Strange Happiness

Psychological Short Story – Strange Happiness

The ticking of the clock seemed endless. I tapped the table with my pen, swimming through the sea of endless thoughts in my mind.

Amidst all this, the question of the hour was nowhere near the importance the time required of me. The 12-point font words triggered what could be the story of my life in my mind- while already drowning in melancholia.

The most important things in life could be family, friends and at this age, the prospect of studies.

Every day, I awake to escape the very atmosphere of my house. The walls of the building only make a roof, not a home. The same old cauterizing emotions and the heavy cloak of bitterness and dying wick of familial relations- that could be spoken of my family.

Friends are nothing but ghost with just voices, laughing over all that exists and murdering the seriousness of life. Just holding out a few hands when they need, and withdrawing as quickly.

And coming to studies, the very idea of it seems to deprive me of the energy I cannot seem to store for even a second these days, let alone battling the bombardment of questions regarding atomic theories and the diversities of life.

What if Dalton was a man as simple as I? Or Newton one of just bare philosophies? Will I be here, jostling through my head, talking about my miserable life?

And if it were the cause, the three of us could catch a movie sometime.

I took a glance at the clock, it said 9.55 a.m. A half hour had passed and I just sat there, with my blank sheet of paper and my equally blank mind. I had another thirty to write down a little few splats of ink for a face-save.

And then I took a look around the classroom- everyone was busy scribbling their answer sheets with everything they could think of and give the questions the answers it desired.

Tick-tock. Tick-tock. A few more minutes till the sound of the final bell. I slowly shine my pen and write a few words.

As the class got over, everyone asked me what I had written. And my reply was still in the making and I knew no one would actually understand why I wrote what I did. So I left the classroom for a stroll outside.

With my hands in my pockets and a whistle on my lips, I wandered the corridors vagabond. The harsh coldness of December did not seem to affect me as much as it affected a few. I walked up a few lonely stairs and took a seat. I was lost and alone in my thoughts when a voice infiltrated my silence.

“What are you doing here, Di?” She asked in a voice I longed to hear every single day. She smiled and caused a beaming sense of helplessness in me that I could never fight.

“Nothing,” I replied, in words that could perplex her the most.

“How was your test?”

“Epic.”

“What did you write?”

And then this question. I knew I had an answer and one she could understand, because she wasn’t like the others. She was different, and one like me, and I knew she understood what nobody else could.

I came in close and whispered in her ear what I wrote. She chuckled and said that it was wise and very smart.

Then I heard the bell ring and saw her disappear. She always left a smile on my face, no matter what the day or how dense the misanthropy the day held.

I returned to class and by the trick of Devil, it was English class. The teacher asked us all what we had written. And soon my turn came.

“What did you write?” She asked, beholding her severe eyes at me.

“Ma’am, I wrote,” I replied.

“Wrote?”

“I wrote to the paper.”

“Wrote to the paper?”

“I wrote to the paper that it was asking too much of me. The question said I must describe what I thought. And honestly, at that moment, it was too much to ask.”

And soon, I stood facing the wind in the wintry corridors.

The next day, it was again a march-past morning. Everyone pitied the sight of me when I returned from the corridor that day after my punishment. But I, I was somewhere else. Lost in my thoughts.

“Oi, why were you not stirred a bit after your punishment?” A friend asked.

“Nothing, because I knew it was smart and very witty an answer,” I smiled at the memory of her saying it.

Nothing mattered because it was fine by her. She, my perfection. A beautiful, sensible, decent and honest girl who never misunderstood, who always inferred the correct side of my words and who always knew that deep down I was still a happy 14-year old.

The only thing, she doesn’t exist. But only in my head where I confined her. And I know that somewhere she was there, in the real world, still with her simple thoughts and twinkling eyes. Made for me.

My Miss Perfect.

__END__

Dedicated to one of my best-est, most special friends, Di.