The girl who felt crushed     Chapter 2

The smooth tempo of the clock seemed to dominate the entire room as darkness began to evade the orange skies. Ara was immersed in her studies, studying ever since she had got home after school. She lived in a normal neighbourhood. Her parents were both very busy with their part time jobs, constantly trying to earn money quickly and pay off their debts. So the house was extremely silent as Ara prepared for the Maths Olympiad that was taking place by the end of the week.

Sweat drops constantly forming on her forehead, she wiped them off using the sweat drenched piece of fabric that formed a part of her school uniform. Her eye lids were on the verge of closing themselves, unable to bare with the amount of information that was being forced into her brain. Ara allowed her tiredness to take control and dropped her head unto her desk.

Her short trip to dreamland was soon disrupted when she heard the sound of the doorbell. Ara quickly readjusted the way she looked and ran towards the door. The person on the other side impatiently kept pressing on the doorbell and Ara already knew it was her mother.

She opened the door and smiled at her mother whose face was purely painted with tiredness. Her mother stepped inside and closed the door behind her with a loud bang. Even after all their years Ara was not used to the tremendous sound that was produced by the door when her mother had touched the pitiful bar of wood. And she knew she never will. Being in total silence for the whole day, to be suddenly met with noise was nothing but unpleasant for Ara.

“Ara, I hope you studied while I was gone.” Her mother said while yawning. Ara simply nodded her head and turned towards her room to go and study again. “Ara.... Please study well, all my hopes are on you. You know very well that your father isn’t the most responsible man on earth. I don’t think I can live with him anymore. When that time comes, it will be only you and me.” Her mother told with grief and annoyance clear in her voice. This was probably the fifth time her mother had said something like that. Her mother and father never got along. Honestly, Ara liked her father and never knew why her mother hated him so much. He was a little lazy and stuff, but that didn’t make him any less of a father.

Ara sighed and returned to her room again to continue with her studies. Her nights were made up of late night studies, her parent’s screaming and fighting with each other and her getting no sleep at all. But she was so used to this distressful things that they didn’t even seem to be a problem for her. Nothing mattered to her anymore and she wasn’t going to let anything bother her. She had set her mind on only concentrating on her studies instead of fooling around with her so called friends who treated her like nothing but a study-buddy.

“Wow.... Yumi, your so lucky! I wish I had a boyfriend like yours. Constantly showering you with gifts.” Ara could hear a classmate of hers who went by the name ‘Gina’ shout loudly in pure envy for the other girl. “ I heard Beakhyun was from a rich family.” Another girl voiced out as if she actually took pride in what she just said.  Ara mentally scoffed at the girls and their stupid adoration for that of a guy. She looked at them with a disapproving look and turned her attention back to her book.

“I think I just saw that Ara giving us a weird look.”  Gina said as loud as possible. Suddenly all eyes were on Ara. She uncomfortably shifted on her desk when she could feel everyone staring at her. “She must be so jealous of Yumi. Everyone knows her undying love for Beakhyun.” Gina shouted for the whole class to hear and Ara kicked her desk as anger began to overtake her senses. It was true, but was that was long back, it was just a little crush, nothing more nothing less. Ara didn’t even like the guy and these girls are claiming that she loved him. They have got to be kidding, because Ara does not love anyone and she never will. As selfish and cold-hearted it may sound, Ara was totally turned off with the whole deal about ‘love’. Her parents being the reason to her disinterest in boys and love.

“Oh! I’m sorry I revealed your secret.” Gina laughed at Ara. “Just look at her! How poorly dressed, her parents must be extremely poor.” Another girl said a joke that seemed to be funny that the whole class laughed at Ara. It was anything but funny for Ara. Tears were beginning to form in her eyes and she soon found herself feeling very tiny when compared to the other girls especially Yumi.

“No! I’m not poor.” Ara shouted unable to bare with the teasing and shame that was being poured on her. “Oh really ? Then tell me what your parents do for a living ?” Gina asked with a smirk on her face. Ara was rendered speechless. Her lips were glued to each other as stood there while most of them gave her pitiful looks including Yumi and some laughed at her.

“I think you already know but Beakhyun got Yumi a new expensive watch. You probably can’t get it even if you work your pants off. So you should hurry up and get a guy since your actually pretty instead of being a nerd and impressing the teachers.” The girls giggled and threw her looks and that was the last straw. Ara ran out of the classroom, her tears dropping more and more with every step. “Those rich people and their pride... I hate them.” She thought to herself, running away from the classroom. As much as Ara hated to admit it, they were right. She knew very well that her family’s financial condition was not very favourable. But they had no right to treat her like that. Ara was angry at herself for being weak in front of them.

She had ran so much that she started coughing and was forced to come to a halt. Before she knew it, she was already in front of the main gate and she mentally debated whether she should skip school and cry all day in her bed or if she should go home after school was over and cry all day in her bed. Not like it really mattered anyway. She had made up her mind, she was going to skip school. She found herself climbing up using the bars on the gate and as she expected, she failed, harshly dropping down on the ground. She winced in pain as she slowly picked herself up from the ground, regaining her composure.  Her tears had dried up with the black mascara that seemed to have washed down while she was crying. She didn’t even want to know how she looked at the moment, already predicting the glory of her tear stricken face.  

She turns around and makes her way towards the school building. But something at the back of her mind told her not to go back to class, fearing that she would be teased even more. So she just stood there trying to figure out a way to get through this sick drama.