The Unveiling

🎶🎶 Evandi unna pethan pethan 🎶🎶
🎶🎶 Pethan pethan pethan pethan 🎶🎶
🎶 Kaiyila kedacha sethan sethan 🎶
🎶 Sethan sethan sethan sethan 🎶

“Ugh, why does this stupid song keep playing non-stop in my head?”

More importantly, why am I still not asleep?

For God’s sake, Reenu. Sleep, bitch, sleep.

Tomorrow is the first day of college. YOU DO NOT WANNA SHOW UP ON YOUR FIRST DAY LOOKING LIKE A ZOMBIE.

No more thoughts. No more thinking. Inner peace. Blank mind. Sleep! Sleeeep! Sleeep!

🎶🎶 Evandi unna pethan pethan 🎶🎶
🎶🎶 Pethan pethan pethan pethan 🎶🎶
🎶🎶 Aargh !!! For God’s sake. 🎶🎶

Reenu swore, utterly annoyed with herself, and checked the glowing radium hands of the table clock—5 AM. Still two hours left for her alarm to ring. She supposed it was futile to keep trying, not with this restless energy buzzing under her skin. Might as well start the day.

She kicked off her heavy covers. The cool granite floor chilled her soles instantly as her feet touched the ground. She tiptoed to the bathroom in the shorts and white tank top she had slept in. They were a bit old, and she had grown considerably over the summer vacation. The once loose fabric that she used to wear casually around the house now clung to her body like a second skin. It was tight, stretching over the new curves that had filled out her frame over the last few months.

She stripped herself bare and stepped into the enclosure. Reminding herself to badger her father more fiercely for a water heater, she turned on the shower. She began a little shivering dance, jogging in and out of the spray, yelping every time the icy water hit her warm skin. Once her body adjusted, she stepped in properly, letting the cool stream wash away the sticky remnants of sleep and tiredness. Her mind cleared, and she felt energized after the long, languorous bath.

Since there was ample time left, she took her sweet time getting ready. She dried herself slowly, combing out her jet-black wavy hair, moisturizing her arms and neck, and applying some very light makeup. That was all she really needed. She already had a complexion and features most girls would kill for. People often compared her looks to the actress Tamannaah, thanks to her almond-shaped dark brown eyes, high cheekbones, full lips, and radiant, milky-fair skin.

She pulled on a simple white t-shirt and blue jeans. A carefully curated combo for her first day. It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, yet it suited her perfectly; the dark fabric made the radiance of her natural skin tone pop. The outfit hugged her curves nicely—snug enough to show off her figure and shape. She wore a cropped demin blue jacket over it to compelete the look. Perfect.

Satisfied, she headed toward the kitchen. She expected her mother to be busy preparing breakfast and packing lunch for college. As she reached the entrance, Reenu quieted her footsteps and peeked inside.

Her mother, Mary, was bustling around the kitchen just as expected, juggling the boiling tea and the sizzling appam pan simultaneously. She was wearing a nice off-white cotton saree with a brown blouse. Mary always wore sarees at home, claiming it was for the sake of comfort, but Reenu knew the real reason.

Her navel-crazy husband—Reenu’s father, Thomas.

The saree gave him easy access to his obsession: his wife’s beautiful belly and navel. Though Mary always complained about Thomas’s relentless teasing of her midriff, Reenu was perfectly aware that her mother loved the attention.

It was Mary’s beauty and skin that Reenu had inherited. So, it went without saying that Mary was a very beautiful woman herself for her age—an older, slightly fuller version of Reenu. Reenu’s eyes traveled to Mary’s plush, fleshy hips from behind. I really can’t blame Dad for wanting to squeeze that every chance he gets, she thought. It was a very alluring sight.

Reenu quietly tiptoed and sneaked up behind her. She placed a hand on the exposed, fleshy hip and gave it a squeeze.

“Ahhh…” Mary let out a soft, coy yelp, thinking it was her husband.

With a wicked smile, Reenu slid her hand along the buttery-soft skin to the front of her belly. She found her target instantly—pushing her index finger right into Mary’s deep oval navel, burying it all the way to the sensitive bottom.

Mary shivered violently under the sudden stab of pleasure. But then her eyes went wide as her brain processed the sensation. The hand sliding along her waist felt smaller than her husband’s. And the finger currently invading her navel had a long, manicured nail that was poking sharply into her core.

