Hearts And Puzzles

CHAPTER 3

Echo of the past-3

AVANI'S POV

I quickly got up to change my clothes. I threw open the doors of my cupboard and got my hands on a plain yellow shirt that was kept folded right in the front with pair of jeans. I took myself a coat to beat the cold and dry autumn air.

I took all of them into my arms and threw them on my bed with one hand trying to remove a button from the dress I was wearing with the other.

As I undressed I looked into the mirror at a tattoo of a blue jay feather below my left collar bone that helped me hide the scar from the incident seven years ago.

I quickly got changed and without bothering how I look, I grabbed my car keys that lay on a table near the door. I was about to close the door and lock it, when I wondered if I switched the gas off.

I rushed in and found it off. I shut the door again and I locked it.

I put the keys in my coat pocket, then I found out I left my purse in but as I put my keys into the pocket I found a rupees five hundred bill in it, so without bothering myself about anything else I got to the parking.

I sat in my black Swift Desire and rushed it out of the building. I started to drive all the way from Padukere beach to Nandigudda of South Manglore (86 kms) where there was AGP hospital, it was where Ridhi was admitted.

As I drove I started recollecting all our memories together from day one. And went deep into them.

Times have changed so very much from when we three came together to Manglore from Rajasthan. I started to recall every tiny but of our journey until here.

It all started in the village of Khetri, Rajasthan when we joined the same tuition in an alley near my neighborhood. It was the first day of our grade nine tuition when we three were not familiar with each other but we're coincidentally late for our own reasons. When the teacher scolded us three together we helplessly or more appropriately, shamelessly smiled and giggled by looking at each other. That was our first encounter.

We went and sat together at the last behind everyone in the small room of the tuition centre. Soon, the class was over and on our way back home, I was the first one to start, "Hi! I'm Hiya Bhakshi." my original name is Hiya Bhakshi but due to the scar that became my identity I had to change it to Avani.

We giggled all the way to our homes joking about random things that day. We three, oh yes... We were three best friends Ridhi, Myself and Hiral. I really missed the old times.

Ridhi came from a poor family which was abusive. She had to not only go to school everyday, but also tuition and then had to work part time in a small shop that laid in the roadside, a few allies away from mine.

She used to be paid everyday according to the sales of the day. But, even if she had a rupee less than Rs.sixty a day she would get beaten and bruised badly by her father.
She was so flustered by her father that she started to learn self defense in hiding afyer everyone went to sleep. It helped her remove her frustration.

A girl practicing self defense was not at all appriciated in the conservative villages of Rajasthan where people expected girls to be innocent, soft spoken and obedient therefore she had to keep her practicing a grave secret.

On the first day we met, Ridhi was ashamed to show us her house so she ran away as we walked nearer to her house. But eventually, we figured it out and told her not to be ashamed as it was not her fault.

My situation was quite opposite of hers in some way. But my parents were no less rude than hers.

My family was quite rich, I had an elder brother who was dumb and not good for anything. My parents were educated; my father studied in Jaipur University while my mom studied at home and passed exams.

I was really good at studies and sports and was called the 'Ace of the school'. But my parents never acknowledged me and treated my brother as a prince and me as a rag just because I was a girl.

They verbally abused me since childhood and not in much time, I got used to it. I tried to stop caring but everyday morning as I woke up, the words often told, "You are a girl and a mistake" echoed in my ears.

The luckiest among us was Hiral, she had the most understanding parents one could ever ask for. She was never scolded for her mistakes instead her mom would each time sit next to her and make her understand why it was a mistake.

She was the eldest among us but she, Atleast, in her childhood had faced the least pain. She was from a middle class family and her house was often the place where we hung out on Sundays. But at the last I don't know why they took a harsh decision of disowning her.

As we finished our class 12, in the small village Ridhi and I were forced to stop our education as girls getting higher education and going to colleges was still an issue not appriciated in the streets of Khetri.

But Hiral did not have that barricade her parents were both open minded and did not care about the talking behind the backs of the village people. Seeing where parents, for the first time ever, our parents accepted out dreams of pursuing further education. But we had to move out of Khetri for this. We took our chance and planned to go somewhere far away from our families and to start our lives again in peace.

We were allowed to go far way, probably because they knew we all are going to be together and Hiral being the eldest (she was born in January) to take care of us.
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How did you like this chapter? This chapter is about their pasts and why they moved out of Khetri to start their new life in Manglore.

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