"Were you scared?" she asked as our foreheads collided together. I shook my head no. I have to act brave and masculine, right?
"No. You're lying," she said as she wiped tears off my cheeks and showed me her wet fingers. Wait, I was crying?
"I didn'...
"Why was your house locked?" I asked Kimora after we all had stopped playing dodgeball. Everyone was talking with others. I saw this as a perfect opportunity to talk to her in the park. After all, until now, I had never really talked to her in the park. Even on the bus, we barely talked. The only time I realised how wrong I was about her was when we played truth and dare on the bus out of boredom on the last day of school.
None of my friends had come to school on that day. Even Avani had skipped school. I still remember how she had fallen asleep on my shoulder on our morning ride. It was a little uncomfortable due to our height difference (I'm almost a head taller than her) but it felt good. Almost natural.
"Why was my house locked? Well, no one is at home right now. Usually, my dad is at home or one of his female friends stay over to look after me because, you know, my dad works for this secret organisation, and I am not lying, so they are always scared about my security because it will be easy to use me as bait," Kim explained. I realised I didn't even know what her dad did for a living.
"What about your mom?" I asked. "Um... she passed away when I was young," she spoke in a brittle tone. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. I..." "Of course you didn't know. I never told you," Kim spoke, looking straight into my eyes.
"Don't tell anyone about this. Only Nitin and Avani know about this," she said. "I promise I won't tell anyone. You can trust me with your secrets," I said, feeling slightly happy that at least she trusted me enough to share this with me.
***
Kimora's POV
When I came back from my trip to Welham, I didn't tell everyone that I got selected. That information was only known to Nitin, Rishi, Dev, Sonali and Manasvi. I hadn't even been able to tell Avani till now. I wanted to tell this to her face-to-face.
When I had asked them if we could play dodgeball, they all agreed and kind of forced everyone to ditch football for one day and play dodgeball instead. I was really happy when they did that. But the cherry-on-top moment was when I saw Vivaan again. I was just happy to see him because... well, he did make me smile often!
Never in my dreams, though, had I thought that I would tell him about my mother's demise.
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The next day...
Vivaan's POV
I was excited to go to the park. Kimora will be there. Well, I had missed seeing her for a long time and now that I could see her again for almost three hours, I wasn't going to miss the chance. I knew (after asking a few boys in the park) that she stayed in the park from 6 to 9 pm unless there was no friend of hers in the park.
When I went to the park, she was trying to make Manasvi's braids. Well, I say she was trying because it looked... bad. Really bad. "What's going on?" I asked them. "Well, Sonali tried to teach me how to make braids and, um, I am trying to braid Manasvi's hair," Kimora said with unease. "It doesn't look like a braid, right?" she asked me. What does a shy guy like me say to her crush? Yes or no?
