Midday of June.
The blazing sun was like a strong LED in a room with walls painted clear blue on all sides.
The temperature was very easy to imagine.
In some places on the busy road, the air near the ground was so hot that the scenery around it appeared distorted.
The visuals were strong enough to affect even those who were seeing the scene, separated from it by the cold air of the air conditioner.
They would quickly avert their eyes as if looking a minute longer would cost them their life span.
But even in this hot weather there were certain individuals who were very... enthusiastic. They couldn't wait to sweat out all the water in their body.
This specific indoor stadium was exclusively occupied by them today.
The stadium was usually desolated, enough to almost give one the impression of it being haunted.
Today, it atleast had enough vitality to appear like a 'stadium' that was in businesses.
At the entrance, there was a small banner in bland colors.
Was it not for the fact that it was hung at a level out of people's reach, the colour of it could almost mislead someone to use it as a rag in a moment of frenzy.
The words on it were the standard information,
'Badminton tournament, organised with the collaboration of East city and West city's registered badminton clubs'
The time and catagories were also included.
The stadium itself was of decent size. And consisted of three courts. And currently, there was only one match, unfolding in the third court.
Naturally all the spectators gathered around that court.
The game was at the last set. One set was won by each player, making the point 1:1.
The third set was at 8:11
Arshiya stood in the middle of the court. Her breathing was a bit quick as her eyes scanned the gallery around her in a very fast motion. She then lowered her gaze and lightly pursed her lips.
She closed her eyes for a brief moment and tried to calm her heart beat which was accelerated by a sudden wave of anxiety .
Within a few seconds her focus was redirected back to the ongoing match.
She could swear in all the other matches she had played up until now, none of them made her sweat as much as it was doing now.
She took some more time to catch her breath before getting in position to welcome a yet another, annoyingly tricky serve.
Technically speaking she should not be too stressed at this point, she still had the lead in this set. But seeing the previous two rally, her worries were reasonable.
Her opponent was a young boy of about eleven or twelve years, yet he already looked way taller than his age.
After smoothening out the shuttle he got ready to serve.
During service, the person who is receiving usually responds with a defensive shot, specially so if it's a short serve.
But the problem with this guy's serve was that he always took position for a backhand serve but it was almost impossible to predict whether the serve was going to land in the frontcourt or in the backcourt.
The later was problematic as hell.
Arshiya was even starting to believe, her opponent might have a line sensor installed in his head because of how his serves always seemed like they were out of the boundary line but every time Arshia decided to skip it, the sight that would greet her afterwards would be the end of the shuttle precisely touching the baseline.
Then if she decides to just return every serve without discrimination, due to how low the long serves were, her counter shots always end up being wobbly and it isn't long before she gets completely shut down by a powerful smash.
The short serves didn't seem as hard in comparison ...well initially that is.
The short serves were just as skillfully controlled. Arshiya had hardly seen drop shots as precise to the net as this guy's short serves. And in the last rally, Arshiya misjudged the short serve which led to a slight delay in her response. But as if already expecting this, his racket had already shut down the shuttle that barely made its way past the net.
It was a scene that the spectators had already seen countless times in the other matches before this. So even though entertaining, it didn't leave any special impression in their minds.
But Arshiya who was facing this directly, felt a subtle shift in her opponent, from this shot.
It was very minute almost unnoticeable, but Arshiya had a bad feeling.
She wished to have held on until she was at least 3 more points ahead of him before giving up her turn to serve.
However, it was no time to repent as the serve came and another rally began.
After making the same mistake of not reacting quickly enough or reacting too quickly for more than just a few times, Arshiya had somewhat gotten used to his pace by now.
She smoothly moved back with a clean footwork, tilted her body towards the right then with a slight jump and a swift motion of her racket, tossed the shuttle from her end of the court to his. Soon after she came back to the middle court again.
The shuttle went to the opposite court, exactly at the left side of the opponent, in an arc that was neither too high nor too low.
The other party who was already in a ready state after service, didn't counter this shot in forehand. Instead he turned around and with quick steps, hit a cross shot across the court.
The rally went on for a while with neither of them giving the other any time to breath. After about ten more shots Arshiya accidentally set the shuttle slightly too high in the middle court, in counter to a terrifyingly precise drop shot.
