"I'm not your brother." A devil smile played on his lips.
Elevating the right brow, I asked, "What do you mean?"
My hand clenched the beer bottle as his gaze intruded into mine.
I hated him. I told the ugliest things of my life to him. I confessed...
May you get the happiness you deserve and this Diwali light your life with hope.
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"Nisha wake up!" A voice entered my thoughts, but ignoring, I snuggled deeper into my bed. "Nisha, get up!" The blanket was snatched from my stomach, making me glare at the person for doing this. Mom smiled at me, nodding her head to the door.
What was she doing here?
Wasn't she dead? Confused I got up from my bed.
"Mom?" I drawled out. "What—?"
"What? Get up. Udisha is waiting for you." Her name died all the protest in my mind. Udisha? What's happening? Mom, she died eleven years ago and you died, one and half a year ago.
She didn't hear my protest and went out of the room. Scared, I gazed around my room, and everything constricted in my throat. It was my old room. What's happening? What was I doing here? But what—
I screamed, seeing the photo frames, grazing my study table. It was our family photo. Mom, dad, Kabir, Udisha and me.
What's happening? Where was I? What's happening? I must be having a dream, but I wasn't waking up from it.
Maybe what I had seen was a dream. Maybe nothing like that ever happened and all I was living in a nightmare of the things I was most scared of. It was just a nightmare. Just a nightmare. Meant Rahul was alive, nothing happened to him, nothing happened to me. I wasn't kidnapped, no knife was plunged into my stomach. Oh god, Rahul. I needed to see him. I needed to see everyone.
Running, I climbed down the stairs, hearing the peals of laughter coming from the dining room. With heavy steps, I entered. Everyone was there. Mom, dad, Kabir, and Udisha.
Udisha.
"Di," I mumbled. She turned her head to me, grinning. She looked the same. Black hair, brown skin and brown eyes with a smile to make anyone believe she was innocent to the core.
"Nisha Oberoi, aren't you early?"
She was here. Meant that accident never happened, Kabir never blamed himself, he wasn't sent to the hostel, he didn't experience bullying and he never smoked.
"Yeah," I said, acting with the flow, but I couldn't contain my happiness and hugged her tightly. "Di, I missed you." Tears grazed my eyes but I blinked them again.
"Smarty head, I was just gone for a week."
"But it felt like forever," I mumbled against her shoulder.
"Nisha, no!" Kabir said from across the table. He wasn't wearing his formal clothes, but a blue button-up shirt and jeans. "Do your lesbian things later."
"Shut up." He had no idea what nightmare I had seen, and he would be scared too if I tell him about it. It scared to know what I had seen because it was full of pain, grief, torment, and things I couldn't remember or had no desire to remember.
