The tension from the test still lingered in the academy. Everyone knew cheating had happened, but no one knew who would be dragged into it next. Conversations were quieter than usual, laughs didn't last as long, and people seemed more watchful than before.
What surprised me more was who had been involved. Batch 1 — the so-called "elite" group — wasn't untouched. Even during the test, I had overheard a few of them whispering answers and discussing questions as if it was nothing. I remember feeling confused even then.
It was only the second test of 12th grade, and things had already turned messy.
At the same time, I was still stuck on something else entirely. I couldn't get over the fact that my sixth sense's prediction had gone right once again. Piyush and Tejas had even asked me for a party after I crossed the 100-mark score for only the second time in six months. A physics question had errors, which gave us four bonus marks, and Satyam sir had included six questions from nomenclature — a chapter that hadn't even been taught.
It was strange how both things existed together — the tension around me, and me being caught up in my own small win.
The first lecture somehow passed, but the second one — Sameer sir's — had everyone on edge. Unfortunately, or maybe deliberately on his part, it was scheduled in Classroom 9, the same room where the cheating had happened the previous day.
As I walked in, I felt a strange uneasiness. My eyes instinctively went to the spot where I had been sitting the day before. I took the fourth bench with Ramesh while Achintya, Naira and Sanjana J took the seats behind us, their gossips standing out from the usual classroom hum.
Every time I heard Naira speak, I didn't turn back, but I knew she was there.
It hadn't always been like that.
The first time I had actually sat beside her had been a week earlier, after a random seating shuffle. Third bench. Naira beside me, and Sanjana J near the wall. From the outside, it must have looked completely ordinary — just three students sharing space.
"Are you comfortable?" I had asked her, more out of habit than anything else.
Naira nodded and asked me the same, smiling lightly.
I laughed it off, saying it felt like we were sitting in a crowded local train.
"Haan?" she leaned in, that same smile still there.
I repeated it, a little clearer this time, and she kept looking at me as her smile widened, as if trying to catch both the words and the meaning behind them. For a moment, I wasn't even sure if she had fully understood it — but she smiled anyway.
What stayed with me more was what followed. With that same ease, she pointed out that I was shaking my leg and asked if I was anxious, and I brushed it off, telling her it was just a habit.
In the present, Sameer Sir's arrival signaled the start of the inquiry into the previous day's incident. After gauging the class's reaction to the difficulty level, he turned his attention to the front-benchers. Between his sharp warnings and the mention of CCTV footage, the room fell into a heavy silence.
Nobody spoke after that.
At one point, Sanjana leaned forward and asked how we would be travelling for the practicals the next day. I replied briefly, my attention still fixed on the board.
The silence returned almost immediately, with one seeming to break it.
I had a question of my own — about the board-level test pattern — but asking it felt harder than it should have. With Sameer Sir's eyes fixed on his iPad, I went over the words in my head more than once before finally saying them out loud.
He responded, and for a moment, it felt like things might return to normal.
But then, from behind, I heard a soft whisper.
I turned slightly.
"Will all the subjects be together?" Naira asked softly, glancing at Sanjana, her voice low enough not to disturb the room.
A moment later, both of them looked at me.
"Puch na sir se?" she said quietly, giving a small gesture in my direction.
I was not sure if it was the first time I saw her eyes blink so fast.
For a second, I hesitated. I wasn't sure why I had been chosen as the messenger. But I asked anyway. Speaking up had never really been difficult for me, even in a room that had fallen into complete silence. Maybe she had noticed that — the way I had asked my own doubt without holding back — and that was why she chose me.
Sir answered her question as well, mentioning that we'll receive the instructions soon.
And for some reason, that moment stayed with me — maybe because, without really noticing when it had started, I had begun paying a little more attention to her presence in the room. I didn't know it then, but I would end up being the one she would turn to whenever she had something to ask.
* * * * * * * *
Those few days of practicals served as a perfect break between the tension of the ongoing chemistry game and the weekly tests. The first day began with a compromise. By the time I typed out a message in the organic chemistry group saying I wouldn't be able to attend the doubt session, nine others had already sent the same. Missing Satyam Sir's lecture was never easy, but with the practical clashing with it, there wasn't much of a choice.
For computer science II (hardware) our group included Ramesh, Sanjana J, Lizz, Neil — and me. It felt like a coincidence at first, ending up with the same people again, but then it didn't seem like much of one anymore. We were all in the same class now.
Very quickly, everyone seemed to fall into a role. Sanjana took control of the microcontroller as if she had done it before, Ramesh stayed close to the teacher, trying to understand every step of the process, while Neil assisted wherever needed. Lizz remained mostly quiet, watching closely, picking things up without saying much.
And then there was me — standing slightly apart, trying to make sense of something that refused to make sense. I had never been particularly good at computer science, and practicals like these only made it more obvious. While the others were busy figuring things out, I found myself doing nothing but observing them. Not the device — them.
After Sanjana finished an experiment, the next turn came up, but no one stepped forward. I waited for a moment, then called out to her from behind Neil.
