Together… Always Together

It has been a long time since the five of us were together.
And together—that word is not just a word for us; it is a memory, a feeling, a rebellion wrapped in laughter.

Together meant laughing without reason,
fighting without hatred,
flirting without fear,
and wandering through markets with empty pockets but full hearts.
Together… together…
Ah! Even the sound of it feels warm, as if the word itself knows how much it matters—not just to us, but to anyone who has ever belonged somewhere.

Our kingdom was a bench near the college gate.
In the language of engineers, it was called the nukad—a tea stall where rebels gathered, armed with notebooks, sarcasm, and cups of boiling tea. It was the battlefield against assignments, practicals, and the suffocating weight of theory. After all, we were engineers—rebels by destiny.

At the nukad, conversations flowed endlessly.
Who was the most beautiful faculty?
Who was the bombshell of the campus?
Who walked like a hero from a movie?
These debates had no conclusion, only laughter. That tea stall was no less than a student parliament, and its owner—our Speaker—constantly tried to restore order with his famous command:
“Chup ho jaiye… chup ho jaiye…”
Just like the real Parliament, order rarely returned.

We were five soldiers in that rebellion army.
Our discussions were often about torture—internal assessments, record work, assignments forced upon us like rituals without meaning. Our imagination was wrapped tightly in copied pages, stapled dreams, and borrowed words. No one cared about the thoughts roaming freely in our minds, begging to be heard.

Yet, in every condition—harsh or hopeful—we stood together.
True rebels do not flee; they endure.

That nukad became our Republic of Resistance.
We gathered there every day, carrying anxiety about four long years of graduation—four endless years. Our voices were softened by fear of internal marks, the silent currency that shaped our percentages and futures. So we protested quietly, sipping tea, swallowing anger, loving those very marks we pretended to hate.

Tea was our fuel.
Words were our weapons.

Sid always spoke first.
“This is all crap,” he would say. “Assignments kill our flying thoughts. It’s just copying—from notes, from anywhere.”

“I agree,” I would nod, loyal to the rebellion.

Then Raju, ever the defender of order, would say,
“It’s for our own good, yaar.”

And instantly, rebellion would strike back.
“Another bookish bug speaks,” I’d say, smiling.

Then came Tyagi ji—the bravest among us. A genius, according to himself, and perhaps to us too. The system, he believed, had ruined him.
“These assignments suffocate me,” he’d say. “They cage my imagination.”
He lived in his own universe, and somehow, we all believed him.

Then it was my turn.

I would order another round of tea—because rebellion cannot survive without fuel.
“All this is fine,” I’d say, “if done honestly. Ask us to think, to question, to explore. Let learning breathe.”

“That’s an honest thought,” Preetu would say. “Good, Aki.”

Preetu.
The only girl among five rebels.
Punctual, disciplined, responsible—everything the system loved. She completed assignments on time, sometimes even before time. We admired her deeply, because she was our silent savior.

We copied her assignments shamelessly.
Not because we were lazy—but because we were rebels who valued time. We submitted everything on schedule and returned to the nukad, where real education waited for us—with tea, laughter, arguments, and freedom.

And there, on that bench, with chipped cups and loud voices, we learned what no syllabus could teach us:

That being together is sometimes the greatest rebellion of all.