It wasn't only Sapna who was perturbed. Raj too was having a difficult time. He had little idea about the animosity between Sapna and those seniors before she began journeying in his bus. He had expected things to settle down sometime later. But a month had passed without any sort of warmth creeping into their relationship. Initially Raj was immune but now the girls had begun to target him too. He didn't want to sour his relations with those girls but he wasn't able to get to a solution too. His all efforts of getting a ceasefire between them had been unsucessful.
What was troubling Raj more was the kind of gossips that were spreading in bus. He had always thought of Sapna as a friend, just like his other male friends. But the people (on purpose) always view a male female friendship with a single pair of glasses. The word had began to spread among the boys, most of them seniors, that both Raj and Sapna were seeing each other. They couldn't find any other reason why Raj was getting into the middle of this girl v/s girl fight. The talks were limited to bus only so far but Raj feared that they might spread into the college.
Diwali holidays were just a fortnight away and Raj hoped that he would get some solution to this problem in those vacations. But destiny worked in some other way. He didn't need to put his mind to any exercise.
It was monday and their group had mechanical lab that day. By the time they finished with their work and handed over their job to the lab assistant, college was already over. The lab was situated on the other side of college, almost isolated from the main building. Raj knew that driver of his bus was one of the quickest and would quickly drive his bus out of the campus. He was very rude and apart from a few students he knew, the driver never waited for anyone. Most of the students and staff had already moved to the bus stand. Other guys from his group too had left. Raj and Sapna were the only one left behind. Raj had packed his bag quickly amd was ready to leave but Sapna was slow. He asked her to haste as they had to cross the whole ground and the building to reach the stand. If they missed the bus, they would have to go in some other which won't drop them to their homes, but somewhere on the way. From there they would have to look for some other convence to reach their homes. Raj didn't want to get into this situation.
As soon as Sapna packed her bag, they began to run. But owing to her being a girl and a heavy bag Sapna was fallng behind. Raj would have to stop after every few paces. Fianlly Sapna told him to go ahead and ask the driver to wait for her. It was a better idea and Raj implemented on it quickly. Taking a shortcut he reached the gate of the college just at the moment his bus was rolling out. Grabbing the handle he quickly got into the running bus. The second he got in, Driver increased the speed of the bus.
"Wait! A girl has been left behind. She was in the mechanical lab and is coming behind me." Raj said panting and wiping sweat on his brow. Driver answered in his usual cold voice without even looking back. "It's already late. Bus won't stop for anybody now."
Raj didn't have strength and courage to counter him. He knew there were eyes on his back waiting for him to say something, to request the driver again to stop the bus for Sapna. Slowly he turned back and without looking at anybody occupied a seat on the first row itself. But before sitting he heard a giggle behind him. He didn't get annoyed. His mind was engaged in some other thought. He had let Sapna down and it was hurting him.
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