02: About Another Bet Lost

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"I'm not getting up so earlyyyyy!!"
That was 10am, and the first lecture was about to begin. But who cares, when your attendance records are being taken care of!
"Kanishk" called out the Class Co-ordinator.
"Present" answered Rishab.
Antara's call was taken care of by Sunidhi. Smiti meanwhile was on call with Kanishk.
"C'mon, get up. This is no time to sleep! How will you learn things without attending the lectures?" said Smiti.
"Seriously, how do you do it by attending the lectures!!?? I am telling you, I am NOT GETTING UP SO EARLY! Now listen to the co-ordinator and let me doze off." said Kanishk and disconnected the call.
Smiti was surprised at something.
"What? Did he get up?" asked Sunidhi.
"No! But he wasn't screaming today. Wait, did he get high last night?" answered Smiti, her eyes filled to the brim with confusion.
"I wish I could believe that, but how would he ever buy any such thing?" giggled Anish. "Kids are not allowed to drink!!" Rishab and Vineet laughed along.
"That's not funny!" very seriously commented Armaan, and then turned to Smiti. "Really? Has he been drinkin for a while? Well, ofcourse not that I'll get company.. I don't drink, you know!!" he said with so much of modulation in his voice that noticing how false it was almost got impossible.

[After 45 minutes of lecture by Mrs. Kaushik (Caustic as the students called this Physical Chemistry lecturer)]
The activity in the class room had greatly reduced. Someone poked Smiti awake.
"What?" cried Smiti with a voice choked out of sleeping.
"Get up!! Lecture's about to be over" whispered Rishab, maintaining his "I-am-studying-guys" look.
Smiti replied with her eyes not opening to let even a single particle of air in, "See, this is for the last time I am warning you. I can't bear her blabbering. Let me sleep."
Before she could sleep again, another poke woke her up.
"Ohkay listen" she said, now a little more loudly, "This woman has been on with her useless crap for one hour, but I didn't stop her. Why do you stop 'me' from dozing off to save myself from listening to her big-time loser Chemical stories? I'd rather find talking to the test-tubes more interesting!"
"Well, sure you would! Let's go and see what else interests you!" said Mrs. Kaushik, as she stood right behind Smiti, staring at Smiti through her vintage glasses. Suddenly all drowsiness disappeared, and Smiti bounced up awake.
"What? NOoooooooooo.. I was not talking about you, Mrs. Caust.. Kaushik. It was Antara. She's been talking weird-" explained Smiti, and then Antara stopped nodding, 'actually' woke up and responded.
"Who?? Me? What did I do?"
She stood up, and Smiti followed. Mrs. Kaushik was quick to respond. She knew students were good at it, and so she didn't give them the time to make anything up.
"She says you've been talking to her. Weird stuff!"
"Yeah! Like I ever do. Infact, I was attentively listening to your lecture, till she made me realise how boring it was." said Antara, smiling like she had just returned after a long tiring day at work, completing a major task.
She only realised what she had done when Mrs. Kaushik told her the interpretation of what she had just said. "So, you've been sleeping through my lecture too?"
"Urrgg.. You're sucha bi-" Antara was going to complete it with Bitch for Mrs. Kaushik, if you're intrigued.
"Binderful teacher.." interrupted Rishab. "She has some pronounciation trouble. Last time she told me she had 'bin' (been) the competition. I said 'for how long?' And then I realised, she meant she had won." He laughed aloud at his own joke, his eyes begging Mrs. Kaushik for just one smile. But Mrs. Kaushik's expressions remained the same like she had been touched by Midas, after Midas changing his power from "turn-into-gold" to "just-stone-will-do".
"Oh! Now I get what this is all about" said Antara as she finally understood what was happening around her. "No, we were not sleeping."
"Yeah? Me neither, while you were making this whole story, which for your information was not entertaining, like my lecture, at all. So how do you like this? Let's go to the Dean's office and see if he gets amused by your little tale"
The three of them got up, and followed Mrs. Kaushik.
The class was silent only till the next weird response to this came in.
Followed by a yawn, a half-choked voice asked "What happened? Did Mrs. Kaushik just faint?" said Anish leaning sideways to see where Mrs.Kaushik stood.
"I don't think so" said Armaan, followed by another yawn, rubbing his eyes. "I think the people of my secret society were here.." Too much for Anish to remain sleepy after listening to.
Now you don't want to know how the rest of the people responded, right?

