marks.
It was malik who asked nimmu, that how come the best friend is not ready to go and reduce his marks. Nimmu had no answer, but malik and aarib was giving different solutions and thoughts to him. The marks were ready and Nagaraj was preparing the report card, it was Gopu the first ranker this time and nimmu the second. Nagaraj told nimmu that he should have come first, but his performance is going down. When the class teacher speaks like this, then his parent’s reaction would be much worse than this.
Nimmu and Gopu very rarely talk now a days and nimmu yet to get the signature from his father on the rank card, it was more than a week over due. Charles was often seen with gopu and they both spend time in the intervals. Malik and aarib was with nimmu, and malik was very angry with Charles and he did hit him in the interval one day. Gopu came to nimmu and asked why he did that for Charles using malik. Nimmu was surprised and he started realizing the distance with that question. Nimmu finally got the signature from his father, after lot of crying and sacrificing his half an hour of television time.
Days went and the revision exams also came, again this time it was gopu who scored high marks and nimmu was second. This time gopu was ten marks ahead. Nimmu by this time more or less decided that it would be difficult for him to score more than Gopu. He saw Charles smiling at him and most of the times he does this after speaking to gopu. There was a trainee teacher who had come to the class, and she was supposed to be there for a month. She was handling Geography. Nimmu was good in that subject and he could answer most of the questions. She really did like nimmu and she made him as monitor for her classes. Whenever she was not there, it was the responsibility of nimmu to note down the names of students who was doing mischief or talking. However that day Charles and Gopu was talking many times, and nimmu did wrote their name and started putting value for it. After seeing this Charles started talking more and more, this time nimmu went and wrote their name on the black board. All the students were surprised, this had triggered gopu and he started talking loudly with Charles. Nimmu was losing control on himself and he warned both of them not to talk, but they both never refrained from doing that. It was then, nimmu went and slapped gopu.
Gopu and Nimmu they never see each other, and gopu stopped going to tuition to avoid meeting nimmu. There was a competition for speech on “Cooperation and Country” and nimmu participated for the first time and it was however gopu who won the prize, and nimmu couldn’t deliver as his mind was not cooperating with him, somehow he had decided that he couldn’t match gopu.
The Final exam was near, nagaraj did notice change in nimmu. He called nimmu and told that, your father is working in government, see but gopu’s father is a teacher, so obviously he spends more time in helping Gopu, but your father couldn’t, so it is you who has to study! Somewhere nimmu felt bad that unnecessarily his father was compared with Gopu’s father, his ego was triggered and Nagaraj knew what he was doing. Nagaraj had now called the students to come to tuition every day at 5 am and he asked them to study till 7.30 am , then they would go home, get ready and then go to school. This was the plan for next one month, till the exams were over. Aarib and malik comes to nimmu’s home and take him along with them. Nimmu had a torch light to carry with him that helps other two also. At 5 am they light the candles in open terrace of Nagaraj’s house and they start reading. It was a unique experience for all of them. One day nimmu and his friends saw a moving stick in the dark, while they were walking, but it turned out to be a snack. They ran as much as they can in all the directions, nimmu’s torch was working, but the speed at which he ran, he never needed the torch to show the path.
The final exams came; every class room had only few students writing the exams, as the schedule was planned well to handle student volume. Nimmu and gopu never met and there was less chance as they both were writing exams in different classes. It was the last day of exam, all the students tried to complete it quickly and leave early, and nimmu was also with the same intention, but that was to safeguard him from the ink spray. The students spray all kind of colored inks from their pen, after removing the nib. Normally the white shirt of the students would become a designer shirt that day. Nimmu met gopu that last day, where gopu was throwing ink on others, but he went quiet as nimmu passed by and no word from each other, but they know that they were passing each other.
The summer holidays were over, the next year classes started. Nimmu and all the students were attending prayer, and it was the same class students normally stand in the prayer for the first day, irrespective of pass or fail, then they would be moved to different sections of the next grade. Nimmu’s eyes were searching for gopu and he was not there. In that prayer they were announcing the school level results for each grade. Ali from Section “D” of 6th grade came school first and it was Nimmu from Section “C” came school second and third was from section”A”. Nimmu couldn’t believe that, Nagaraj came and told Nimmu that he missed the first score and he should aim for that this year in 7th grade. Nimmu knows his parents would be happy, but still his eyes and mind was searching for gopu.
Gopu came on the next day and he also met Nimmu and congratulated him, and told bye to him, as their family was moving to a town which was 150 miles away. Nimmu never had time to talk to him; neither could he achieve back the confidence of his friend.
Nimmu was successful in getting back his first rank in his class. It’s 22 years now; he knows his friend is missing. He knows his friend was worthier than those two marks, now he is ready to give away those two marks, but will he get his friend back? Nimmu has changed a lot; he had learned that earning people and their trust is more important than being number one or achieving some extra mileage. The life has shown him that having a good friend is god’s gift! We too see lot of grown up Nimmu’s, who are missing their friends for money, ego, fame and other miscellaneous things! Nimmu realized his friend is missing! Do all Nimmu’s realize this……..
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