The ceiling fan in the classroom hummed with a rhythmic, irritating buzz, its blades cutting through the stagnant afternoon air. Veer's gaze was locked—unmoving—on a single golden lock of hair that danced in the artificial breeze. Behind that strand of hair lay Priya's profile: the dark, depthless eyes, the soft curve of her pink lips, and skin that seemed to glow like polished gold. In that moment, the chaotic roar of sixty students in the middle of a pre-lecture break didn't exist. The world had shrunk down to the girl sitting three rows ahead.
Veer, an eighteen-year-old with a face that usually carried a look of bored indifference, was currently gripping the edges of his desk so tightly his knuckles were white. He felt like he was strapped into a spring-loaded seat, ready to be launched into the air at any second. His heart was racing, pounding against his ribs with the frantic speed of a high-stakes mutual fund disclaimer. Romantic relationships are subject to social risks, his mind whispered, mimicking a television ad. Please read the girl carefully before proposing.
But Veer was done with caution. He reached into his bag and pulled out a single red rose and a soft pink card. The items felt heavy, like lead weights in his trembling hands. He stood up, his movements stiff, and navigated the narrow aisles until he was standing directly in front of Priya.
As if on cue, the entire classroom fell into a vacuum of silence. It was the kind of sudden, eerie quiet that usually meant a teacher had walked into the room, but Veer was too focused on the blood rushing to his ears to notice. He took a deep breath, extended the rose, and let the words out.
"I love you, Priya."
Priya didn't blush. She didn't smile. Instead, her eyes widened with a flash of genuine alarm. She glanced past Veer's shoulder, her teeth gritted as she hissed in a low, sharp voice. "Shut up! Veer, look behind you!"
Veer froze. A wave of cold realization washed over him as a heavy, gravelly voice boomed from the doorway. "Oh, Hero. Aashika Awara. Why don't you take that rose and find your seat? I have results to announce."
The classroom didn't just laugh; they erupted. The silence hadn't been for Veer's bravery; it had been for the professor who had been standing right behind him the whole time. Veer retreated to his seat, his ears burning with a heat that felt like a physical fever. The humiliation was just beginning.
"Failed in Math. Again," the teacher barked, tossing a report card onto Veer's desk. "And this time, I need your parents' signature. Understood, you Lanth (useless)?"
The word Lanth rippled through the room. But the sound that cut deepest was Priya's laugh—the loudest in the room. The same laughter that used to make Veer feel like his world was in bloom now felt like it was burning his life to the ground. He couldn't take it anymore. He stood up, grabbed his bag, and walked out of the classroom, the teacher's mocking shouts and the students' derisive whistles following him down the hallway.
He walked toward the exit of the college, his mind a blurred mess of equations he couldn't solve and a girl he couldn't win over. Mathematics and love were the same thing to him: two complicated systems where he was destined to fail.
As he stepped out into the humid air, the thought of home felt even worse than the classroom. Since his father had been murdered in a cold-blooded business rivalry, the house had changed. His mother and sister were all he had left, but they were also the people he felt he was failing the most. He was the man of the house now, yet he couldn't even manage a passing grade in Math, let alone protect them from the three-crore debt that hung over their heads like a guillotine.
He looked down at the rose in his hand, now wilted and crushed. He dropped it into the gutter and started the long walk home, unaware that his life was about to shift from the mundane misery of college to a struggle for survival on a different world entirely.