Childhood regrets

I started The Kite Runner finally. I wanted to read it since a long time. I have only been through the first 30 pages of the book and I had to take a break because it is so good! Actually, it reminds me of some of my own childhood experiences which don't make me too proud of myself. They reach out to me time to time to remind me what a human I am. I thought I should give them material forms this time...


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I was in the 2nd grade. I was writing some exam. In the same hall there were students of another grade too. Given my hardly observable sense of observation, I didn't know which was the other class combined with ours until I finished my paper.
I always, well, almost always, finished my paper before time in school. (Sometimes in college too when I got tired of faking knowledge!) I was a 'good' student in school. I never stood first in my class and never was my rank below the third. I would have stood first only if my teachers would notice me before the results were declared. School is very childish actually.
Anyways, I finished my paper and the bell just wasn't ringing. I checked my paper two or three times. (I don't really remember but I'm sure I was stupid enough to have done it.) I played with my pencils and eraser. (Thankfully!) Then I looked up and took notice of the rest of the class. Half of them were the faces I knew but the names of only half of which I had 'understood'. (I was unthinkably socially-dumb!) Rest of the class I didn't know. Those kids were smaller than me so I assumed they must be KG students.
I turned behind. I spoke to my class-mate who was trying to finish her paper. I have no recollection and I just can't figure out what the hell was I talking about to her in the middle of our exams and what the hell was the invigilator doing!
There was a little girl sitting next to her. She had a perfect round face, she was very fair and had plaited her hair into two pony-tails behind her ears. And she had big eyes. She must have been a Sikh. I looked at her blank answer sheet. She hadn't scribbled a word on her paper. I was aghast with shock! Didn't she know the concept of an exam? I told my friend about her and she too wondered what was wrong with this little girl. We asked her which class she belonged to. She said nothing. She only kept looking at us turn by turn as we spoke to her with her huge dark eyes. Gradually, a sense of supiriority/seniority complex overtook my bewilderment and I almost started mocking at the poor innocent child. I was telling her, "Don't you want to pass? How will you get marks? Do you know nothing? Didn't you study anything?" (where was the invigilator man?)
She didn't say a word. I stopped when I saw those big dark eyes welling up with tears. And something has just stopped there since then. I still find myself sitting in front of this chubby-cheeked, neat but dumbly innocent child, looking at me, the tears almost ready to overflow at the borders of the eyes that don't get off me...
Why did I have to be so hard on the poor kid? I just regret it so much...


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Again, in the 1st or 2nd grade, (Wow! I was from Chucky's cult or what!) I had a friend called Raji. Well, not exactly a friend cuz she would remain even more quiter than me and she was stupider than me, then. But we did sit together occasionally and exchanged a few stupid jokes. She was the only person that I bullied on, ever. I just remember I slapped her on her back once. She said something stupid and I was trying to show her I was angry, I wasn't. I knew I was just bullying her. I'm so sorry Raji... If you ever happen to stumble upon this paragraph on the net, just know that I am so so so sorry.

