I knew deep down that I wasn't quite as I appeared to be when I did. I looked at her again, and in her glasses I could see myself, and if I looked harder, maybe even in her eyes.
She walked to the table, her motion as smooth and uninterrupted as that of a river, and sat down diagonally towards me. As she took her books out, I passed her a smile that to my dismay went unnoticed. She then proceeded to start solving some random questions from the science book. Random to me at least. I gave her a look that, had it been noticed would've clearly conveyed to her how unappreciative I was of the fact that she had enough sincerity in her to solve questions even in the absence of a teacher. And had she cared enough to look a bit more carefully, she'd have understood that it wasn't just disproval - it was respect.
As she continued to scribble in her notebook, I noticed something on her left shoulder: A brown, crinkled leaf. I waited patiently for it to fall gently off her shoulder, and when it didn't, I told her that she had something over her shoulder. She turned her head excitedly to where she thought the leaf was, but ended up turning towards the wrong side. I laughed at her innocent stupidity and exclaimed, 'No! The other shoulder!' She noticed the leaf on her other shoulder and brushed it off with an elegant movement of her hand. Before she went back to exercising her brain on random questions, she looked at her watch. Then she realized with a shock that our teacher wasn't in our class yet. She might've noticed the fact that it was just the two of us in the class too, but I couldn't really go that deep into her mind.
'I think I should call ma'am,' she said. The tone of her voice when she spoke was mildly suggestive of the fact that she was either stating or asking. But the whimsical idiot in me took it to be a question and said, 'Sure.' I was almost flabbergasted when the words left my mouth - as did she the room - because I was definitely sure it wasn't what I wanted to say. For all I care, 'Sure, go on and end the only few moments that we'll ever share together,' or, 'Yeah, why not, it's getting so lonely without a teacher anyway,' would've been more conducive in proving my point, but I let it be.
She came back in a jiffy - or that was what it felt like because I was thinking of her all this while - and, looking down at her converse shoes, said, 'Ma'am's not going to take class today'. I sighed. All the energy that I'd lost thinking about nothing and everything(about her) in particular came back to me as soon as she'd uttered those words. Then, I said, 'Well, isn't that a relief?'
It might've been just me, but I guess I saw her nodding.
I took my bag and scurried out of the class. Then, the wee bit of politeness that was still left in me urged me to ask her if she was going to come. So I went back to the door of the class, and saw her arranging her books. As I was almost about to utter something, she bent down and picked up the brown leaf that she'd earlier brushed off. A frown formed on my face. Then, she placed it carefully in her science book. The frown deepened. Fearing she'd see me staring at her and take me for some pervert, I yelled out to her, 'Are you coming along?'
'Yeah, I'll be out in a minute,' she replied.
As I was left to my thoughts in the following moments, I wondered about why she'd done what she'd done. Pondered, rather.
Did she really put that leaf in her science book? Why? Was it really that... meaningful to her? Or memorable?
Or was I being obstinate as usual, in thinking that she actually cared about it?
I looked at her again. She came out of the class. We walked outside together.
Maybe, just this once, I was right.
Maybe.
She came back in a jiffy - or that was what it felt like because I was thinking of her all this while - and, looking down at her converse shoes, said, 'Ma'am's not going to take class today'. I sighed. All the energy that I'd lost thinking about nothing and everything(about her) in particular came back to me as soon as she'd uttered those words. Then, I said, 'Well, isn't that a relief?'
It might've been just me, but I guess I saw her nodding.
I took my bag and scurried out of the class. Then, the wee bit of politeness that was still left in me urged me to ask her if she was going to come. So I went back to the door of the class, and saw her arranging her books. As I was almost about to utter something, she bent down and picked up the brown leaf that she'd earlier brushed off. A frown formed on my face. Then, she placed it carefully in her science book. The frown deepened. Fearing she'd see me staring at her and take me for some pervert, I yelled out to her, 'Are you coming along?'
'Yeah, I'll be out in a minute,' she replied.
As I was left to my thoughts in the following moments, I wondered about why she'd done what she'd done. Pondered, rather.
Did she really put that leaf in her science book? Why? Was it really that... meaningful to her? Or memorable?
Or was I being obstinate as usual, in thinking that she actually cared about it?
I looked at her again. She came out of the class. We walked outside together.
Maybe, just this once, I was right.
Maybe.
Just this once...
* * * 
this is so awsome
Bitch! this was good!! To be honest, if you want some critique-- avoid using certain cliched preachy stuff like "she removed it with her slender arms" or whatever. .cause the theme was a lil.. contemporary? So you have to be very careful with the kind of vocabulary that blends in, you know what I mean?
but hey that was just an opinion, please go ahead with what You feel is right.
I really loved the ending. It was something that made me smile :)
good work!