A thief
“Some people are cursed by luck—blessed with everything that should make them happy, yet abandoned to loneliness so deep it shapes their destiny. And sometimes, in that silence, they make choices that follow them forever.”
I don’t remember when I learned to lie.
Only that, at some point, it became easier than telling the truth.
My name is Ishaan.
At home, I was the youngest—the one who got the last piece of food, the one everyone said they loved.
It took me years to understand that love can exist without understanding.
And when it does… it leaves a different kind of emptiness.
We lived in Nagaland for a while.
People call it beautiful. The hills, the air, the quiet mornings wrapped in mist.
I remember none of that.
What I remember is a corridor.
It was my first day.
I was walking alone, holding my tiffin too carefully, like if I dropped it, something worse would follow. The school felt too big, too loud, too full of people who already knew where they belonged.
I didn’t.
A shoulder slammed into mine.
I turned.
Three boys.
Not smiling.
"New?” one of them said.
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.
The second push was harder.
My grip loosened. The tiffin slipped, hit the floor, the lid snapping open. Food scattered across the corridor.
For a second, no one spoke.
Then one of them stepped forward and pressed his shoe into it.
Slowly.
Grinding it in.
“Pick it up,” he said.
I bent down.
I don’t remember deciding to. My body just… obeyed.
My fingers hovered over the mess. Rice, dirt, oil mixing into something I couldn’t separate anymore.
Behind me, they laughed.
Not loudly.
Just enough.
“Leave it,” another one said. “He’ll learn.”
I stayed there a moment longer than I should have.
Then I stood up and walked away.
Without the tiffin.
Without looking back.
At home, my mother noticed.
She always did.
“Ishaan,” she said, tilting my face toward her, “what happened?”
There was a mark on my cheek.
A small one.
Easy to explain.
For a moment, I saw it—everything spilling out. The corridor, the laughter, the way something inside me had gone quiet.
But the moment passed.
“I fell while playing football, Maa.”
The words came out clean.
Practiced.
Even though they weren’t.
She looked at me.
Longer than usual.
Then she nodded.
And that was the end of it.
The next day, I walked slower through the corridors.
Like it might delay what was coming.
It didn’t.
They found me again.
Same faces.
Same look in their eyes.
This time, it wasn’t even about what they did.
It was about how expected it felt.
Like I had already become the kind of person this happens to.
And then they appeared.
Seniors.
They didn’t ask questions.
Didn’t check if I was okay.
One of them just grabbed one of the boys and shoved him back.
“Move.”
That was enough.
The others stepped away immediately.
No argument.
No resistance.
The seniors didn’t look at me.
Didn’t speak to me.
They just left.
Laughing about something else.
Something that didn’t include me.
But I kept watching them.
Because they weren’t afraid.
Because no one laughed at them.
Because they belonged.
And somewhere, quietly, something inside me shifted.
Not hope.
Something smaller.
More desperate.
If I stood close enough to them… maybe some of that would reach me.
At lunch, I sat alone.Again.
But this time, I wasn’t looking at the ground.
I was watching them.
The way they talked. The way they took space like it was theirs.
One of them noticed me.
“Go get snacks.”
I went.No hesitation.
When I came back, they didn’t tell me to leave.
That was enough.
It started small.Snacks, Drinks
Little things.
Each time, I stayed a little longer.
Each time, they didn’t push me away.
I didn’t question it.
Because it felt like belonging.
Even if it wasn’t.
The money came from my mother’s purse.
The first time, I stood there for a long time.
Just looking at it.
I told myself I wouldn’t.
That I didn’t need to.
That this wasn’t who I was.
Then I took a little.
Just enough that no one would notice.
That’s what I believed.
After that, it stopped feeling like a decision.
Just something I did.
Quietly.
Carefully.
Days blurred into weeks.
I stopped thinking about right and wrong.
Because for the first time…
I wasn’t alone.
Or at least, I didn’t feel like I was.
The day it ended was ordinary. That’s what I remember most.
My mother handed me money.
“Give this to your father.”
I nodded.
And before leaving
I took more.Not even thinking about it.
That’s how normal it had become.
At the market, my father was arguing over vegetables.
Same as always.
For a moment, everything felt untouched.
Then my sister found me.
“Maa is calling you.”
That was it.
No explanation.
Didn’t need one.
Something inside me had already started sinking.
The house was quiet.
Too quiet.
My mother took me into her room and locked the door.
And then she cried.
Not loud.Not dramatic.Just… broke.
“Ishaan,” she said, “why?”
I didn’t have an answer.
Not one that made sense outside my own head.
“I won’t do it again.”
The words came fast.
Repeated. Empty. Because even as I said them, I knew something had already changed.
She opened the door. My brother was there.
The first slap came before I could react.
Sharp.
Sudden.
The second hit harder.
Then another And another.
I didn’t move.
Didn’t raise my hands. Didn’t say anything.
Not because I agreed.
Not because I thought I deserved it.
But because, in that moment I understood something.
No one was here to listen.
After that, nothing exploded.
It just… shifted.
My sister stopped talking to me. Completely.
My brother didn’t hit me again.He didn’t need to.
Every look said enough.At home, I existed.
That was all.
At school, the corridors stayed the same. So did the silence. The seniors didn’t call me anymore.
Didn’t need me.
Whatever I thought I had earned was never mine.
Days passed.
I don’t remember how many.
I just remember feeling like I was there…without really being there.
Like something had been switched off.
But even now—
there’s one question that never left me.
Not with time.
Not with distance.
Why didn’t anyone ask me why?
Why didn’t my mother ask where the money went?
Why didn’t my brother ever see me sitting alone?
Why did no one notice before it was too late to matter?
Yes. I was wrong. I stole. I lied.
I became something I never thought I would be.
But I wasn’t born like that.
No one is.
I became it slowly.
In silence.
In places where no one was looking.
And sometimes I think
if just one person had stopped…
and asked me one simple question—
“How are you, Ishaan?”
Maybe I wouldn’t have needed to lie.
End