“Aaargh! Reenu!!! THIS GIRL!”

She screeched, slapping the hand away and spinning around with mock anger, raising a hand as though she was going to hit her. Reenu jumped back, laughing loudly.

“Don’t you have anything better to do than bothering me while I am busy trying to do ten things at once?” Mary scolded, though her cheeks were flushed.

Reenu continued to laugh in childish delight. “Gotcha again! That reaction is never gonna get old.”

Mary scowled, adjusting her saree. “Stop messing around. Go eat your breakfast. You don’t want to be late for college on the first day itself.”

“Relax, Mary darling… There is still ample time left. Besides, Dad said he will drop me today.”

She gave a quick peck on her mother’s cheek to pacify her, then loaded her plate with hot appams and egg curry before heading to the dining room.

She was halfway through gobbling down her breakfast when her father, Thomas, walked in, returning from his morning jog. He was a pleasant-looking man with a wheatish complexion and a receding hairline peppered with grey here and there.

He froze dramatically in the doorway at the sight of Reenu.

She grinned brightly through a mouthful of food. It was an uncommon sight in the house to see Reenu awake, let alone ready, at this time of day.

“Crows are going to fly upside down today. The unthinkable has happened. My daughter is awake before the sun hit her ass.”

“Ha-ha, very funny. That joke must be older than your grandfather, Dad,” Reenu said sarcastically.

Thomas laughed, wiping sweat from his forehead with a towel. “Some jokes are timeless, kiddo. Let me go quickly freshen up.” He raised his voice and yelled towards the kitchen, “Maryyyy… I am back!”

“Yesss. Breakfast and tea coming in a minute…” she yelled back.

He took a quick shower and joined his daughter at the dining table. She was already done with breakfast and was idly scrolling through Reels on her phone.

Mary emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray of food in one hand and a steaming cup of tea in the other. Because she was holding things in both hands, her saree had shifted slightly. A generous portion of her fleshy hips was visible, and a tiny, dark corner of her big navel peeked out teasingly from the edge of her pallu.

Thomas’s throat went dry at the alluring sight. Even after two decades of marriage, his obsession with his wife’s midriff hadn’t died down one bit.

Mary pretended not to notice, though she was perfectly aware of what she was doing to her husband. She placed the plates and cup in front of him and turned to return to the kitchen. The next second, Thomas’s hand shot out and landed on her exposed hip.

She stopped in her tracks with a shy smile.

Thomas turned her around and pulled her closer to him, right between his legs. Without hesitation, he moved her pallu aside, fully exposing her delicious, soft belly and that deep, well-like navel. He sank his face into all that yummy flesh with a deep, soul-searing kiss, burying his nose into her slightly damp skin. It was still a bit sweaty and salty after all her bustling around in the hot kitchen, which only drove him crazier. He planted a few more loud, deep kisses in quick succession before looking up at her.

She looked down, meeting his gaze shyly with a mock pout.

Thomas went in again, but this time he didn’t just kiss. He plunged his tongue right into the depths of her navel and licked deeply.

“Aaaaaaaahhhhh…”

Mary moaned, her knees buckling slightly as she felt his wet tongue twisting deliciously inside the depths of one of the most sensitive parts of her body.

But suddenly, she snapped out of her momentary reverie. She remembered their audience. She smacked the back of her husband’s head.

“Ahh, stop it, Thomas! Don’t you feel ashamed to do these kinds of atrocities in front of your own grown up  daughter? Whom, I should remind you, is nearing marriageable age herself!” she scolded sternly, though her face was flushed pink.

Thomas started, as though just realizing that himself. He turned around to see his daughter giggling behind her hand.

The sight of her father teasing and kissing her mother’s navel was nothing new for Reenu. And Thomas knew it, too. He just shrugged nonchalantly.

“So what? Once she is married, her husband will be doing the same thing to her as well. Let her watch and learn. It’s practical education.”

“Uff! Such a navel-crazy idiot you are,” Mary complained, putting on a mock angry face and pushing his hands off her waist. She quickly adjusted her saree to cover the ‘crime scene,’ turned on her heels, and went back to the kitchen with a huff.

“Really, Pappa. I have never seen a man with such a navel obsession in my entire life,” Reenu said, shaking her head as she picked at her egg curry.

“And how many men do you actually know to make that claim?” he asked, smirking.