"Can you do this one as well?"
There was no hesitation in her response. No judgment either. She simply agreed and got back to the device, as if it didn't matter that I had been standing there without contributing anything so far. And only after that did I realise how long I had just been watching them, doing nothing.
Once we were done, the four of us stood together near the table — Sanjana and Lizz leaning casually against it, while Neil and I stood opposite them.
"Tanish…"
I looked up at Sanjana.
"…ye cheating hai."
I followed her gaze down to my pants before looking back at her, confused.
"Huh?"
"Your pants," she said.
For a second, that caught me off guard. We had spoken before, but always because of the game — team decisions, questions, something that had a reason behind it. This felt different.
I glanced at them again — slightly darker than the usual uniform — and shrugged, trying to be normal. "At least the cheating is only in the pants, right?"
"Even the shirt is different.", Lizz looked at me for a second before adding,
I still hadn't bought the college uniform and had been managing with one of my dad's shirts and trousers.
The next day was about me realising I had misunderstood something basic. When the teachers had asked us to bring a lab apron, I had taken it quite literally.
"Don't tell me you brought a kitchen apron," one of the girls, barely holding back her laugh.
I didn't even need to answer. My silence said enough.
For the rest of the morning, that became a running joke as others got to know how stupid I was. But once we entered the chemistry lab, the mood shifted. Unlike the previous day, the fans weren't switched on, and the heat inside the lab made it difficult to even stand comfortably. Monika ma'am was the in-charge this time, and she made it clear from the start that this was a chemistry practical — no sitting, no leniency.
She also checked for lab coats, which made me quietly message a friend of mine to somehow lend his coat to me for the next two days. We were arranged in alternate rows, and when it came to explaining the procedure, Sanjana was the first one to be questioned, which she handled with ease, as expected.
During the demonstration, ma'am accidentally took the solution a bit too far while using the pipette and rushed out soon after, leaving the class laughing for a moment before everything returned to silence when she came back.
The rest of the practical was spent standing in the heat, trying to get through the experiment without breaking any of her strict rules.
For the physics practical, we were assigned the oscillations experiment. I gave up almost immediately, joking that instead of performing it, I could at least help by fanning everyone with my practical book.
As expected, Sanjana and Ramesh took charge again. She handled the experiment while he recorded the time period, the two of them coordinating with an ease that stood out. It wasn't something dramatic, but the way they worked together — without confusion, without unnecessary discussion — made it clear they understood each other's pace. I found myself watching them more than the experiment itself.
Sanjana handed me Lizz's book as I stepped out to take the readings to ma'am, something I was always comfortable doing. When I returned, though, my practical book was missing from the table.
I asked Lizz about it, reminding her I had left it with her, but she simply shook her head, as if she didn't know. I searched around the lab, checking one table after another, trying not to let the irritation show too much. Losing my belongings was something that always bothered me more than it should have.
After a few minutes of pointless searching and one wrong assumption about someone else's book, I finally realised what had happened — I hadn't even written my name on it. One of the unnamed books lying around was mine. When I picked it up, the relief was immediate.
The last day of the practical coincided with my parents' nineteenth wedding anniversary. They had insisted that I join them at Leopold Café, but I refused. I hadn't missed a single lecture in all this time — skipping an entire practical session didn't even feel like an option.
But when I reached college and saw that only the four of us had shown up, with Sanjana absent as well, I couldn't help but wonder if missing a practical was really that big a deal after all.
After three days under Monika ma'am, my perspective had shifted a little. It didn't feel like she was being harsh anymore — just strict in a way the lab probably demanded.
Once the final chemistry practical was done, she even allowed us to take pictures with the apparatus, though only in groups. Somehow, I still managed to sneak in a quick photo of my own. The physics practical, on the other hand, was more about the instructions for the next practical session, which would be held around Diwali.
By the time we reached the academy, barely ten minutes were left before the lecture, and even then, only a few students had arrived. The class filled up just moments before it began. Sajit sir seemed to notice the condition of the students who had returned from their practicals, and thus chose not to introduce anything new, asking us to simply solve questions instead.
Some of us even drifted into short naps, heads resting on our desks, not really caring about the questions in front of us — not realising that we would end up paying for it in the very next lecture.
* * * * * * * *
I never quite understood the logic behind Sajit Sir's choice of punishment.
Entering the class right after lunch on the Monday following our practicals, he didn't begin teaching. Instead, he scanned the room slowly before ordering every boy from Batch 2 to stand up. One by one, he assigned us new seats — between two girls on benches meant for two.
The room soon filled with whispers, nervous laughter, and side glances. No one knew the official reason, but the rumors were already traveling through the rows—apparently, someone had been caught sleeping in the previous lecture, and this was our collective penance.
'Sit there,' Sajit Sir instructed me, his finger pointing toward a spot that felt like the center of a storm: the bench which had Naira and Sanjana.
Sanjana, who was sitting on the outer side, shifted inward to create a small gap. But before I could move, sir interrupted.