The moment she hit that shot, Arshiya already knew the outcome but she didn't close her eyes, instead in that small moment she intensified her focus on the shuttle while moving to get back to her position.
Her opponent didn't disappoint her, in fact it seemed like he couldn't wait to get the shot so he jumped extra high.
Before Arshiya even had the time to get back to mid-court the shuttle was already slammed down on the wooden floor of the court making a dull but loud noise, as if reflecting the mood of the person who hit it.
Everything was quiet for a while before cheers and praises of the rally sounded from all directions.
The umpire announced the points and the game proceeded to the next rally.
- - - -
Arshiya sat alone in the bench inside the changing room. Head slumped forward, her temples being supported by the thumbs of her interlocked fingers.
Before the match started she had already known the outcome. The difference in their skill was something very obvious, something Arshiya could tell from watching his previous matches, she really did. But even so, at the very least she wanted to put on a solid fight. Only to be met with the terrible reality in the end.
Her score in third set which was initially ahead of her opponent by 3 points, was overturned in the blink of an eye. She was shown with a finger pointed at her face that the other party wasn't at all putting in his full effort up until then. It was almost as if he didn't even want to bother doing so. The proof was the later half of the third set
In the locker room everyone have already left. No coach or family member came to get her as she wasn't from this city and came to play the match here from the West City.
Her shoulders that were partially covered by the towel started shaking gently but no sound could be heard even in the ghostly silent room.
_
Ishan got in the car and closed the door. The award ceremony took longer than expected because, apparently the runner up was missing!
It seemed no one came with her and she also didn't have any friend here who knew about her. Calling at the registered number which was in the application form, it was found that the number wasn't correct. Her home adress was there but this was just an under fourteen badminton match. Who had the time to go out of their way to look for a person who didn't even live in this city, not to mention the addresses could also be wrong just like the phone number.
Ishan sat quietly in the back seat. After a while the front door opened and a tall man got in the driver's seat.
The car was started and soon they got on the highway.
The man driving the car was the head coach of the badminton club that Ishan trained in, as well as the owner.
The Mercy Club.
He had accompanied Ishan to the stadium today.
They sat in the car, neither of them being the first to speak.
It was not before they were almost home that Ishan heard the coach, Nilanjan, say in his usual lazy voice,
"let this be a lesson for you. Underestimate your opponent again and next time, the one getting the shuttle in their face would be you."
Ishan still didn't say anything as he was aware that he was wrong.
Nilanjan was a laid back person. His personality inevitably reflected on his traning methods.
His way of teaching players was to only warn them once beforehand and not saying a single word for the rest of the time.
Only speaking up again, after the deed was done.
He never scolded anyone verbally but for some reason none of the players talked back to him.
It was most probably because he always had live examples to support his claims, such as in this case.
Ishan had been warned once right before the final match started.
But after the warm up, Ishan had found that the opponent was rather wobbly in their play style and so he very conveniently forgot anything and everything Nilanjan had told him before the game.
Ishan had indeed underestimated his opponent a bit too much. And by doing that not only had he lost the second set he was also about to lose the third set.
When he saw that things were about to go out of hand, only then did he use brute strength to land smash after smash on the opponent's court until he climbed up all the way to 21 points. Needless to say, he would need an ice pack for his shoulders and wrist after he got home.
His opposite side was pretty agile and flexible, the force in her arms were also slightly above that of girls her age. But she seemed to be a novice as her shots, one way or another always ended up comming to Ishan's range of attack way too frequently.
Ishan stared out of the window.
The scenery outside grew more and more familiar as they got closer to his home.
He tried to imagine how it would feel like if it were him who lost today and couldn't help but cover his face in dispair.
All his friends and juniors in the team would probably be nice to him on surface but on the inside, they would definitely laugh at him for losing to a girl!
According to this gentle man's, twelve year's old Semi-vacant head, it was fine if a girl lost to a boy but if the otherwise were to happen, there was absolutely no way out of it. It's a stain for a life time!
While he was still shaming himself in his mind another sentence was tossed out to him from the front,
"So have you decided on how you will deal with him when you get home?"
This seemingly offhanded comment had the strength of popping the small bubble of imagination Ishan had created in just a matter of a second.
He looked at the rear view mirror, waiting for Nilanjan to meet his eyes.
