68. Bully

A few minutes later, both the boys came out. Olivia straightened up and started walking towards the second floor. On her way, she met Ritutandra, Joy and Parijat. The three of them greeted her with a slight bow of their head and she nodded back. There, she showed them the library, music room and instruments room. When they saw the library, a collective gasp escaped their mouth, looking at the sheer number of books stored inside. The library space looked like a maze of huge shelves filled with varieties of books.

"Same method to enter or exit," Olivia said, bringing her watch near the scanner on the door to get her ID proof scanned.

"Wha... what if we g..g..get inside and... ca... cannot open... the d... door?" The same timid boy from before asked.

He had a pretty big built but somehow looked small with his hunched back and shrunken neck. Olivia noticed how he persistently avoided eye contact with her even while asking questions, and how his hands were tightly clenched and visibly trembling.

"There are emergency exit buttons right next to the doors in each room. The first one is for manually opening the door. You click it and pull the door handle. If that fails, the next one is for alerting the authorities that you got stuck inside. If you feel like you can't stay inside and wait for the authorities to reach, press the third one. It would dismantle the hinges of one of the doors. A slight push would be enough to make your way out. Also the doors are very light. You'd not get hurt by it." Olivia replied.

The boy looked at her with wide eyes in shock, surprise and gratitude. He had wanted ask that question from the beginning but was feeling scared of talking to her. However, the memory of a past experience made him gather the courage and spit out the question. At most, he expected her to tell him to wait inside and call for help, not go into great details of what to do in such a situation, especially as far as dismantling the door. Most importantly, she was equally serious while explaining each of the methods of exit. Now he felt guilty for wrongfully judging her as uncaring from her cold attitude.

"Oh... t... thanks... a... ac.. actually I... I'm clau... clau..." He struggled to say something when another boy pushed him rudely.

"Hey, are you a scaredy cat? Why are you stu stu stuttering? Geez. Can't you speak normally? It irritates my ears. You sound like a broken engine" he said.

Some of them laughed.

The boy's face became red from embarrassment, "I... I... so s... sorry... I'm sorry."

He lowered his head. Olivia carefully observed the reaction of each person. Sreemanti rolled her eyes, the boy who bullied him and two others laughed, one girl looked uncomfortable with the whole situation and another boy looked at him with disgust. Koushik was frowning at the bully, ready to say something.

But Olivia spoke before him, "Why are you stuttering?"

"I... I... stu... stu..utter... nor... normally." He said in a quivering voice.

"Sor... sorry... I didn't... m.. mean to ir... irritate you.. you all."

"Shut up," Olivia said coldly.

Koushik looked at her with a mixture of emotions. He felt sad for the boy getting bullied for no reason, he was disgusted by the bullies' behaviour, he was horrified by Olivia's indifference towards the crime that was being committed right before her eyes, and there was another weird emotion present that even he did not understand why. He felt... betrayed... by a stranger he had just met that day. Although subtle, as a sensitive person, he could distinguish it from the other strong emotions surging in his heart.

He said furiously, "Why are you all speaking to him like that? Don't you have basic humanity and manners? Is this how you treat a fellow student? Make fun of something he can't control? And you, Miss School Captain. How can you let a student get bullied in front of you? Isn't it your responsibility to ensure everyone maintains decorum in school?"

"No," Olivia said looking at Koushik with an empty gaze.

He moved back a few steps, feeling uncomfortable from staring at her lifeless eyes. When he looked around, he found that the others mostly did not care about a fellow student getting bullied. They either participated in it or ignored it. Like some of them were grumbling about being late to class, some were shifting in their place uncomfortably, waiting for the fiasco to get over while the bully was still jeering at the boy.

"Quiet," she addressed everyone in a low yet commanding voice.

The noisy environment made her fists itch to punch something, preferably the bully's face.

Everyone instantly became quiet as if they were voice-controlled robots. They followed her commands unknowingly.

She looked at her watch and said, "Tour done. Go to your classrooms."

"But we don't know which class we have been assigned to. You were supposed to show us." Some students complained.

Olivia dictated the class, section and name of the class teacher of each of the students. A few exclaimed in awe at her memorising skills. But they did not know that Olivia never memorised it. She had only looked at it once when she was in the Principal's office.

When they were dispersing, Koushik gave an angry and accusing look at her before turning back. He still could not figure out where his sense of betrayal came from.

Olivia called out, "Anupam stays."

She was referring to the guy whom the students were making fun of. Anupam stayed back with his head hung low while the other students left, ignoring him, except for Koushik.

"Are you also trying to bully him?" He said, scowling at Olivia.

She looked at him blankly and said, "Go to your classroom."

"No." He said firmly.

Olivia closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again.

"Go." She said coldly.

Koushik wanted to refute but her frosty eyes seemed to suppress his protest, he could not speak. He clenched his fists and walked away giving a worried glance at the boy one last time.

"You. Come here." Olivia turned to Anupam.

He stood there silently.

"I don't have all the time in the world," she said.

Anupam noticed the hint of annoyance in her voice which was not there till now. His instincts told him that angering her would not be a good choice. He timidly stepped forward while looking at the ground.

Olivia asked, "Why were you stuttering?"

"I... I...ju... just...s... stutter. I don't... kn... know w...why."

"Look at me." She ordered.

He kept his head lowered.

"Are you deaf too?" She asked.

The boy shook his head.

"Then look up," Olivia stated.

Anupam slowly lifted his head. Olivia could see his eyes turning red alongside his face. His hands tightly fisted the sides of his uniform.

"Why did you apologise to them?" She asked.

"Th...ey... said th... they felt unc... comfo...ortable lis..ning to... to m.. me," He said softly.

"But you said you speak like that?" Olivia said.

The boy nodded. "Then why did you apologise? Did you say anything rude? Insulted them?"

Anupam shook his head.

"Then why did you say sorry when they were the ones mocking you? Are you trying to appear pitiful by tolerating injustice?" Olivia raised an eyebrow.

Anupam shook his head.

"Do you think if you humble yourself to everything, people will feel bad for you? Today someone stood up for you but what about the next day? And the next? " Olivia said in a monotonous voice.

Tears glistened at the corners of his eyes.

"Your tears aren't valuable to the world. Today you cry, tomorrow someone else. Your silence will only fuel their atrociousness. You not retaliating will simply encourage them to bully others. Will you be able to forgive yourself, if, in the future, you saw them bullying someone, knowing that you could've prevented it? How many times do you expect to get help from good willing people? Once? Twice? Thrice? How long do you plan to live off other's help? It can only last so long. They can lend a hand but not walk your path for you. No one can if you aren't willing to help yourself. A step forward needs to be taken to make them step backwards. Now, whether you choose to be brave or just turn a deaf ear and a blind eye to everything is up to you."