Reenu had done all her schooling in a girls’ school, surrounded by nuns and strict rules. He was well aware she didn’t have many guy friends to compare him to.

“Even so, I highly—HIGHLY—doubt if there is anyone else in this world who is as mad about navels as you are,” she teased.

“Don’t belittle my taste like that, dear,” Thomas smirked, leaning back in his chair. “Truth be told, if you actually knew how many men out there—especially in our country—worship the navel, you would be absolutely shocked. It’s practically a national pastime.”

Reenu rolled her eyes, trying to dismiss what her father said. “Yeah! Sure!”

“I’m telling you the truth. Haven’t you watched our movies? Haven’t you seen the costumes the actresses wear? The low-waist sarees, the lehengas? All of them are designed to highlight the navel. Have you ever thought about why they do that?” Thomas asked earnestly, waving his hand for emphasis.

“Ah, I don’t know. And what is there to be so obsessed about a navel anyway? Doesn’t everyone have one? I have one, Amma has one, you have one. It’s not even something that can be considered a proper body part… just a leftover scar from birth. A tiny little hole. It does nothing.” She said it with genuine confusion, scrunching her nose.

Thomas looked at her with a strange, knowing glint in his eyes.

“You won’t understand just by me telling you. You are starting your college life today, aren’t you? You will understand everything soon enough,” he said mysteriously.

“Whatever. I don’t care,” Reenu sighed, dropping the subject. “That is the least of my worries at the moment, Pappa. What I am worried about is ragging. I have heard it’s going to be especially bad the first few days.”

“Hmm, don’t worry too much about that.” Thomas took a sip of his tea, his voice calm and reassuring. “Girls usually have it easier. Your seniors know they can get in serious trouble if someone goes and complains to the management. The laws are strict now.”

He paused, looking her over.

“Still, just to be safe, try and keep a low profile. Keep your head down for the first couple of months. Try not to draw too much attention to yourself.”

He said the words, but inwardly, he sighed. He knew it was futile advice. With her looks—that radiant skin, the striking features that mirrored her mother’s, and that fresh, youthful glow—his daughter was going to turn heads even if she walked around staring at her feet. She was a magnet, and she didn’t even know it yet.

An hour later, Thomas dropped his daughter at the college gate and bid her goodbye. She watched him drive away, feeling a sudden pang of nervousness as she looked towards the campus from the outside.

This was it. The place where she was going to spend the better part of the next three years of her life.

The grounds were already bustling with the noise of young men and women, engines revving, and loud laughter. She took a deep, excited breath to steady her nerves and entered through the main gates.

As soon as she set foot inside, she froze. A long, musical squeal erupted from behind her.

“Reeeenuuuuuuuuuuuu….”

She knew who the owner of that voice was without even turning around. Before she could react, the owner of the voice ran into her, wrapping her arms around Reenu in a crushing hug from behind.

It was none other than her best friend, Divya. They had been buddies since school, and evidently, college wasn’t going to change that.

“That’s it. My college life is screwed. The first thing I hear as soon I step foot inside is your stupid voice,” Reenu complained, turning around with a scowling face, though her eyes were smiling.

Divya laughed, releasing her. “I was waiting for you to show up! If I had gone in alone, I would have become the attention magnet for all the seniors waiting to pick up the freshers for ragging. But with you beside me? I don’t have to worry about that.”

She winked mischievously. “There is no better way to become invisible than to walk beside a girl who looks better than you. You’re my human shield, darling.”

“Stop blabbering nonsense this early in the morning and come. Let’s try and find our class soon,” Reenu said, rolling her eyes but grabbing Divya’s hand to drag her along.

Luckily, they were able to navigate the corridors and find their classroom without being cornered by any of the ragging gangs. The seniors were roaming the college compounds like packs of wolves looking for prey, but the girls managed to slip past unnoticed.

Maybe it was the nature of the course—BA English—but the number of girls in the class far exceeded the boys, almost double the number. Still, there were some good-looking ones in the bunch. Divya was surreptitiously checking out all the available options, her eyes darting around. Reenu, on the other hand, couldn’t care less.

The first period kicked off with an introduction by their Department HOD, Varghese Sir—a pot-bellied man with a shiny, balding head who welcomed them all with a booming, slightly boring speech.

However, the mood in the room shifted when he introduced the person standing next to him.

