Chapter 38: It Was Your Idea

“Wow, he’s used the dare so appropriately!” Janya exclaimed.

“How can you be so shameless?” Aanya laughed, shaking with mirth as she packed her belongings. “Weren’t you criticising his choice for a dare just now?”

“Ah, you know how pricey the special is. But it’s so tasty too! So, if that spiky-haired idiot isn’t hoarding the food for just the boys, it’s all good! Food comes before anything else, Aanya! Got it?”

“Yeah, yeah, everything is as you say.” The black-haired girl shook her head as she smiled.

“Hey, he’s calling us.” Farzeen tugged on Janya’s arm.

As the girls looked over, they saw Harshil waving his hand at them enthusiastically.

“COME ON!” He yelled.

“COMING!” Janya yelled back as she pulled her friends towards the group of boys who were almost at the door of the classroom.

Kamal sir wasn’t visible. He had left.

*****

“Probably had come to terms that he would soon have an almost empty wallet.” Cabir guffawed recalling how their teacher had frozen for a few seconds before striding briskly out of the classroom.

“I feel bad for the guy. Not only for the food, but for the trick Harshil pulled later in the day.” Jeet laughed, “The next day, when that braggart received the summons, he was so surprised. But his face when he came back! A sight to behold!”

“…Ugh.” Cabir groaned, “I just remembered something.”

“What?” Jatin raised an eyebrow.

“The week’s specials were always scheduled for Friday, remember? That was the only day we could get the specials! That reminded me…we had to go to school on the Saturdays too! The first and third Saturdays of the month were working days in D. A. Intl. School. Even remembering that we had school on a Saturday tires me out.”

“Yeah, it was kinda annoying. But you know? They changed the rules the year after our batch passed out. A junior told me. All Saturdays became off days.” Jatin mentioned as he bit into a donut.

“Well, we escaped that torture for the last two years though.” Aakash let out a soft chuckle.

“What do you mean?”

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“Oh, yeah! Since we were talking about D. A. Intl., it totally slipped my mind! Aakash, Aanya and I transferred schools, remember? Our new school had only five working days. Sat and Sun were off!” Cabir raised his hand towards Aakash who genially returned the high-five.

“Okay, okay. It’s just one day of rest from a long time ago. No need to flex.” Jeet shrugged.

“Just think how much those ‘one’ days add up to in total.” Cabir leaned back into his chair and snorted.

“Well, whatever the case, the fact remains that you experienced the torture of school on the weekends with us till 10th.” Jatin retorted.

“Conversely, we escaped it for two years while you did not.” Aakash poked fun at his two old friends as he joined in with a grin.

“Yeah. We managed to escape from both – schools on Saturdays and Kamal sir – when we transferred.” Cabir beamed.

“Dude, Kamal sir didn’t teach the senior secondary classes. He only taught up until Class 10th. Did you forget?” Jatin shrugged.

“Oh, yeah. There’s that.” Cabir nodded in agreement.

“Talking about Kamal sir…I have no idea how Harshil had the guts to pull the stunt that he did…man, was sir angry…” Jeet trailed off, an awed expression appearing on his face.

“We had board exams that year and the internals which could affect our final scores were all done, so he probably didn’t mind pissing off the teacher he didn’t like.” Jatin said.

“Or it was his normal devil-may-care attitude. Rash bravado and being a prankster at heart are Harshil’s defining qualities after all.” Aakash mused.

“…hmm. You’re prolly right. He never thought about the consequences as such, I guess.” Jatin nodded.

“Not that he got punished anyway.” Jeet shook his head incredulously, “You’d think that after typing a proposal for a co-ed trip to Goa, he’d name himself as the proposer but instead, that guy actually put Kamal Sir’s name as the one who had put forth the proposal.”

“And that’s not all. He even got a class list and had everyone sign it after which he stapled it to the typed proposal! We just knew that he was asking everyone to sign for the proposal but since only his name would go as the one who suggested it, we knew that he would have to meet the vice princi. Who knew that he’d throw Kamal sir under the bus!” Cabir smacked his palms together.

“Sir was called just as class began; he came back later with such a black face! I still remember that when he asked Harshil that why he’d put his name as the one who proposed the idea rather than his own, the spiky-haired asshole made that face that makes you want to punch him!”

Jeet rolled his eyes, “He had the gall to say, “Sir, it was your idea; the co-ed trip to Goa. How could I bring it up in my name? That’d be unfair to you!” Well, that’s not his exact words…” Jeet ran his fingers through his hair, “But roughly around that.”

“Obviously.” Cabir rolled his eyes, “How would you remember the exact words? We get it, duffer. This isn’t something you explain.”

Jeet glared at him.

“That aside,” Aakash snapped his fingers, “The best part was when sir dragged Harshil to the vice princi to make him confess. The guy didn’t even deny it! He just straight up said that Kamal sir gave him a dare so he did it but since the Goa trip was sir’s idea, he didn’t want to take sir’s credit…”

Aakash trailed off shaking his head, “Well, that’s what he told us at least, But seriously…vice-principal Ma’am was even more pissed at Kamal sir for wasting everyone’s times with games. I have no idea how that troublemaker always had such a good rapport with the teachers. He almost never got scolded!”

“That’s coz he hardly ever got caught carrying out his pranks.” Cabir shrugged, sipping a smoothie.

“And he was good at acting all innocent.” Jatin snorted.

“Two-faced bastard.” Jeet spat out.

Sudden silence.

Then all four of them burst into laughter.

For some reason, it was quite fun insulting their old pal behind his back!