‘Would you rather take a sensible student, or someone who

speaks
a foreign language well?’
My defiance stumped them all. Prof. Fernandez wiped his glasses
as he spoke, turning his head towards me. ‘English is no longer a
foreign language, Mr Jha. It’s a global language. 1 suggest you
learn it.’
‘That’s why I’m here, sir,’ 1 said.
My answers came from the heart but I didn’t know if they had
any
effect on the professors. The interview was over. They asked me
to
leave the room.
*
I stood in the corridor, figuring out where to go next. Piyush came
out of the committee room. His lean and fit frame made him look
like
a student, despite him being much older. He spoke to me in Hindi.
‘Your sports trial is in one hour. See me on the basketball court.’
‘Sir,
is there even a point? That interview went horribly.’
‘You couldn’t learn some English, along with basketball?’
‘Nobody
speaks it in our area.’ I paused and added, ‘Sir.’
He patted my back. ‘Get out of Bihar mode, son. Anyway, sports
quota trials are worth 85 per cent. Play well.’
‘I’ll do my best, sir.’
2
If she weren’t tall I wouldn’t have noticed her. It is funny how her
height shaped my life.
If she had been four inches shorter, my eyes may never have met
hers and everything would have been different. If I had not been
bored and arrived at the basketball court an hour earlier, it would
have
been different. If someone had not missed a pass and the ball had
not
come out of the court and hit me on the head, I would have had a
different life.Tiny bumps in time shape our lives, even though we
spend hours trying to make long-term plans. I had no plan to meet
the
love of my life on a basketball court. I was there only to kill time
and
because I had nowhere else to go.
A small crowd of students, mostly men, had gathered around the
Stephen’s basketball court. Girls’ sports trials always garnered an
audience—-there was no better excuse to check them out.
Everyone
spoke in English. I didn’t speak at all. I straightened my back and
stared at the court with a sense of purpose, mainly to come across
as if
I belonged there. As ten girls came on to the court, the crowd
cheered.
Five of the girls belonged to the existing college team; the other
five
had applied for admission under the sports quota.
Piyush came to the centie of the court, ball in hand and whistle in
mouth. As he blew it, the girls sprang into action.
Five feet, nine inches is tall for an Indian girl. It is tall even for a
girl in a basketball team. Her long neck, long arms and long legs
held
every guy’s attention. She was a part of the sports-quota
applicants’
team. She wore black fitted shorts and a sleeveless sports vest
with ‘R’
printed in yellow at the back. She collected the ball within
seconds.
She wore expensive Nike ankle-length sneakers, the kind I had
seen
NBA players wear on TV. Her diamond earrings twinkled in die
sun.
She dribbled the ball with her right hand. I noticed she had long,
beautiful fingers.
‘Ten points for looks, coach,’ a senior student called out as R
passed the ball. The crowd tittered. Well, the men did. The
wisecrack
distracted R for a moment, but she resumed her game as if she
was
used to such comments.
The sports-quota girls played well individually. However, they
didn’t play well as a team.
R dribbled the ball and reached the opposition’s basket. Three
opponents surrounded her. R passed the ball to her teammate,
who
missed the pass.
‘What the...’ R screamed. Too late.The rival team took the ball,
passed it to the other end and scored a basket.
R cursed herself, inaudible to anyone tise. She then signalled to
three of her teammates to cover specific opponents and jogged
across
die court.When she went past me, I saw her sweaty, flushed face
from
up close. We made eye contact for nanoseconds, perhaps only in
my
imagination. But in those nanoseconds something happened to my
heart.
No, I wouldn’t say I fell in love with her. I wouldn’t even say I
felt
attracted to her. But I felt something deep inside, strong enough
for my
heart to say, You have to talk to this girl at least once in your life.
‘Babes, cover her. I said cover’ R screamed. Her state of mind
was
as far from mine as possible. She passed the ball to her teammate,
who
missed scoring a basket again.
‘What are you guys doing?’ she shouted in perfect English. I felt
nervous; how would I ever speak to her? Her face was grimy, dust
sticking to her left cheek and forehead. Yet, it was one of the
most
beautiful faces I had seen in my entire life. Sometimes it is hard
to
explain why you find a person beautiful. Was it her narrow face,
perfectly in line with her slender body? Was it her flawless skin
and
complexion, which had turned from cream to pink to red? Or was
it
not about her looks at all? Was it her passion, her being totally
immersed in the game? I didn’t know.
Of course, I never actually thought it would lead to anything. She
seemed too posh to even give me a second glance.
Destiny, however, had other plans. For why else, in the seventh
minute of the first half, would the college team captain overthrow
the
ball outside the court, where it hit my head as I stood on the
sidelines?
Why would I grab the ball in reflex? More than anything, why
would
R come to collect it?
‘Ball, please,’ she said, panting. I felt paralysed.
‘I said ball, please,’ she said. I held on to the ball for an extra half
second. I wanted to look at her a bit longer. I wanted to take a
snapshot of her sweaty face and store it in my mind’s camera for
life.
I threw the ball at her. She caught it with ease and looked at me.
She could tell from my throw that I knew the game.
‘Change your point shooter,’ I said. For some reason, I had
managed to speak in correct English this time.
‘What?’ she said. She surveyed me from top to bottom. I now
wished I had worn better clothes. I had not changed out of my
interview shirt and pants, both of which the tailor back home had
stitched too loose for me. I looked out of place on the basketball
court.
With my folder of certificates, I resembled a hero from those
Hindi
films of the seventies—the one who could not find a job. I have a
Bihar state team T-shirt, I wanted to tell her. Of course, in the
middle
of a game, and as a first conversation, this was a terrible idea.
‘Your shooter is useless,’ I said.
The referee whistled to commence the game. She turned away
and
forgot about me faster than her throw reached her team member.
‘Here, pass it to me,’ R shouted as she reached the opposition
basket.
Her point shooter held the ball and looked around, confused.
‘I said here’ R screamed so loudly that pigeons flew off the trees
in
the lawns.The point shooter passed the ball, R caught it and took
a
shot from well beyond the three-point line.
Whoosh! 'The ball went through the basket. The crowd cheered.
They already had a soft spot for R anyway.
The referee announced a break at the ten-minute mark. The
college
team led 12-5. R huddled with her team, figuring out their
strategy for
the next half. As her team meeting ended, she wiped her face and
neck
with a towel.
I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I forgot I had my own trial in less
than an hour. I only wanted to figure out a way to talk to her a bit
more. Maybe I could tell her she played well. I wondered how to
tell
her about my state-level game without coming across as a show-
off.
And, more than anything, how would I go beyond five words of
English?
She caught me staring. I wanted to kill myself. She continued to
jgnli directly at me, the towel still around h