She was a very attractive woman in her late twenties who introduced herself as their tutor for the first period—Smitha Ma’am. The whole class sat up a little straighter. The rest of the period was spent on the usual introductions, with everyone standing up to say their names and where they were from.

Through it all, it was obvious that the one person making the biggest impression in the class was Reenu herself, despite her best attempts to keep a low profile. Almost everyone was checking her out appreciatively with subtle glances.

You couldn’t blame them for looking, either. She easily stood out from the bunch. Her skin was a luscious, milky white, and her oval face held a beauty capable of breaking the meditation of the holiest of sages. To call her body ‘Apsara-like’ would be doing her a disservice—she was far more than that. Every curve was perfectly proportioned, sculpted, and full.

Her clothes were clearly chosen to accentuate those assets. She wore a snug white T-shirt that clung to her chest, layered with a cropped, dark blue denim jacket left deliberately unbuttoned. Hugging her waist and legs was a pair of skin-tight jeans in the same deep blue, finished off with simple casual shoes.

Though she was aware of the attention she was drawing, it only made her nervous. Divya was the opposite. She craved the spotlight and was keeping a mental note of everyone throwing glances their way. Though not as stunning as Reenu, Divya was a very good-looking girl herself, easily the second prettiest in the room.

Time passed quickly, and soon it was the lunch break. They had just finished their food and were chit-chatting with their new classmates when chaos erupted.

Some boys from their class, who had been standing outside, rushed back inside with panic written all over their faces.

“They are coming! Seniors are coming!” one of them announced to the class at large, sounding like he was warning them that zombies were coming to eat their brains.

As if on cue, a bunch of guys entered the classroom with an air of arrogance, walking like they owned the place.

“Crap!! I thought they were not allowed to step into our classroom,” Reenu heard someone whispering nervously from behind.

There were around a dozen of them. The tallest and most muscular guy, who clearly looked like their leader, stepped onto the dais. He flashed a dazzling, yet unsettling smile.

“Good afternoon, my dear guys and lovely girls. I am Sarath. Your senior.”

Pin-drop silence.

His smile turned malicious. THWACK!

He smacked his hand loudly onto the teacher’s table. “I said, Good Afternoon!!”

Everyone jumped in their seats.

“Good Afternoon, Sarath!” the class chorused in panic. Some even stood up in alarm.

His smile returned, smoother this time. “That is more like it. These are my friends. We are from 3rd year B.Com. We just dropped by to meet all of you, our lovely juniors.”

His eyes roamed over the room, scanning the faces. But like a magnet, his attention snapped to Reenu the moment his eyes landed on her.

A cold shiver raced down her spine as she noticed his gaze. She quickly averted her eyes, staring at her desk. It wasn’t just him; all the guys who came with him had noticed her too. The energy in the room shifted instantly.

“Lock the doors, bro. Let’s start our afternoon entertainment,” Sarath called out to his friend, his eyes never leaving the general direction of the girls, a coy smile playing on his lips.

Panic rippled through the room as one of the seniors slammed the classroom door shut and turned the key with a loud click.

And just like that, the “programs” started.

They began to call students to the front one by one, forcing them to perform tasks. Nothing overly cruel, just the standard humiliating antics: singing film songs off-key, miming the making of imaginary dosas in the air, doing pushups until their arms shook, mimicry, cinematic dancing—the works. No one was spared.

Sarath was the ringmaster running this circus, while the rest of his gang stood around like supervisors, arms crossed, enjoying the show. They had already made plenty of freshers perform all sorts of stunts, yet strangely, no one had called out Reenu’s name.

It was clearly deliberate. Sarath was saving her for the very end—a special treat to close the show. A dessert after the main course.

Suddenly, a commotion broke out near the back benches.

One of Sarath’s lackeys was screaming for no reason at a boy from Reenu’s class named Nithin. Reenu had noticed him earlier, too. He stood out from the rest not because of his looks, but because he carried an air of maturity far beyond his age. He was dressed in simple, unassuming clothes—nothing fancy—but he sat with a quiet, grounded stillness.

“What da? Why do you alone have this much arrogance? Everyone else here has the sense to obey orders. Trying to be the cool dude, eh?” the lackey shouted, pointing a finger in Nithin’s face.

Sarath noticed the disturbance and sauntered over.

“Well… Well… Well… what do we have here? A rebel in the midst, ha?” he said with a coy sweetness that was edged with a clear threat.

