“I have a doubt,” I said brightly, staring at my chemistry textbook with wide eyes. It was a very rare occasion when I questioned something. I normally could make no sense of the teeny tiny letters and ended up falling asleep before my mind could process the overflowing fountain of knowledge that I held in my hands.

(I meant the textbook, in case you didn’t get the sarcasm.)

But today was different.

Today, Shriya Sinha had a doubt.

“What is it?” asked my father, who I had summoned from his room and was hovering impatiently over the table. Normal people picked up all their books, took it to wherever their parents were and then stood very awkwardly trying to balance everything and ask their question at the same time.

As you can see, I’m not normal. I am, as you can probably relate to, allergic to moving unless under highly catastrophic situations. The lowest on my list of catastrophes would be a 7-scale earthquake. Or maybe a pizza delivery. In both these cases, I’ll be just brimming with energy.

“Okay,” I picked up my textbook and made sure my dad was paying attention. “Supposedly, there’s one sodium atom and one chlorine molecule in a vacuum-”

“There are no vacuums in the atmosphere.”

“I said supposedly!” I glared at him. “Let me make this easier. Imagine I get a degree in chemistry eight years later, I become a scientist and I have my own high tech lab, blah blah, and I get this brilliant idea for an experiment! Now, I’ll create a vacuum- IN MY LAB- and put one sodium atom and one chlorine molecule in it. Did you get it so far?”

My dad nodded.

“Good. Now, in the textbook-” I held it out so he could read the microscopic text. “It says that ‘most atoms of elements are not able to exist independently’.”

He nodded again.

“So… if the sodium atom combines with one atom from the chlorine molecule, what will happen to the other chlorine atom?”

I looked up for an answer.

Instead of providing one, my dad just stared at me blankly.

“Well?” I demanded.

“Um… it depends on whether the sodium and chlorine’s bond is strong enough to stay that way. Or if the chlorine molecule’s bond is stronger, they won’t combine at all.”

Now it was my turn to stare with my mouth hanging open.

“BOND?” I shouted. “Where did bonds come from? And why isn’t it written in the textbook then? IS THIS EVEN SCIENCE ANYMORE?”

My dad looked downright nervous. It wasn’t his fault, I do get a little crazy while studying. I think it’s the effect of TMI that textbooks often inflict on students.

Too. Much. Information.

“Ok. Then which bond is stronger?” I asked.

“It depends-”

“Answer me with a proper answer, not a bunch of random words forming a sentence, please.”

He slowly started creeping back towards his room. “I don’t know! It’s been a long time since I studied chemistry.”

I took a deep breath. Sometimes, talking to adults was hard.

“Ok ok! Suppose, the bond of the sodium atom and chlorine atom is stronger. And then they combine together to form… umm, something. What will happen to the other chlorine atom?”

My dad blinked. “Nothing. It will remain independent.”

I could see my patience level waving at me from twenty miles south. I just couldn’t maintain my calm demeanor anymore.

“BUT THAT’S NOT POSSIBLE!” I roared. “THE TEXTBOOK SAYS IT CAN’T EXIST INDEPENDENTLY. If you’re right, the book is wrong.”

He tried to calm me down. “No no, they can exist independently on a temporary basis. Until they find something else to combine with, like a hydrogen atom.”

“THERE ARE NO HYDROGEN ATOMS IN MY VACUUM.”

“But there are in the air!”

“I’M TALKING ABOUT MY-” I sighed. “Nevermind. You can go now. I give up.”

Just as his head popped into his room, an idea struck me like thunder.

“WAIT!” I spluttered in excitement. My discovery made so much sense that I didn’t know how no one had ever thought of this before.

“I think I found a way to kill atoms!”

Read PART 2 here!