The final monsoon showers had just finished washing the city clean. In the school's assembly ground, a mingled scent of damp earth and chalk from the classrooms hung in the air. The principal's voice, which had boomed over the loudspeakers after the national anthem, had faded into silence, replaced now by the unified shuffle of thousands of shoes. The crowd was thinning out, each student heading towards their respective classroom.
Amidst that very crowd, Aarav Mehra walked with his hands tucked into his trouser pockets. His shoulders were slightly slumped, as if he were trying to make himself smaller, less conspicuous. But this attempt, as always, was futile.
He pretended not to hear the whispers rising behind him.
"Look… he's gorgeous," one girl whispered to her friend, her palm hiding her mouth. "It's almost painful to look at him."
These words, upon reaching the ears of the boys nearby, caused their gazes to bore into Aarav's back like daggers. Envy, anger, and a hint of wonder—these were the emotions Aarav had grown accustomed to. He didn't slow his pace. This beauty of his was a cage, and he had learned to carry that cage with him since childhood.
'The same again... the same whispers, the same stares,' Aarav thought to himself, a faint weariness in his breath. This school, this city, these people—they were all the same. They looked at him, but none of them truly saw him. To them, he was either a beautiful statue or a target.
Nothing changed inside the classroom either. The physics teacher, Mr. Sharma, had just written a difficult problem on the blackboard and stepped aside. There was a dead silence in the class. The question was from outside the syllabus; it was a challenge.
"Is there anyone who can solve this?" Mr. Sharma scanned the room from behind his thick spectacles. Not a single hand went up.
Finally, his gaze settled on Aarav. "Aarav? Would you like to try?"
Aarav took a deep breath. He wanted to refuse, to say, "Sir, just leave me alone," but he knew that would only lead to more talk. 'Look at him, so arrogant.' That's what they always said.
He rose silently from his seat. Every eye in the class was fixed on his every step. The girls watched him with admiration, while the boys, especially Rohan, the captain of the sports team, had a look of undisguised hatred in their eyes.
Aarav picked up the chalk and, without a moment's hesitation, began writing the equations on the board. His hand moved swiftly, as if the solution was already fully formed in his mind. Within two minutes, the answer was on the board—clean, precise, and brilliant.
"Excellent, Aarav! Absolutely excellent!" Pride shone in Mr. Sharma's eyes.
Aarav returned to his seat without a word. The praise didn't affect him. It was all too easy for him, so easy that it held no interest for him anymore. He felt as if he was watching a film he had seen a thousand times. He already knew every character, every dialogue, every scene. And this feeling was hollowing him out from the inside.
The time after school was perhaps the only part of the day Aarav felt a semblance of freedom—the football field. There, people didn't see his face; they saw the magic in his feet. Drenched in mud and sweat, he was just another player.
But even here, the air was tense today.
A practice match was underway. Aarav's team was down by a goal. Only five minutes remained. The ball was with Rohan, the captain of the senior team. Rohan was powerful, his game aggressive. He had a habit of steamrolling any player who stood in his way.
He saw Aarav approaching him. His eyes held a clear challenge: 'Come on, show me what a hero you are.'
The ball came to Aarav. He looked into Rohan's eyes, and for a split second, everything slowed down. He could see Rohan's next move perfectly. Rohan was going to tackle him from the right.
The moment Rohan lunged forward, Aarav lightly flicked the ball with his heel and executed a graceful spin. Rohan, thrown off balance, lunged into empty air and fell face-first into the mud. The entire field went silent for a moment.
Aarav didn't stop. He surged forward with the speed of lightning. Two more defenders rushed him, but Aarav slipped between them like a gust of wind. There was an unnatural rhythm to his speed, a grace that made his play look less like a sport and more like a dance.
Only the goalkeeper remained. Aarav didn't take a powerful shot at the goal. He simply nudged the ball, letting it glide gently between the goalkeeper's legs. The ball settled in the corner of the net like a dream.
The score was level.
A strange silence fell over the field. Even Aarav's own teammates forgot to celebrate, staring at him instead. He had done it all so effortlessly, without even breaking a sweat. He had humiliated Rohan, the school's star player, in front of everyone.
Aarav turned to look at Rohan, who was now getting up, covered in mud. His eyes held not anger, but a cold, deep-seated hatred. Rohan glanced at his friends standing nearby—the same boys who were always with him.
They just exchanged a single look. A look that needed no words, yet contained an entire plan. A conspiracy.
Aarav caught that look. He felt a cold knot form in his stomach. He knew this wasn't going to end on the field. Something was going to happen tonight.
The doors of the cage, which had felt open for a brief moment, were now swinging shut. And this time, Aarav had a feeling that the cage was going to be smaller and more suffocating than ever before.