“We get ones like you here and there every year,” Sarath said, coming to stand near the desk where Nithin was sitting. He cracked his knuckles loudly. “And we know exactly how to humble wanna-be tough guys like you.”

He reached out, grabbed Nithin’s collar, and forced him to stand up.

Nithin didn’t resist the pull. He stood up and squared up against Sarath, face to face. Though not as bulky and muscular as Sarath, Nithin looked fit—wiry and solid. He stared back at the senior defiantly, refusing to back down, his expression calm but dangerous. He didn’t utter a word, but his eyes said he was ready for anything.

Sarath’s cronies sensed the shift in atmosphere. They swarmed over, standing behind their leader, waiting for the signal to pounce.

A junior guy standing up to them like that on his first day? And when he was massively outnumbered like this? It was unforgivable. Stepping back was not an option for their massive egos and superiority complex. An altercation was imminent.

The other guys in the class looked at each other, panic in their eyes. They wanted to help Nithin—it was the right thing to do—but getting on the bad side of seniors on the very first day was a bad idea. The other senior gangs would get wind of this, and the entire department would turn against them. This was not a battle worth fighting.

The silence was deafening. Everyone looked on with dread, waiting for the first punch to be thrown.

Suddenly, a chair scraped against the floor. A girl stood up.

“Chettaaa… Please don’t create any issue. This is just our first day here.”

The voice was shaky but clear.

All the juniors turned to look at her with varying expressions ranging from awe to absolute alarm. It was Reenu.

“What the hell do you think you are doing? Sit back down!” Divya hissed, frantically pulling at her hand.

Sarath froze. He turned his head slowly to look at her. He didn’t like it one bit. The girl he had marked for himself—his prize—was taking the side of another guy.

He released Nithin’s collar with a shove and turned his full body toward Reenu.

“We gave the order to him, not you,” he snapped, his voice dropping an octave. “We will tell you what you have to do later. You can just do it then.”

He took a step toward her, his eyes narrowing.

“Now… what’s your name?” His voice was a warning, demanding her identity.

“Reenu,” she replied, her voice steady, trying hard not to show the nervous flutter in her stomach.

“Reenu… ha,” Sarath repeated, rolling the name on his tongue as if tasting it. A slow, mocking smile spread across his face. “So, tell me, Reenu. Why are you trying to defend this guy? What is it? Does your heart beat for him? Is he your boyfriend or something?”

“Does a person need a ‘special interest’ just to speak up for a classmate?” she retorted sharply.

Sarath bristled. The smile vanished. Now a second junior was standing up to him. And this one was a girl. A stunningly beautiful girl, at that. Unlike the guy, he knew he couldn’t touch her physically without the college management raining hell on him. But there were other ways to break someone.

“Hmm. Is that so?” He took a step back, his eyes gleaming with a new idea. “Fine. If you want to be the hero, be the hero. Why don’t you take his place? We just asked him to dance for us. You do that instead.”

Reenu froze. She glanced at Nithin, who was frantically shaking his head no, his eyes wide with warning. But she knew the situation. If she refused now, their egos would be bruised, and they would make life miserable for every boy in the class.

She squared her shoulders. “I will dance,” she declared, her voice ringing out in the silent room. “IF… you promise me that you will never harass anyone in this class ever again.”

Sarath narrowed his eyes, giving her a calculating look. A crooked, predatory smirk slowly formed on his lips. He saw the opening.

“Deal,” he said smoothly. “My boys won’t touch a hair on anyone’s head from your batch again. But… you have to dance right here. On this dais. And you have to do it exactly the way we tell you.”

Reenu had an ominous feeling about the way he stressed the word exactly. Her heart hammered against her ribs, but she had already committed.

“Fine.”

Sarath clapped his hands loudly, startling the class. “Well then! Take a seat, boys! Miss Gorgeous here is going to put on a special performance for us.”

The boys sniggered wickedly. They aggressively shooed away the terrified students sitting in the front row, clearing the “VIP seats” for themselves. They sprawled onto the benches, legs spread, leaning back with expectant grins.

Reenu took a deep breath. She stood up and shrugged off her denim jacket, dropping it onto her chair.

Now she was standing in just her snug white t-shirt and jeans. The air in the room seemed to thicken instantly. She walked up the steps to the dais, turning to face the class. She was ready to get this over with.

