She was going home after school like every day with her head facing down. The elders, including her parents, relatives, and neighbors demanded not only her but also the other girls in the society to always face down towards the earth while walking outside. They say that if she do so, then nobody would come to tease her. So, she followed them accordingly & never raised her voice.
But, unlike every day, she was called by a teenage boy who was wearing a T-shirt and jogger jeans. She lifted her head to get questioned by him. “Hey! May I know your name?” She mouthed her name to him, “I am Aarushi!” with a puzzled look.
Before she asks him why he wanted to know her name, he had walked back to his friends, who were a couple of meters away from them. She just walked past them with confusion lingering in her mind. She was just a 10-year-old girl who was not aware of the true nature of the society out there. She answered him without analyzing his hidden intentions. The girl’s age is not mature enough to comprehend the situation. Consequently, she fell into the treacherous chasm.
She totally forgot the incident that happened yesterday and is usually going back home today. Like every other day, she has followed the similar practice of bending her head down while walking home. While on her way, she heard someone calling her name and looked in her direction. The same teenager is now walking toward her with a terrifying look, though she cannot recognize the meaning underlying it.
She continued to go home without stopping for a second. The way the stranger and his friends behaved doesn’t seem right to her. Though they had not abused her verbally or physically, it felt extremely uncomfortable.
It has been repeating for months. Sometimes she used to take classmates along with her. However, they all refused to help her as they all had got afraid of them. Now she is all alone, not able to realize the solution. “Why did you tell your name, Aarushi? Can’t you see his motive towards you?”
She bawled at herself. “I can’t continue with this forever, so I must think of a way to get rid of them” After giving a lot of work to her brain, she decided to face them strongly contrasting to these days.
She has been trying to confront and rebuke them since last week, only to fail with fright. Nevertheless, she had settled to face them with courage, and with a lot of determination, and hours of self-motivation. Like all these days, he uttered her name, and everyone was making her anxious. Despite their menacing behavior, she shouted at them, “Idiot”.
Without looking at them, she just ran off from there when she had heard them howl in anger. After getting to the safe place, she stopped sprinting to hear how fast her heart has beating against her skin. She felt it might explode out of her ribcage. She spent a sleepless night thinking about how they will react to her hereafter. “Will they chastise me? Or will they beat me?”, terrific thoughts were haunting her mind.
The next day she strolled out of the school gate with trembling legs. She peeked into the usual place those gangs of boys stay in every day. Despite her savage actions, they are still in that area. She was pale and quivering incredible because of fright. Yet, she continued to walk, observing them from the corner of her eye. She suddenly halted in her spot because of what she had seen in front of her. However, the fear on her face has replaced with a smile and smirk. She observed they bent their head down immediately after seeing her. She could not comprehend their emotion, yet she felt so brave and walked, raising her head. Regardless, she realized that “You will be harassed and agonized until you confront and raise your voice and reprimand them.
So, raise your voice. The tone of voice is far better than silence.”
Since then, she never let her head bent down in her life and raised her voice to express the injustice.
Author: Nikitha Sai
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