"Sit between both of them."
Great.
For a second, I just stood there.
Sitting beside Naira had started to feel easy, light, and normal. But beside Sanjana, however, it felt different — quieter and more formal, as if you had to think before speaking.
Two different energies on one bench.
Sanjana stood to let me pass, and I slid into the narrow space between them.
From the back benches, a few suppressed laughs and murmured comments followed as I took my seat. I didn't turn around. I didn't need to. I knew exactly what they were about.
On my left was Naira, sitting near the wall with her notebook open. She looked up briefly, just to check if I had settled, and gave a small nod.
That simple gesture eased something inside me.
"Are you okay?" I asked her quietly, directing it only at her.
She shifted her arm a little to make space.
"Yeah… it's fine. You?"
"I'll manage," I answered with a faint smile, as she went back to her notebook.
When I turned to ask Sanjana the same question as Naira, she nodded without looking up. Even though the question was the same, the silence that followed felt different.
Sir had started explaining inverse functions. Naira rested her chin on her hand, her gaze shifting from the board to her book and back again.
"Kya hua?" I whispered. "Not solving?"
She exhaled lightly.
"Bhai, meko maths nahi pasand."
Bending forward, she rested both arms on the desk. Her pen moved, paused, and then moved again, but her eyes weren't really on the questions. For a brief moment, the punishment didn't feel like punishment anymore. Behind us, Neil and the rest of the usual crowd kept passing unnecessary, distasteful comments, but to me, the moment was simply about being there.
I shifted my focus to the next question and verified the solution with Sir, which turned out to be correct.
Just then, I was about to glance at Naira when Sanjana nudged my notebook.
"What about this one?"
The moment slipped away.
I shifted slightly to the right, careful not to brush shoulders, and explained what I could. She asked another question, and when I moved to raise my hand, she stopped me with a small shake of her head.
Sanjana wanted the answer, not the attention.
So I tried solving myself, writing the steps quickly.
"Write it properly," she said.
I slowed down.
"Properly."
I rewrote the line, reading it aloud.
Before I could finish—
"Tanish."
Sir's voice cut through.
"Get up. Sit in front."
For a second, I stared at the page.
Then I stood up. Tejas, who was also sitting between two other girls, switched places with me.
Perfect. I finally got a chance to sit beside Naira, and I still managed to waste it, I thought, almost mocking myself for letting the moment slip away.
Walking to the front bench felt strangely abrupt. The cramped space, the two different silences, the quiet contrast — all of it stayed behind in one second.
"Too much talking." Sir mentioned before he resumed teaching as if nothing had happened. But the rest of the lecture didn't feel the same anymore.
Every minute, I felt like turning back — just to see if Naira was still sitting the same way, head down over her notebook, or if she had finally started taking down the notes.
But I didn't.
I just kept looking ahead.
Ten days later, the classroom felt hollow. It was the final lecture before summer break, and Batch 1 looked unusually thin — barely eighteen students had shown up. The year itself seemed to be slowing down, as if already halfway into vacation mode.
Seeing the empty benches, Sameer Sir decided to continue anyway. He announced he would finish capacitors — probably knowing that those who skipped would return to a gap in their notes.
"Haa…" I joked a little too loudly, saying that otherwise a girl would start complaining that she wasn't understanding anything.
A few students laughed, until I heard a familiar voice from behind.
"Tanish…?"
The voice came softly from behind me.
I turned.
It was Naira.
"You shouldn't say that about her," she whispered, keeping her eyes on the notebook as she said it
"Why?" I asked, half-smiling.
"Because someone here might tell her… and she'll feel bad."
Naira said it like it was obvious, not needing any explanation. I didn't give any attention to her words and I turned back toward the board,
The final few minutes of the lecture drifted into a discussion about the JEE Main results of our seniors. For a while, the whole class dropped their pens and listened to Sameer sir as he talked about ranks and attempts.
And just like that, the lecture ended. The summer vacations had officially begun — something I had been waiting impatiently for days.
And without realizing it, that initial phase in the elite batch came to a pause.
* * * * * * * *
Ten days later, the classroom felt unusually empty. It was the final lecture before summer break, and barely half the batch had shown up, with the rest of them already slipping into vacation mode. I, too, was excited for my first solo train journey.
Sameer sir continued with capacitors anyway, knowing those who skipped would return to incomplete notes. At one point, I joked a little too loudly that otherwise someone would start complaining about not understanding anything.
A few students laughed, until I heard a soft voice from behind.
"Tanish…?"
I turned. It was once again Naira.
"You shouldn't say that about her," she whispered, without looking up from her notebook.
"Why?" I asked.
"Because someone might tell her… and she'll feel bad."
She said it simply, as if it didn't need explaining. I didn't respond and turned back toward the board. The lecture drifted into a discussion about our seniors' JEE results, and before it could feel like anything more, it ended.
And just like that, summer break began.
Without realising it then, that first phase in Batch 1 had quietly come to a pause. What was waiting on the other side of those vacations, I had no idea yet.