Break Point

Chapter 11

One month later

Zia

On the last week before we left for the trip, Raul gifted me his mother's car. We took a ride on it for the first time together. He taught me how to drive. We had ice cream at the end of the day, and kissed as the sun set.

Raul

On the last week before we left for the trip, Zia got a haircut, she now showed off a Bob. Calling it her personal version of rebellion.

Alex

On the last week before we left for the trip, we went to the court for Zia's adoption.

"Next case, adoption of Zia Telbot by the Xavier family", the lawyer said to the judge. Zia shifted a little in her seat. It was time. She sat there, the whole time silently listening to the lawyer my parents had hired. Raul sat beside me a few seats behind from where my parents and Zia were sitting.

"Are you done with the packing then?" he tried small talk with me. We had become quiet used to each other with his being around so much. He and his British accent were growing on me.

"Oh yes, the bags are in the car, we'll go straight from here. And you?" we were soon leaving for our senior trip which was also our special assignment. What was so special about it was still a mystery.

"Nowhere near done. I have to go back and pack. I just needed to be here for Zia. Looks like she is handling it fine."

Zia signed some papers and looked back at Raul, just like that he got up and left with a faint goodbye for me, and Zia turned back to the front. They did this frequently, it took me some time to realize what they were doing. They had these little invisible conversations, like they lived in their own little world, pure and untouched by those who did not understand the intensity of how their hearts were somehow made from the same blood and vein. I have never seen two people so much in sync. They moved together, laughed together, cried together. I felt a pang of jealously, an urge to have what they have, loneliness haunted me these days.

After a few more papers were signed, the judge announced that Zia was now a member of our family. She had decided to keep her last name. So, she was still Zia Telbot, but now, she was my sister, she was family.

Two hours later we were entering the Philadelphia International Airport, people with expensive suits and grey briefcases were coming and going with such speed that I felt dizzy. This fast paced life was not for me, I was a lover of sleep, laziness, procrastination and all things slow. I helped Zia get her baggage, and a pair of hands helped me, I knew it was Raul.

"Here, I'll take this", he said with a smile.

"You are going to be like this the whole trip?" I asked him.

"What helping her? I am going to be like this my whole life." Zia smiled behind me, she was wearing a pink summer dress, all ready for the Indian heat, her new haircut contrasting her style. Raul was looking equally contrasting with his white crisp shirt and black hair. Zia took the luggage and left with Raul, hand in hand, leaving me behind, alone. I got the idea of what was going to happen in India, I wasn't angry at what she was doing, I wanted her to be happy, I was angry at my loneliness. Why did I have to break up with Miranda a month before the trip? I could have just dated her for a month more. Could I have? No, our relationship was shallow, it felt like we initially came together just be a high school cliché, basketball captain and head cheerleader, meant to date each other, until the captain falls in love with an outcast, but my outcast never came.

When I entered the airport, I easily found Mr. Watts. Surrounded by teenagers and an attractive woman with red lips, who was introduced to us as Rita, our tour guide. However, the smile she gave Mr. Watts, said something else. Zia and Raul stood just ahead of me. Miranda came and stood beside me.

"Hey Alex, nice jacket"

"Thank you"

"So, you excited?" she asked placing a hand on my hand. I jerked my hand away.

"What are you doing Miranda? I told you I am not interested in getting back with you. Stop it."

"Come on Alex, I know you, I know you feel lonely without me." I felt anger boiling in me, I somehow control myself.

"Shut up and leave Miranda, you can no longer toy with me, you got it."

"Fine, your loss"

She left and I felt an air of relief leave my lips. I went back to what Mr. Watts was saying.

"Kids, kids, hey guys, can we have silence please, I know you are extremely excited, but I need to do the boring stuff first, then we can go crazy together. Is there anybody who doesn't have their application signed? No? Okay, so I have your tickets, if you follow Rita, she will take you to the terminal. Go on go. Come on, faster." As everyone starts moving in slow walks, Mr. Watts calls me, "Alex, can you please keep the smoking to minimum?"

"But I don't...."

"I know you smoke Alex, everyone can see that."

"Okay Mr. Watts"

"And please keep the fighting off too, you are my responsibility and I don't want anything to go down the gutter"

"Yeah okay"

My fighting, yes, my fighting, my anger, the only thing that I cannot control. Last month I got into a fight with bobby, he was making fun of Zia. We were walking down the cafeteria, Zia, Raul and me. He came up from nowhere, and started passing snick remarks to Zia, about her clothes and makeup. Before Raul could confront him, I went ahead and punched him. This was not the beginning, I have had episodes before, I was in rehab for a month before, but nobody knows about it. The fighting became more frequent after that, anybody could tip me off. I just needed one push and I went off the cliff. I used basketball to channel my anger as I was taught in rehab. But, after a while it stopped working. And then I met the world of Marijuana. Weed made me numb. It made me free from my anger. I went to the airport bathroom and got high, the rest of the journey was a flash of bright lights and laughter.

Preet

It was an unusually bright day, there were no clouds in the sky. A soft breeze played with my hair, while I stood on the balcony of my seaside apartment, sipping tea under the shade of the palm tree. The mighty red and white lighthouse stood in its usual place, untouched by its petty surroundings and the gigantic sea. The sea. It had been two weeks since I came here, but I had no time to visit the sea, I longed for the touch of water and the feeling of soft sand beneath my feet.

I came to Odisha on a one month assignment, my father pulled some strings and I got an internship at National Geographic India, as their location photographer. I could choose from a variety of places, Goa, Chandigarh, all the beautiful hill stations. But, I didn't want to visit these already beautiful places. I wanted to find beauty where there was chaos, I wanted to find myself.

So here I was, day after day, taking pictures of slums, and beggars and construction working, finding life in them. Finding beauty in charcoal cheeks, and dilapidated homes, dead trees and vacant eyes.

I left my room to get on with today's assignment, a gigantic tree in the middle of the city, it was the only survivor in that area, after a massive hurricane had hit the city two years before. I got my camera out and took a picture of a small kids sitting by the pavement reading a book.

"Hey, are you lost?" He looked up from his book, saw me, got up and left. It wasn't the first time people were averted by me, I wasn't the typical Indian girl, I didn't have a pretty face or a sexy body. I looked more like a boy than a girl. I was an OUTCAST.

A word from the author:

Visit Barhampur, Odisha, its one of those undiscovered places where tourists don't come. The beaches are marvelous. You'll know more about it in the coming chapters.

P. S. If you like Preet and her unusually self, please vote and let the world know about her.