I open my eyes to the chirping of the birds. I shove the blanket wrapping me and get off the bed. Then, following my daily routine, I go to the glass doors and slide them open, leading me to the balcony. It’s a lonely street with only three families residing here. We can hear a few vehicles passing by during the daytime, but it gets oddly quiet after seven. During the first few days after we moved here, I would avoid going out much. But now, I have grown accustomed to this feeling. 

The fog hasn't even started to dissolve, making it impossible to see anything past the road separating my house from a stretch of almond and coconut trees that run alongside the road. If I narrow my eyes and try harder, I can see another house on the other side of the road and a lady sitting on the chair on her balcony. I can imagine her smiling at me, making those wrinkles around her eyes even more visible. She is the only occupant of the big house. The little that I have learnt from our short conversations is that her husband died three years ago due to a cardiac arrest and her only son stays in a different city. He comes here often to meet her. I smile and wave at her and wait for her to respond. But I gather that she is not paying attention. I hear footsteps behind me, and I turn around to find Divij, my husband, carrying two coffee mugs. His hair reminds me of the colour of the storm compliments his brown eyes. 

"Coffee?" he smiles, revealing his dimples. 

I smile and take it. 

"How is the hangover?" He says after a minute.

"Not good!" The headache shoots up the moment he mentions it.

"But we made a terrible mistake yesterday." His confused look makes me continue, "we were both drunk, and you drove all the way back home in that state," I clarify.

He narrows his eyes, brows pinched together. I wonder if he is trying to recall the events of the last night.

He opens his mouth to say something but then closes it again. He doesn't seem to remember anything, but after a moment, he nods. "I know." He presses his lips, "It was really irresponsible behaviour on our part."

Not wanting to push it any further, I drop the topic, smile at him and take a sip from the coffee. 

"What are your plans for tonight?" He raises his eyebrow.

Well, apart from trying to come up with an excuse as to why my timelines are not met? Nothing!

I might have said it out loud and realize this from his chuckle. I throw a daggering look at him. He raises his hands in defence and smiles at me.

"No… But seriously… What is taking you so long to finish the book this time?" He seems amused.

I shrug my shoulder.

He lets out a dramatic sigh. "If you come up with an excuse easily, then we might go out for dinner."

Sounds cool! He puts his arm around me, and we walk towards our room.

"Great then!" He grabs his coat lying on the bed. "Be ready by eight," he gives me a side hug and leaves for his law firm.

**

I hit the keys of the laptop really hard this time. It’s been half an hour that I am trying to get these keys to work, but no letters appear on the screen. 

My laptop has a great tendency to get on my nerves whenever I am already annoyed. Finally, giving up, I shut the screen and take deep breaths to get my frustration under control.

I hear my phone ring. Anticipating who it might be, I check the screen flashing the name ‘headache’ and grunt in frustration. I hold my head between my hands. 

Perfect timing!

'I'll definitely try to come up with a good ending and try finishing this book by the end of this month.' Alayne, my literary agent, had lifted her eyebrows in a sarcastic ‘really?’ kind of way when I rambled in front of her.

"It’s good that you have turned into a writer… The way you tell things with such conviction makes people believe you… even your bluff," she had said and not in a complimenting way.

I ignore the call. 

The phone rings again.

I recheck the phone. It’s not Alayne this time.

I know we met yesterday and tried to mend our estranged friendship and even succeeded to some extent. But, still, I did not expect her to call me the very immediate morning. Or did I?

"Hi," I try to sound cheerful as I pick up the phone. 

I might be wrong, but I guess I hear her sobbing.

"Avni…. Are you OK?" I ask her, my voice laced with concern.

I imagine her shaking her head in a no with her puffy eyes and nose turned red. Her face turns messy when she cries. 

“Avni” 

"Did you hear about Sarah?" She finally gets a coherent sentence out of her mouth in between her sobbing.

I don't want her to say anything else. I want her to keep quiet, and I want to disconnect the call. 

"What is it?" I manage to voice out. 

I hear her say something and figure out her incoherent sentence. I can’t speak to her any longer. 

“I’ll call you back,” I say before disconnecting the call.

Sarah is dead! 

This is what I think I heard.

**

"Oh, Come on, Ajji. Don't be a chicken. You are spoiling the mood… I hope you know that," Sarah said on the other end. I could imagine her waving her hands in frustration and rolling her eyes. We were on the phone for almost an hour. She had called me up to make me reconsider my decision of not going to the party. 

She knew how much I hated being called that, and I knew she deliberately used it to get to me.

"Next time you call me that, you'll have a broken nose…. And I hope you know that." I promise I wanted to sound stern, but then I couldn’t help but chuckle, imagining Sarah with a broken nose.

"Mehak Ajjain. Why don't you understand that this is my last year of high school? We might not be able to spend this much time together afterwards. And besides, Divij and Avni are also coming to the party. Just step out of your comfort zone for once, for your friends."

"Why don't you people come to my place," I suggested and was immediately rewarded with silence.

Oh!

I forgot for a moment that she had stopped visiting my place- our place- after that night. The night she saw our mother die here in the hall.

Sarah is my older sister. 

Correction. She was my older sister. And it was a fact that most people found difficult to process because we shared nothing in common, and in most recent news, she didn’t even live with me in this house. Our aunt, Mrs Som, took Sarah with her after our mother died, and she has stayed there ever since. She never visited dad and me at our place after that night.

I mentally shook that off.

"Or we could hang out at a peaceful place where there’d be just five of us, away from those drunk junkies." I tried to cover up my statement.

Silence followed.

"Sarah… I know you are sold. You can now stop pretending to be mad at me and just make the arrangements for our new plan." 

"For your new plan." I could practically imagine her rolling her eyes and then smiling. "Fine"

Teardrops rolling down my cheeks and landing on my hand resting on the photo album bring me out of my reminiscence.

I remember spending our evening at Savanna's, our local park. I smile, thinking about how everyone was mad at me for ruining their plan. And, as much unaffected as I was by their anger, I equally thanked my stars for sending them into my life.

**

I stare blankly at the polaroid. Sarah has her mouth stuffed with chips. She tried covering her face the moment she realized I was clicking them. And her perfectly wavy hair curtaining her from those sitting beside her. Avni and Divij are laughing at some random joke.

I set aside the album.

I try to contemplate what exactly went wrong. But I guess I know exactly what went wrong!