Two Birds One Arrow (Completed)

Chapter 3

My mother got way too excited than what was necessary when I told her that I was interested in Gautham after taking a look at his profile. My father reacted with just a smile and a collective nod but my mother became so happy that she came and hugged me, the point of which I had totally missed.

See the thing here is that, my mother got overly excited that she immediately got into conversations with our relatives over phone. Then she started pestering my Dad to call Gautham's family and talk to them. When my Dad told her that he would call them tomorrow and speak to them, she glared at him so much that he gave up with an exasperated sigh and picked up his phone and disappeared off to call them.

I went back into my room and messaged Ananya, a picture of Gautham to which she responded back five minutes later with a thumbs up emoji and a 'go for it' GIF.

Since it was Friday, I was so much tired with all the work in my office. Though it was not the right time, I decided to nap away seeing as I was totally exhausted but in addition to it, a part of me also wanted to avoid any phone calls that my mother was making. It was only a matter of seconds before I fell asleep. However I was woken up by my mother tapping the door of my bedroom and calling out my name.

I immediately get out of my bed and open the door. As soon as she sees me, she informs me that it is dinner time and tells me to eat something and then go back to sleep. I obey her as I switch off the fan in my room and walk with her towards the dining table and have a seat there beside my Dad who was too invested in flipping through some news channels.

"Neha, come to the kitchen." I sigh being the lazy idiot I am. However I do not find it anywhere in me to disobey any of her direct orders and face her wrath later which are basically hour long lectures about how much of a lazy and irresponsible girl I am.

"Take these outside and go set the table." She points to the various dishes besides her without even looking up to face me.

"But Mom, you have never asked me to do this before, right?" I ask her as I lift the dish which weighs the lightest first in the fear of dropping it down.

"Yeah, but what will your in-laws think about the way I have brought you up if you do not know to do any house work?" She answers me back snappily and I roll my eyes at her and continue to carry the dishes to the dining table where my Dad eyes me weirdly as if he could not believe that I have decided to do some house hold work and snickers.

Finally after I finished setting the table, my mother walked in with three plates and placed them down on the table and sat opposite to my father and I.

After serving myself, I begin to dig into the food. That is when my mother decided that it was time to start a conversation with me.

"Neha, your father did speak with Gautham's family. Their son likes you too. They wanted to meet you. Since, this Sunday was an auspicious day, we have asked them to come." I start choking on my food and my dad pats my head.

"Sunday as in day after tomorrow?" I ask my parents after chugging down a glass of water.

"Yeah." My mother replied back within no time.

"Mom, why so soon? Do I not need any time to get ready?" I question her which I know is a very dangerous territory.

"How long do you need? If you want, go to the parlor nearby." She tells me as if already being prepared for this.

"No ma, not the make-up. I am talking about mental preparation." I inform her in a 'duh' tone.

"What mental preparation?" She asks me as she continues eating her food and my dad stays silent refusing to engage in any part of this conversation.

I stare at her in silence without knowing how to explain to her.

"I will never understand your generation." She serves her self some more food and then looks at me. "You better sleep now and get up in the morning and keep the saree and the ornaments that you are going to wear ready. Go to parlor and even do facial if you want. Let me know if you want anything. I will get it from the market. " She tells me not willing to understand the concept that I definitely need some more time.

"Yeah sure, Ma." I tell her deciding to take the route of convincing her to accept my decision which was something which is never going to happen to be honest.

We continue to eat the rest of the dinner in silence as the TV blares on about some news repeatedly but my attention is elsewhere. I am pretty much scared and nervous about the meeting that is going to take place on Sunday which was not far away. There is this unbearable pressure of how your future pretty much depends on the decision you are going to take right now which rattles me.

I finished my dinner and walk up to my room to spend some time on my phone and waste some time on laughing at pointless memes which is like pretty much the only thing I have been doing these days. I keep scrolling through some memes but my attention seems to be elsewhere, being preoccupied on some other thoughts.

I turn off my phone and brush my teeth and then decide to give my body some rest which it has been begging for quite some time now. However, I could not even catch a blink of a sleep during the entire night, so I continue to listen to some music hoping it would pull me into sleep but it seems to be in vain too. I don't know how long it takes till I finally fall into sleep but I surely did get only a very few time to sleep.

That was how Saturday night went as well except I could not even get the few hours of sleep that I was fortunate enough to get on the previous night. As the clock ticked, my fear increased and I was certain I was going to pass out in front of everyone on Sunday.