Story: The Ultimate Question

Draupadi couldn't remember then last time she had gone to bed before three in the morning. She worked 30 hours a week (and she still needed more money) and balanced that with classes somehow. After an afternoon of working at a local company, she spent her remaining hours on schoolwork. Her friends were whoever sat next to her in class. She wasn't always in this predicament. Another classmate she had befriended last year had taken the scholarship she depended on for money. Draupadi and Yudhishthira had been chatting one day before class when Draupadi mentioned that she had made a much higher grade on their statistics test than Duryodhana had.

"What did you make on that test last week?"  Yudhishthira had asked Draupadi.

"I made an A, what about you?" Draupadi responded.

"I also made a pretty good grade." Draupadi nodded and said,

"Most people did really well. Those people who made lower than an A should probably just drop the class, honestly." Unfortunately, Duryodhana had been sitting behind them.

"How did you do, Duryodhana?" Draupadi asked.

"I made a C." Yudhishthira and Draupadi started snickering. A few people from around the lecture hall looked over. That was the moment that Duryodhana, exhausted from sleep deprivation and motivated by his competitive nature, vowed to get back at Draupadi for insulting him.

Duryodhana worked all semester to make better grades than everyone else. He stole answer keys and even e-mailed professors for extra work, telling them that he had terrible circumstances that made him more deserving than the other students. He applied for the same scholarships as Draupadi, giving a sob story to the scholarship donors so that he could receive what she depended on.

Now, Draupadi was suffering through the worst year of her life without the money she needed. Often she would call home in tears, asking why good things happen to people like Duryodhana. I mean, everyone knew he cheated on tests and copied homework. Her parents had no answer except that she should persevere and forgive Duryodhana, but that was too difficult for Draupadi. She thought back on her life before the ordeal. She had time for friends, extra money for eating out sometimes, and at least 8 hours of sleep every night. It was a dream. Now, she was getting four hours of sleep per night. Her friends had eventually stopped inviting her to functions when they realized that she would never say yes. Duryodhana continued to do well in school so the professors all liked him and recommended him for special projects and internships. All the students, meanwhile, knew how he had achieved his status. Everyone knew he was a cheater, but it didn't matter. Duryodhana continued to prosper, while Draupadi and her friends suffered. Though all of this, she just had one question for life or fate or whoever controlled the universe: Why did the evil do well while the good suffered?


A/N
I wrote this in response to reading about Draupadi's moment of despair in the forest with the Pandava brothers. She is thinking back to how the evil Duryodhana, who tried to make her his slave, is now prospering, while her and the brothers, who are good people, are stuck in the forest. She remembers how she used to have such a luxurious life-- full of beautiful clothing, good food and a comfortable bed. Now, she's in a forest--wet, sleeping on the ground, and merely surviving. She asks Yudhishthira why the evil prosper. This question comes up a lot even in our lives. We wonder why the bad people around us are doing so well while we suffer. I connected a lot with Draupadi's question and decided to make a parallel story in which Draupadi and Duryodhana were students. I like to write what I know, so that's what I did.

Bibliography: PDE Mahabharata