I woke up to a great commotion in our hostel lobby. Both of my roommates’ beds were empty. Disheveled quilts were lying on the bed as if their owners had disowned them in hurry.
I scrambled towards the noise. Outside, in the lobby, a group of 20 odd boys aged between 18–20, were chatting excitedly. As I walked towards them, I kept getting stares from the hostel mates.
More & more hostel boys were joining in the commotion. As I reached the epicenter, suddenly people started staring at me, and the commotion kind of converted into a hush-hush.
I pulled my roomie aside and asked “what the hell is happening?”
He said, to the worst of my fears: “yesterday night, 25 underwear got stolen, 10 of them are claimed to be without any holes”.
He trembled as he declared “The serial underwear thief is back”.
Everything became hazy for me. I crumbled to the ground. Flashbacks of my worst memories hit me hard. I was the biggest victim of the underwear thief. He had stolen all my underwear. The one I was wearing that day was the only one left with me. With little pocket money, I could not afford to buy some immediately. So the sole survivor became my savior for the coming days. Wear, reverse it and wear again, wash, dry, microwave dry and wear again became a pattern for the coming weeks.
The underwear thief had not only stolen all my underwear, but he had also stapled my yellow-stained white undies on the college billboard, with my photo stuck right above the yellow stains.
In the days to follow, several other boys were shamed. Their worst underwear secrets were made public. Someone was awarded the “Jockey book of world record for the most holes”, “another’s was displayed as the smelliest underwear award”.
And now he was back. And I had 2 yellow stained white undies. And 1 white stained black undies. And 2 multi holes underwear. 3 of these underwear were drying on our hostel room window at the moment. Completely vulnerable.
Everybody was tense. There were huge queues in front of the laundry room. Desperate boys trying to wash away white and yellow sins from their underwear.
A growing mountain of discarded underwear became a landmark in the hostel lobby. People were simply discarding anything and everything which could become an embarrassment. Unbranded, worn out, stained, loose, fancy colored, random shaped, funky patterns, everything was being tossed discreetly in the pile.
It was too painful for me to see this. I had had enough. As the seniormost victim, I had to do something.
I took on myself to catch this nasty thief once and for all. I swore to become the protector of hostel underwear secrets.
To be Continued….