[An hour later, in the cafeteria]
Sunidhi and Anish were discussing something when Vineet interrupted. "Do you think that's a guy?"
Sunidhi made her eyes smaller and saw carefully in the direction Vineet was pointing. "NO!! Ofcourse that's a girl."
Anish casually slurped on the weird new shake they had just introduced. "Ewww.." he said, but then he looked around to see if anyone noticed. He didn't like to let people know that he made a wrong choice. The real punch is that people never let him realise that they knew it.
"Really? Why?" said Vineet, quite confident that it was still a guy.
"Well.. Look at how she's walking." Vineet gave an "Oh C'mon" look to Sunidhi.
"What? I'm telling you, she's a SHE!"
"Yehaah! And you really think I'd buy that?"
"Well!" said Sunidhi. "May be we can have a bet!"
Anish was still slurping, and listening to all this carefully.
"Ohkay! 100 bucks" said Vineet as he took the challenge.
"500!" strongly challenged Sunidhi. Vineet's expressions went from 10 to 3 on the meter of confidence.
Anish giggled, and was noticed. But nobody really said anything.
"Prove it to me that it's a girl!"
"For that," started Sunidhi, "you'll have to do a little something. Unbutton your shirt, and she'll hit on you. I can see that craving in her eyes."
"Huhhh No! I am not doing that." said Vineet. His eyes were back to open after a long interesting Challenge fight. But that did not happen with Sunidhi.
"Do I hear my purse telling me it's ready for a new family member? What? Did it just say, it's a 500 bucks note?" she said with a lot of excitement mixed with gravity.
Vineet thought for a while and then began to breathe like a Mad-bull. "You don't win, Sunidhi Manchandadi! I'm in"
Sunidhi boiled up. Well ofcourse, people had been making weird stuff out of her name lately. "Ohkay seriously, do you guys not like my name?"
But Vineet didn't hear a word. He took the shake from Anish. It was brave of him, because when Kanishk only shifted his food to the other side, he got punched in face.
Anyway, Vineet threw it on his shirt and then unbuttoned it and shouted "Oh My God! My shirt... The shake all over"
The girl came running. "Did I hear it right? I mean, you need help?" she said and then whispered into Vineet's ears, with a mild blush over her face, "May be I can make some free service. You seem to work out, by the way!"
Vineet was trembling. Sunidhi immediately got up and whispered into the girl's ears, "He likes you! Give him your number."
She smiled and gave Vineet her number and then went away saying "Here.. Call me. I am Naresh!"
Vineet and Sunidhi's eyes and hands were spread in shock.
And then Anish got up and said "You could have asked me, and saved yourselves a lot of embarassment. That's one of the cleaning-boys, new at cafeteria. But anyway, thanks for another story." He called up Kanishk. "Hey Kanishk, where are you? Funny story. Vineet just..." Spices were, ofcourse, added to make it wilder.

[Another lapse in time]
"I can't believe it!" exclaimed Smiti with a big smile.
"Yeah! He's such a nice man" agreed Antara.
"Ofcourse. Such a sweet, kind.. " began Rishab, but could hold it for long and said what had been ringing in his mind. "GIGOLO!"
"What? Why?" said Sunidhi. She was keenly interested in knowing the spicy story (for a gossip, ofcourse). But then she held her expressions back and looked more concerned.
"They were sleeping.. They were talking.. They were making stories up.." complained Rishab.
"Yeah, so?" said Sunidhi.
"He has been punished to sit outside his office in the place of peon for two days" said Smiti keeping herself from laughing, but then finally they all burst into laughter.
"Yeah, because apparently, he didn't like it much when I followed Antara and Smiti, and told him how stunning he looked in that 'tie'" slowly said Rishab, looking down at his feet.
"The 'TIE'?? You liked him in the tie?" exclaimed Armaan.
"Is it my fault that Smiti complimented on the 'Shirt' and Antara, on the 'Pants'?" wailed Rishab.
"Dude! But the 'Tie'? Think of his esteem. You could have combined it with his Underpants!" came the world's wisest advice from Armaan to numb everyone listening.

[A few minutes later]
Kanishk entered the cafeteria, and dragged himself down to their table.
"You don't seem fine!" said Smiti. Sunidhi, Vineet, Rishab and Anish got busy with the discussion of what had just happened with Vineet and Sunidhi.
"I am, I am! I just fell. Anyway, I met this girl -" Kanishk started.
"Fell in love, huh?" interrupted Smiti.
"No! Why would you bring that up?"
"It's written all over your face" said Antara, like she had just completed a study on Kanishk's face.
"Here!" pointed Smiti at Kanishk's left cheek and then on the forehead, "and here!"
"Just two? And that makes you say I am in love?"
"No actually, just one. The cheek one. Everywhere else, it's written that you are in Love!" said Smiti.
"No, I'm not! Guys, the girl is Pratigya, just another friend I made today. She's an amazing singer and is here to pursue it as a profession." said Kanishk justifying (atleast he believed he could) that he wasn't in love.
"Singer? Oh.. That's bad. These guys are so -" started Anish, as a girl's topic grabbed their attention.
"No! She's good. She's just great. Don't talk like that about her." argued Kanishk. Actually, nobody was really arguing back.
"You're welcome, guys!" said Anish as everyone smiled mischievously at Kanishk.
Kanishk's brows rose up. "You don't think I am really in love, do you?"
"Yes, we do!" said Sunidhi.
"And I don't agree at all" said Kanishk, forcing his body language into conveying that he didn't care.
"Don't challenge her, dude! She's evil" said Vineet still not able to come out of his trauma.
Armaan finally found an opportunity to be the hero. "I am with Kanishk. He's not in love. We are the Single bros."
"You know what, liars often get the punishment shared by their friends. So here's Armaan to share yours!" laughed Smiti at both of them. Strangely, her prediction went true. A girl came growling towards Armaan, gave him a tight-slap, swore at him, and then stormed out of the cafeteria. And then Sunidhi spoke. "You won the bet. And I won entertainment. This is the girl I kissed. I told her after the kiss that you had threatened me into kissing her or you would... You know what stories I can make up, don't you?"
"Aaahhggg.. The war is not over yet, Sunidhi Rajavansh Rai!" said Armaan. His left-cheek had gone all red.
"What's wrong with y'all?" cried Sunidhi.
"But I think now I like this girl more than the last one...!" said Armaan looking at the door she walked out of, with a lot of love in his eyes.
"Let's move.." said Rishab taking his bag up.
"Yeah!" said Vineet and everyone picked bags up and started moving. And then Armaan threw his last question to Sunidhi
"How good a kisser is she?"
[The day concluded]