Jilly and Viki adhered to the formal rules you were expected to follow if you were twins. You were supposed to wear your uniform the same way. You were supposed to do your hair up the same way. You were supposed to finish each other's sentences. You were supposed to be in a sort of union that preceded and perhaps even transcended marriage, working together in tandem. They were supposed to know each other's minds better than the cruel world around them. They were supposed to understand each other.

Jilly was, however, feeling more and more disillusioned with this state of affairs as the years wore on. Every passing class revealed a talent in maths and physics in her that Viki couldn't even come close to. Viki could do English and Malayalam. Viki could do sports. And perhaps most importantly, Viki could do boys.

Now, they are seated together behind the lunch-hall. Annie is in the primary school down the road, silently praying she doesn't lose control like what happened last week and finishing her homework. Her older sisters are conspiring.

"I got it confirmed." Jilly says.

"Really?" Viki asks.

"Yeah. Lizzie got asked by Vincent. Vincent's friends with them. Apparently they're going to ask."

Viki is playing with a stick, drawing a figure on the sand with a flower for a head. Jilly absently contributes with her big toe, filling in the centre of the flower.

"Good." Viki nods sagely. "It's all good then."

"All the girls with WhatsApp have no problems like this." Jilly mutters.

They share a battered old Nokia that used to belong to their father. Only enough charge for emergency call. No games. No boys' numbers.

"We don't need WhatsApp. We're pretty." Viki says.

They here a scratch on the sand-flecked marble of the lunch-hall behind them. They both turn.

"Ansu? You didn't go home?"

The little girl, who possesses the honour of being Kevin Kurien's little sister is bright tomato red. "Viki Chechi, can you come with me?"

Viki gets up and leaves. Jilly stays behind, scratching at the sand slowly, turning Viki's flower into a proper head, filling in the little details. A pair of glasses. A beard. A bald patch. She does not like the fact that she has drawn a picture of Papa on the sand. She wonders why that is the first place her mind took her. She wonders if she too is becoming as dependant him as her sisters. She wonders.

She is pretty, she knows. Not beautiful. Not Viki. But she's pretty. Her hair is cut short but she knows from a reliable source that multiple boys think that's cute. She is exactly the same height as Viki and exactly the same weight. Yet she's somehow softer. Less pointy. Cuddlier. She doesn't like that. That softness.

She stands up and brushes the sand away from her feet. She puts her shoes back on. She begins the long walk back to the school entrance. She sees them, of course. Hiding in plain sight. Kevin Kurien and her sister, the pointy one. The one with the edge. The one all the boys want to ask. She waited by the front gates, watching the patterns the sunlight made on the edge of the road as it wove its way past foliage. Thin, rounded leaves were gently falling. It was never autumn here. Or, it was always autumn. The trees were an un-unified mass of brambles and shrubs, choking and symbiotically sucking from each other.

Viki came up next to her.

"Of course he asked you," she said. "Of course he did."

"He did ask me. I'm sorry."

Jilly nodded. "And I suppose you convinced him to make Jonny ask me."

"Yeah, about that. I've got an idea."

Viki told her the idea.

Jilly nodded and said nothing. On the way back home, her hand found her sister's and clutched tight. She tried to pass gratitude along through touch. It worked.

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