Decision

The holi had been over. A light coloured holi was played in the college due to fear of coronavirus. Weekend was going to start from tomorrow. Rohan had already decided to take complete rest on Saturday and Sunday.

It was 5`o clock in the evening of Friday, Sameer came from the adjacent room and said, ”had you gone through the notice of college?”. Rohan replied, ”not yet” and then picked his phone and checked the official whatsapp group of the collage. The notice was “Due to increasing case of COVID-19, the college will be closed till 31st of March.”

At that time a little smile came to his face for getting a holiday of 15 days. In fact, all the student enjoyed this notice but no one had any idea that what is going to happen in the future.

Rohan called a few of his friends and everyone had already planned to leave within tomorrow. He called his father also, and father told him to come home if he wants. But Sameer was not in favour of going home. He was thinking to stay in Kolkata and to prepare for semester exams. Rohan was experiencing a warm desire to visit home as he had already missed a lot the holi of his village. He was deciding to go for home alone if Sameer will not join him.

But seats of all the trains were already reserved. Only a single train, whose stoppage was before a station of Madhubani, having some seats vacant. But that particular train used to arrive at 12’o clock at night. And distance of Madhubani from there was almost 50km and there was no other train for Madhubani from their before 4’o clock. It means only option was to stay at the station the whole night. But that station was like a deserted area so, very few people used to travel in that train.

Sameer was his cousin brother and generally, they used to travel together and family members were relaxed by this. Rohan was in this turmoil that whether go home or not. Suddenly, Sameer’s father called him, ”if you want to come home then come on Sunday. The train service will be interrupted from Tuesday for about 10-12 days. If things didn’t improve then you will feel trapped. SO, it’s better to come.”

His father told this in an intensifying manner, so not willingly but Sameer also became ready to move for home. A week later, government-imposed a lockdown for a month ordered everyone to stay in their house because situation was getting worse . Rohan was feeling relaxed as he was at his home and the effect of the virus was less in rural areas. Sameer was thanking his father because he had never thought that decision of going home will become so crucial.