The Mourning Moon

Chapter 17

The five friends sat inside the tent discussing what they were going to do for their stay there. There were many ideas like telling ghost stories, going hiking, playing cards, etc. But all ideas were declined by Ishita.

"Ishita, you are so hard to please. Ok fine, you tell us what do you want to do," said Somya.

"I don't know. If I had an idea do you really think I would sit here and listen to your boring ideas."

"I have an idea," said Shreshth. "Why don't go fishing?"

"Hey, that's a great idea. We should do that," said Vivaan.

"Well, we could but we are not going to hurt them or eat them. We will just catch them and then release them," Somya ordered.

"Ok, baby. As you wish," Vivaan said.

"But we don't have fishing rod," Ansh pointed.

"Don't worry about that. We may not have fishing rods but we do have our hands. This way the fishes won't get hurt", Vivaan said.

Soon the five of them went to the nearby lake and started fishing which quickly turned into water fight. All of them were running around the water, trying to douse each other in the water. When all of them were thoroughly drenched, they got out of the water laughing and panting. They went to their tents and changed into their hiking gears after resting for a while. They set out to hike, talking and laughing, taking breaks to eat snacks and food. Ansh had tripped thrice while hiking, so Shreshth held his hand. While Ansh was embarrassed, he was quite glad of his clumsiness as he got to hold hands with Shreshth. As they reached to their hiking destination, they took a bunch of group photos, with the setting sun as their background. They were all exhausted once they reached the campsite. So they had an early dinner and went to rest. They all had decided to pull an all nighter, so after few hours of rest they got up and told each other ghost stories. Ansh was trying his hardest to stay awake but was failing miserably as he was not habituated to such outings. Somya noticed it and asked him to go rest. Ansh smiled gratefully at her and retired early.

It was two in the morning. Ansh was sleeping soundly when the shuffling sounds coming from the outside broke his sleep. He got up rubbing his eyes and looked around himself. The tent was empty. So the guys were really going to pull an all-nighter. He stood up and decided to join them. But when he went outside he saw no one their. The shuffling sound came again from the bushes. He went towards the source of the sound thinking his friends or Shreshth would be there. What he saw instead caused his eyes to be widened. Standing in front of him was none other than the person who always came in his dreams. But instead of wearing silver, he wore yellow this time, silver hair cascading down his back up to his waist. He was playing with red diamonds that were floating in the air. Ansh thought he was dreaming this beautiful dream again. So he pinched himself and hissed, his eyes widened as he realised that no he was not dreaming. It was real.