Bravery

He was hungry again. He had been fed a couple of hours ago. His nephew had poured one entire glass of milk down the tube. Unlike yesterday, he didn't even ask today if he wanted more food. Perhaps he was tired supporting his uncle's back while feeding. After all, to hold up a hefty body like his uncle's for almost 20 minutes was not an easy routine for a lean teenager like him.
He felt a gurgle in his stomach. He stared at the fan shaking sideways as it hovered slowly right above his head. He tried to figure out the colour of the blades beneath the thick layer of dust gathered over them. He thought he could see a little cream at one end of the blades. He gradually shifted his gaze as down as it could go. He looked at his long beard spread on his chest. The colour of henna was fading away just below his chin. He thought he saw some gray. He remembered he had to colour it two days ago, if only he could move his right hand. He still couldn't remember exactly what had happened that day. He got up from bed to pray after a short nap induced by the heavy lunch he had taken. And then as he spread his rug on the floor, he suddenly fell down. He tried to get up, but the light was fading away. When he opened his eyes he saw light which was so bright that he could see nothing else. Then he saw a few humanly figures leaned over him. For a second he was overwhelmed to wonder if it was Allah's palace. Then the faces took shapes and he saw his younger brother and his son trying to tell him something. He tried to speak but only let out a sound. He tried again but couldn't produce the word. He tried to lift up his hands but the right side of his body refused to even get dragged an inch. He tried the whole day and ultimately gave up. He knew he was in a hospital. He had an idea what had happened to him. He didn't know why.
He had faith in his Allah. He had prayed five times a day all his life. He was devoted to the almighty's service. He didn't get married unlike his brother, unlike the weak souls weakened more by worldly pleasures. Why then, his father put him through this? But no. He wouldn't lose faith. His father is trying to tell him something. But what?
He turned his gaze to the left. He saw an old man almost sinking into his bed, his skeleton almost visible beneath the skin. He wore saffron. Kaafir... He muttered in his mind. But instead of the repulsion and anger that he'd usually feel for a kaafir, he felt pity at the old man's condition. He himself was almost 60 but no one could guess he was more than 45. He was tall and broad. When he stood, he looked like an unconquerable mountain. He walked with the disciplined demeanor of a soldier, of a warrior, unconcerned and unconnected with the weak souls in the weak bodies around him. He knew he was strong because his Allah wanted him to be. So that he can fight his war, the war of a jehadi.
He had always been a warrior. After his encounter with the almighty Himself one night when he was fifteen, he had no option but to believe what was being taught to him in the training camp. In fact, he understood it more than just believe it. And following that he led many holy battels with all the bravery he was endowed with. He was a hero amongst his men. He sacrificed thousands of kaafirs in the service of his father. Those idol-worshippers were so weak that they couldn't even look up at him as the shine of his sword on their necks met its edge...
His stomach gurgled again. He looked at the nurse at the end of the ward. He tried to say he wanted food. The nurse turned to the sound. He tried to look at the tube coming out of his nostril. When he looked up again, she had already turned away. Then she got up and gathered her bag. She was leaving.
His anger tried to give in to a stir of a feeling of helplessness that was slowly rising in him. But he strongly resisted it. He closed his eyes thinking about Allah.
He barged into the house in that small village. It was freezing cold but the warmth of the zeal in his blood also melted the fear in the group of young boys he was leading. He shouted aloud the name of his savior and ordered his men, "Dhoondh dhoondh kar khatm kar do sabhi but-paraston ko!" And his men immediately split into small groups and began searching through all rooms of the house of the most affluent hindu family in the village. He stood in the big hall listening to the screams of the men and women of the family and the silence following the sound of the bullets his men fired. He heard someone sobbing. The sound came from a corner of the hall. He proceeded towards its direction. He couldn't see anyone. There was only an iron box kept in that corner. He heard the sob one more time and then he heard his own foot-step. There was silence again. With the naked sword he carried in his hand and the rifle hung on his shoulder he approached the box and with one action of his sword he swung the lid of the box open. A small girl sat inside. Staring directly at his face with her tear laden eyes she sobbed as she breathed. He smiled at the fear he saw in those big dark eyes. He saw fear rolling on the milky-white full cheeks and he heard fear as she pleaded, " Mujhe mat maro baba. Baba... Mujhe mat maro. Baba... Nahin baba..." He raised his sword high up above his head. The girl kept sobbing and pleading. As he began lowering it over the target on the little neck in which she wore a pendant of some idol-God, she reflexly raised her hand to cover her face. He saw a thread tied to her left wrist. His sword descended with the speed of lightening. There was a big noise as it clanked the edge of the box. If he hadn't been startled by a sudden noise of his men shouting alert he wouldn't have missed his target. Army men were rushing in from the rear door. Without wasting a moment he turned away from the box and as he saw his men running out of the front door, he followed them out of the house. The girl not looking out of the pseudo-cover of her hands, kept pleading, " Baba... Mujhe mat maro baba..."
"Baba... Baba..." Someone was shaking his shoulders. He opened his eyes. The face he saw was like that of an angel, white. The large dark eyes staring into his eyes shone with zeal of life and a strange kind of hope. There was no pity in them just a motherly re-assurance. "Baba dawai pee lo. Utho baba..." He was mesmerized by the eyes that held him. He wanted to hold on to the support they offered. She helped him sit up. Then poured the pink milk like medicine down his tube. As she did it, he saw a thread tied to her left wrist. The image of the girl in the box flashed in front of his eyes. " Aap theek ho jayenge baba. Fikr mat karo." She eased him into lying position. Her smiling eyes reassured him again. Then she took her tray and went over to the old man in saffron on the next bed. "Baba..." Her white angelic image began to get distorted as tears collected in his eyes for the first time in his life. He wanted to scream. He couldn't. The tears kept flowing...