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Wednesday 1 February 2017

Graduation Day - Short Story

Devosmita Sen
India
                                                                               


               “ The Graduation Day


Do you know who you are? 
Do you understand what has happened to you? 
Do you want to live like this?


 500 WORDS =) =========================================================================

“Mom! Today is my graduation. Whoo! Yippee!” Akanksha said to her mother while doing her victory dance .

“Yes dear, I am so happy that you are graduating college. Whole world is your doorstep now. Whee! My girl has really grown up now! “ said her mother from the kitchen while making her favorite breakfast.

“Yum! Mom .Today you have outdone yourself “Akanksha said while putting the last morsel in her mouth.

“Mom! I am off to college .Meet you there” said Akanksha touching her mother’s feet.
Then the door closed.


5 Years Later.

Rain is pouring .Once again the city is clogged. By the window, Akanksha is sitting and looking outside .Her mother is calling for her to come and have her breakfast but Akanksha seems lost in her own thought.

“I just over and over again try to think about that graduation day. It was such a beautiful morning “Akanksha says to herself trying to figure out what went so horribly wrong that she now is paralysed from the neck down.

“All my friends are in such great places in life and me just stuck .Just stuck” Akanksha thought.

Her mother interrupts her thoughts and wheels her to the dining table and says, “Beta! Eat your breakfast or it’ll get cold and your professor again called he wants to ask you whether you’ll accept position of Asst .Professor. You could give video lessons from home itself.” then looks at her daughter with the motherly concern and affection just like that graduation day.

For Akanksha now each task even the simple ones takes patience and strength. She is getting better in those but she has to take each day as it comes.

Akanksha nodded and says “I’ll think about it “.

Her mother worried about Akanksha as she no longer has any friends and tomorrow it would be 5 years since that incident.
“Akanksha, you know there is an app ‘Wanted Umbrella’ where you know you could get to know people who have similar disabilities and you know you could chat, support, help fellow people and go their meeting. Darling, you need to be open and make some friends “her mother suggested hesitantly knowing she did not like these talks but she knew that Akanksha needs friends who understand what she is going through and could support her. Her mother knew that Akanksha needs to move on.

“Mom, please don’t” Akanksha requested then moved towards the window.” It’s still raining” Akanksha said as she likes rains.

That night Akanksha dreamed of that day again and again and again. She was so relieved that it was morning .She went to her balcony on the way she saw a piece of paper lying on the table .It was familiar to her .She read it

Do you know who you are?
Do you understand what has happened to you?
Do you want to live like this?

Yea, She had written it when they were taking her to the hospital after the incident .But after it she had hidden it as she was afraid of it .Akanksha read that again aloud and the birds where chirping with her as if encouraging and reassuring her. She shouted at top of her voice again and again .Something about Akanksha changed that day

Well that was the last she dreamed about the graduation day, now she no longer feels stuck. She now is an Asst Professor and is working with an NGO of differently abled.

She is not where she had dreamed to be when she was a child but I think she is getting there. I think she’s making her mum’s word true about the world being at her doorstep.        =)


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