Page 28 - Till the Last Breath . . .

She had left the examination hall thirty minutes before the scheduled

time. She knew all the answers. She had wanted to write them. The pen was
in her hand, and the answers in her head. But her hands had cramped. It
wasn’t the fear of the examination; she didn’t know what it felt like to be

afraid of an examination. There was something wrong with her hands. It
wasn’t the first time she had felt it, but she had chosen to ignore it earlier.

She had tried moving her hand in vain. After struggling with intermittent
pain and the lack of sensation for half an hour, she had started to write. She

had written three beautiful answers when the pain and the lack of sensation
came back. She had tears in her eyes. She didn’t know what was wrong

with her hand. Every page from every medical book she had read came
rushing back to her mind. Her head hurt. Tears streamed down her face.
Half an hour before the exam ended, she left the hall, tears in her eyes and

strange cramps in both her hands.
‘Why haven’t you been picking up your calls?’ Venugopal asked, worried

and flustered.
Venugopal had been calling her for quite some time now. Pihu had

disconnected all calls till she asked him to join her in the library.
‘There is something wrong with me,’ she explained. ‘I had not given it

too much thought earlier, but I know something is definitely wrong with
me.’
‘Yes, I know. You study too much,’ Venugopal suggested and smiled.

‘It’s not that. It’s the examination.’
‘What? You did well, right? Everything you taught me was perfect! It

was like you knew the questions beforehand. You are teaching me
everything from now on!’ he chortled.

‘I didn’t write anything after the third question,’ Pihu said, tears flooding
her eyes.

‘Hey … Hey … Are you crying? What happened? Were you nervous?
But you knew everything, didn’t you?’
‘I knew everything.’

‘Did you blank out?’ Venugopal asked, concern writ across his face.
‘NO! I knew the answers.’