Growing Up

Tears come naturally to me. I have cried in school, in college and yes, in office too.
I was in Delhi when my Class XII result was declared. I was staying with my uncle who had just shifted base from Pune and they were yet to get a landline. So my mum had rung up my aunt's place and then both my aunts arrived, with the result, to my uncle's place in the evening. They handed me a Post-It with my marks on it and I don't think I had gone beyond the first line before tears started rolling down my cheeks, thick and fast. R, 11 years younger, was the only person with me in the room and she held my hand and kept on saying with the innocence only a child can possess, "I will never study. I will become a dancer."
Despite her efforts and later my parents' over the phone (Uncle had returned from office with his cell), I cried for the next seven hours. In the morning, my eyes would hardly open, the left one having swollen to a potato's size. Dad, who was also in Delhi then, but at a different place, arrived around 10 and hugged me and told me not to worry.
I cried every night for the next two weeks. I was only 17 and staying away from home for the first time. Since I didn't have any privacy there, I would wait for everyone to fall asleep, then softly cry into the pillow.
My relatives didn't make it any easier with their comments. "Why don't you take up Home Science? That's the best subject for girls." Or "Why don't you join some translation course at IGNOU?''
Somehow, however, things worked out. I cleared the cut-off required to take the English entrance test at a decent college by a tiny margin of 0.25%. I got through.
Something similar happened yesterday. I surpassed my own expectations in two sections of an exam, but the third section was absolute disaster which just pulled my total down. When I first saw the marks, my heart sank, I could feel the tears welling up. I left my job, stayed at home for six months and now, this? I knew I was about to disintegrate.
But something happened as I was making my way up the stairs from the cyber cafe in the basement. I told myself that I would talk to my parents first without crying. I did. I spoke to my brother. I spoke to S, giggling and laughing.
I met up with S. She asked me if I had cried, I said I would probably do so at night.
At night, I reached home, told my grandparents amd then went into my room. Chatted again with S and M, discussed Hindi film songs from the 80s with the former and Kabul Express with the latter.
I finally went to bed around 1.30, but the tears didn't come. I thought about everything that had happened, I thought about my future, but I didn't cry.
And then I thought, perhaps, this not-so-good result may have done what 25 years of living hasn't- made me grow up.
I thought about what Mum said. You did your best and that was important. S said giving my job was a risk I had to take if I didn't want to have any regrets at 50. And Dad asked me to have faith in God. I do.