She didn’t notice many mouths dropping as their eyes followed her, but the change was undeniable. Without the denim jacket, her figure was projected deliciously in that snug white t-shirt she was wearing underneath. The fabric strained slightly against her curves, leaving little to the imagination.

Yet, she wasn’t showing any hint of nervousness or fear, and that was triggering Sarath like nothing else.

She was such a gorgeous girl. He wanted badly to make her cave to him. To break her spirit. To humble her. He wanted that deep ego satisfaction of seeing her look up to him in obedience, fear, and respect. But so far, the only thing he could see in her eyes was a sort of bored nonchalance. It infuriated him.

Sarath smirked as a new idea formed in his head. A way to push her too far.

“I will play a song on my phone. You have to dance to that song,” Sarath called out.

Reenu shrugged. “Sure.”

He quickly navigated through his phone and hit play. The opening trumpets of the trending Telugu item song “Oo Antava Mava” from the movie Pushpa began playing loudly through the speakers.

Reenu heard the music and smiled involuntarily. It was a song she had danced to plenty of times in the confines of her bedroom. She knew most of the steps by heart. The rest she could improvise.

She rolled her shoulders, preparing to start.

“Hold on, Reenu. Not so fast,” Sarath interrupted, holding up a hand and pausing the song. “Remember the deal? You have to do it exactly how we tell you.”

He leaned forward, his eyes dropping deliberately to her midsection.

“So, I was thinking… how about you try and match your attire to what the actress Samantha was wearing in the song? You know, for more originality?”

He said it in a slick, insinuating voice, feigning innocence.

A collective gasp went through the classroom. Everyone knew exactly what Samantha wore in that song—a tiny blouse and a skirt that showed everything.

Reenu raised her eyebrows, pausing. “What do you mean?”

“For instance, you know… you can roll up that t-shirt of yours,” Sarath explained, gesturing vaguely at her stomach. “Just so that it looks closer to the blouse Samantha was wearing. We want the full effect.”

“Ohh….” Reenu paused, looking down at her shirt.

Sarath watched her closely. He thought Reenu had finally started panicking. He expected her to start folding soon, begging for his mercy, realizing she had walked into a trap.

“THAT is the only way this deal holds, Reenu,” he said firmly, crossing his arms and leaning back. “Take it or leave it.”

A hush fell over the class. It was absolute, dead silence.

His cronies sniggered delightedly, exchanging high-fives behind his back. They looked at her with malicious, predatory gazes, hungry for the humiliation she was about to endure.

Her classmates looked on in agonizing suspense to see what Reenu would do.

Something like openly showing off a bare belly and navel might not be a big deal up in the northern states or in Bollywood movies. But down here in the South, in the little state of Kerala, it was still a touchy subject. Sure, the state was evolving fast. Modern outfits were becoming common, and society was moving past the old conservativeness. But there was still a lingering, light stigma surrounding the specific act of exposing the navel.

It wasn’t that skin shows were forbidden—sleeveless tops and short dresses were fine. But the midriff? That remained a specific point of fascination and hesitation. Women still hesitated to bare it fully to avoid the intense, glue-like stares that inevitably followed. Even while wearing sarees, many girls still pinned their pallus carefully to keep that specific zone hidden from prying eyes.

This was precisely the reason why Sarath thought Reenu would be humiliated by a command like this. He expected hesitation. He expected shame.

But little did he know, Reenu wasn’t conditioned by those lingering social awkwardnesses. She had spent her life in an all-girls school, shielded from the male gaze. More importantly, her home was a sanctuary of navel worship. Her own mother always wore sarees in a low-waist fashion, allowing her navel to play peek-a-boo behind her pallu all day long. She grew up watching her father shower her mother’s midriff with endless affection. To her, a bare belly was a perfectly normal thing. No big deal.

That is exactly why she just shrugged nonchalantly.

She reached down, grabbed the hem of her t-shirt, and began rolling it up.

As everyone looked on with hammering hearts, her belly began getting unveiled, inch by agonizing inch.

First came a thin expanse of her lower belly—a shock of radiant skin that was even fairer and softer than her face. Every eye in the room zeroed in on that strip of white flesh, waiting with bated breath, for they knew what was coming next.

And as she gave the fabric another roll, the showstopper appeared.

Several jaws literally dropped across the room at the sight.

A giant crater of a navel, dazzlingly alluring and beautiful, came into view. It was a wide, deep oval—big enough to easily insert two fingers simultaneously, and deep enough to swallow more than half of their length. It was a hauntingly alluring cave, a vortex of shadow in a sea of white flesh, its sinful depths promising the sweetest of honey to anyone bold enough to explore it.