When they had to stop in the last traffic light, Nilanjan finally met Ishan's gaze- which was filled with pure horror- with an mercilessly clam expression.
In this one day Ishan was away from training because of the match, he had totally forgotten about the final boss, at no where else but at his own house!
While the realisation downed on him he was already at his door step.
He looked at Nilanjan as if he was his last ray of hope and said in a pleading tone,
"uncle, won't you come in for a cup of tea?"
"Unlike you I am quite busy so no, thank you."
Nilanjan, the head coach and also the younger brother of Ishan's mother, said with a slight smile.
Ishan still didn't let it go, he got out of the car and opened the door to the driver's seat,
"mom misses you very much. She even asked me to bring you along this morning."
"That's odd. The last time I called her, she couldn't recognise who I was for a full minute. Turns out she didn't even have my number saved, hahaha." Nilanjan maintained his smile but Ishan was too young to detect the sarcasm in his words so Nilanjan closed his teeth and once again assumed an expressionless face.
Ishan was totally oblivious to all the complicated relations between adults.
Since his previous method didn't work, he moved on to his last as well as his signature move.
He hugged Nilanjan's arm and stuck to him with practiced ease.
Nilanjan was clearly too used to this to even try to escape.
After all, if this follows the usual sequence of events, there would be familiar voice calling for Ishan any moment now.
But even though Nilanjan put up with this human sized koala for quite a while, his supposed saviour didn't arrive. Instead, it was Ishan's father who came outside after hearing the sound of the car engine.
He then dragged an extremely reluctant Ishan back home, worried that he was dehydrated from the constant sweating all day in this hot weather.
Nilanjan was helpless as he watched his youngest nephew, being dragged in the house.
After his father had settled Ishaan in the house, he came right back and looked inside the car, through the window.
He was also a tall man so leaning down to the window level caused the joint of his waist to make a crisp cracking sound.
Nilanjan panically got out of the car with great concern for the fragile back of his brother-in-law.
After exchanging some casual greetings between each other, Nilanjan was invited inside once again. His answer was still negative, however this time very politely, totally unlike his ruthlessness towards Ishan.
He actually wanted to make an escape right after he dropped off his nephew but his plan didn't succeed so he just decided to stay outside and chat for a while before leaving, after all it wasn't everyday that his escape plans doesn't succeed.
Before he was about to leave, Nilanjan's eyes 'happen' to land on the first floor window. The first floor included the rooms of the two boys in the family. One of the rooms was facing the main entrance to the home.
At the sight of the person who was leaning against the open window, Nilanjan paused. He then smiled.
All his actions were very well coordinated. Not at all appearing out of place.
But the moment he saw the other person give him an overly kind looking smile in return, Nilanjan knew he was busted.
This was a young man of around sixteen or seventeen. He was also tall as most of his family members.
Actually Nilanjan had seen him the moment he got off his car. He was waiting for the boy to call Ishan back, like he would have done any other day. But for some reason today he just silently watched without making any moves to rescue his uncle.
The reason for this petty behavior only indicated to one possibility. An underlying grudge.
Nilanjan was well aware that he was the cause. So he could only try and ask for a truce, "I was busy with the match preparation since morning. And didn't get to talk to you the whole day today. It's a bit late but congratulations."
The boy seemed to have accepted the half hearted excuses and this time his smile was quite genuine.
He changed his position from leaning on the side, to resting his elbow on the window sill,
"Though a simple text probably wouldn't have taken half an eternity, it's alright. Excuse accepted. And thank you."
Nilanjan thought he was done. But the boy continued, "But I do hope, the reason wasn't something like it 'slipped my mind'."
Nilanjan maintained his impeccable act on the surface while feeling a hint of dispair for having been seen through.
Finally after some back and forth Nilanjan looked up at the young man properly.
It was for a very short while though, so short that it went unnoticed by the other person.
His gaze was soon covered by his eyelids gently dropping over. Effectively concealing the melancholy.
He then said in a casual manner while trying to change the subject, "Go easy on Ishan. The little guy has had a long day today."
"That would depend on the intensity of each of the mistakes he had made."
Nill didn't say anything in return to that, only shrugged.
'At I can say I tried my best if Ishan were to accuse me of not helping him later.'
Afterwards, he waved to the boy, turned to his car and drove off from this cozy little home of four.