Reenu continued rolling, oblivious to the chaos she was causing, until she exposed the entire delicious expanse of her fatless, yet plush, milky-white skin. It was flawless and radiant, glowing softly like the moon against the dark blue of her jeans.

She was completely unaware of the effect she was having on them. Several pairs of eyes bored into her navel, unable to look away. There were gazes of awe. Gazes of lust. Gazes of silent worship. Gazes of pure, unadulterated adoration.

The seniors sat frozen, their mouths slightly open at the sight. Some of them actually had to wipe the corners of their mouths. The silence stretched on, heavy and thick with sexual tension.

“I am ready.”

Reenu announced, looking up after tucking the rolled fabric just above her ribs. It was only then that she noticed the demented, hungry gazes her belly was drawing.

Sarath blinked, snapping out of the trance-like state he was in. He fumbled with his phone for a second before finally managing to press play again.

In the next moment, Reenu’s whole demeanor changed. The nervous fresher vanished completely. She tuned into the vibe of the heavy, thumping bass, and her body language shifted into something fluid and dangerously seductive.

She began to move.

Her movements oozed with feminine grace and a raw, untamed allure. Her expressions shifted, becoming playful yet naughty, her eyes locking onto the crowd with a daring glint. Her enchanting movements hypnotized every pair of eyes in the room.

But the real show was her midriff.

Their eyes greedily followed the movement of her exposed white belly. As she swayed her hips to the slow, grinding rhythm, the soft flesh of her tummy quivered and jingled delightfully with every jerk and twist. It was a hypnotic display of physics—softness and structure moving in harmony.

Her navel, that deep, mysterious crater, seemed to be a performer in its own right. With every stretch of her torso, the shape of her navel changed—morphing from a round, deep hole into a vertically stretched slit, then relaxing back into a perfect circle as she dipped low. It winked and teased, drawing them in deeper with every beat.

The hearts of every guy in the room were hammering against their ribs. The girls looked on with a mix of awe and burning jealousy.

Reenu was completely unaware of the magnitude of the impact she was making. She didn’t realize that in those few minutes, she was creating a room full of lifelong admirers devoted to her belly and navel. They watched on, unblinking, afraid that if they blinked, they might miss a single quiver of that milky skin.

Sarath was so lost in the performance that he grabbed a notebook from a nearby desk. He frantically tore off some pages and began shredding them into small little pieces, his eyes never leaving Reenu’s waist.

When the song finally ended with its last trumpet blast, Reenu struck a final, breathless pose with her hip cocked to the side.

The classroom broke out in tumultuous cheers and applause that shook the windows. Sarath stood up and threw the handfuls of paper bits into the air, making them rain down over Reenu like confetti in a cinema hall.

Reenu grinned, breathless and flushed, looking pleased with herself as the paper snow fell around her.

But her smile faltered when she saw Sarath walking towards her. She grew a little alarmed—was he coming to congratulate her, or demand something else?

THUD! THUD! THUD!

Suddenly, cutting through the ruckus, a loud, violent banging on the classroom door silenced the room instantly.

“What the hell is going on here? Who locked these doors?” a screeching voice demanded from outside.

It was Smitha Miss.

The color drained from the seniors’ faces. They looked at each other in alarm, and then at Reenu, who was still standing on the dais with her t-shirt rolled up, her midriff fully exposed to the air.

For a second, everyone was paralyzed. Then, Nithin rushed to the door and unbolted it.

The door swung open, and Smitha stomped in, fuming. She had clearly guessed what must be going on inside.

“How dare you lock the—”

She stopped dead in her tracks.

Her eyes landed on Reenu. The girl was standing on the dais, freezing in guilt. But what arrested Smitha’s attention wasn’t Reenu’s face—it was the sight of her midriff.

For a split second, Smitha just stared at that milky white skin and the deep, prominent navel displayed so boldly. Her eyes widened slightly, a flash of something unreadable passing through them.

Reenu, realizing where the teacher was looking, turned bright red. She quickly scrambled to unroll her t-shirt, yanking it down to cover her shame.

The spell broke. Smitha’s gaze snapped away from Reenu’s stomach and turned steely again as she looked at Sarath and his gang.

The seniors began shaking in their boots.