Shashank was sleeping peacefully when his phone began ringing in the middle of the night. He groaned in frustration but immediately sobered up when he saw Miraya's name flashing on the screen. He attended the phone call with quite excitement, “Hey!”

“Come out! I'm standing outside your house.”

Sleep flew out of window and so did Shashank. His room was on the ground floor and the window opened in the lawn and the lawn led to the gate at the backyard.

“Did security gaurds notice your presence?” He asked her while reaching the gate that was always locked. As a teenager, he used to sneak out of the house at night from the gate. Nobody remembered where the key of that gate was kept. Unknown to them, the key was with Shashank since fourteen years. He took it from the store room where it was kept in a drawer reluctantly.

“No, I'm standing at a distance, under the pine tree.”

“Oh, I'm coming right away. Wait for me,” He unlocked the gate and went outside the house.

He ran to the pine tree and saw Miraya's car parked under the tree. She was leaning against the car. Miraya smiled seeing him coming and ran to hug him.

“What are you doing here this late at night?” He asked, looking around for the gaurds. There was none.

“I wanted to sleep in your arms,” She replied innocently while wrapping her arms around his neck.

“Really?” He smiled and held her waist.

“Hmm, I don't get nightmares when I sleep with you,” And she rested her head against his chest again.

Shashank patted her back and whispered in her ear, “Let's go inside the house then.”

🦋🦋🦋

Shashank and Miraya sneaked into the bedroom after locking the backyard's gate. She put her phone on the nightstand and laid down on the bed after removing her sneakers.

Shashank covered her with duvet and then joined her on the bed. His arms wrapped around her waist as he pulled her closer. Their lips met in a soft but long kiss.

His hand brushed against her pajamas and he felt something in the pocket.

“What that tiny thing in your pocket?” He asked.

“A pen drive. Lost it a week ago and found it in the car while driving here,” She replied calmly.

“Put it on the nightstand,” He told her. Though he found it odd that she told him the reason of keeping that pen drive in her pocket when he didn't ask for it. It was very out of character for Miraya to explain such small, insignificant acts.

“It's very important. I want it keep close to me.”

“As you wish,” He smiled and kissed her forehead.

Miraya hugged him tightly and closed her eyes. Shashank too tried to fall asleep. They didn't try to do more than a kiss. None of them made a move to take it further. They just wanted to rest in each other's arms. The next few days were going to be hectic and a peaceful sleep was all they needed.

🦋🦋🦋

Shashank was sleeping like a baby. Well, he always slept like a baby. Even an earthquake could not disturb his slumber. Around three in the morning, Miraya opened her eyes. Somehow Shashank managed to trap her under his weight while they were sleeping. His head was resting on her left breast.

“Ah, he is so heavy!” Miraya cried in a whisper.

It was a task to get out from under his weight. Her arms began hurting from pushing his heavy body. But she managed to do it nonetheless.

Her eyes roamed around the room to find his laptop and brown leather diary. She checked the drawer of the nightstand and found the diary there. Miraya sighed in relief and quickly took out the diary.

Shashank too had the habit of writing diary just like her. However, she only wrote a diary entry when she felt extremely sad. Shashank wrote a diary to remember his achievements. The deals he cracked, the money he earned from short selling, the land he bought, record of all his assets, everything was recorded in that brown leather diary. Also, the passwords. He kept different passwords for everything so he noted them down at the last page of the diary in case he forgot any password.

She needed the password of his laptop that was kept on the coffee table. She flipped to the last page of the diary and saw all the password written there. Even the password of his old Wattpad account.

“He also had a Wattpad account? What did he read there? Stories written by horny teenagers?” Just the thought of it made her chuckle.

She checked the password of his laptop. It was Whi$k3yC1u6.

“Whiskey Club?” She turned to look at him who was sleeping peacefully.

“None of the passwords have my name in them and he claims to love me,” She pouted.

But then she remembered the real task at hand. She put the diary back in the drawer and and sat down on the couch with the laptop. Miraya turned the laptop on and put the password.

“Where is the file of Label Sandhya?”

She looked through every single file and it took her forty minutes to find the file she was looking for. Miraya quickly inserted the pen drive and transferred the information into it. Once she was done, she turned off the laptop and put it on the coffee table again. Miraya sighed in relief when she put the pen drive in the pocket of her pajamas.

She joined Shashank on the bed, who was totally unaware of what she did while he was asleep.

🦋🦋🦋

Around six in the morning, Miraya sneaked out of Shashank's house from the same gate. Shashank locked the gate after her and returned to his bedroom.

Few hours later, his mother Ruhani began banging his room's door.

“Shashank, wake up! Or we'll be late for the Haldi!”

Shashank was watching a Netflix documentary on short selling. He shut down his laptop and quickly ran to the bathroom after opening the door for his mother. Ruhani put his white Kurta Pajama on bed and left to get ready. Shashank did a mini concert of Ali Sethi songs in the shower and then quickly got ready. Together, Shashank and his parents left for the Yaduvanshi villa.

🦋🦋🦋

The Haldi ceremony was kept at Miraya's home only because it would have been a nuisance for the common family friends to first go to one house then thr other. It was Angana and Sahana who insisted on keep Miraya and Shashank's Haldi together.

“Tara Aunty, Miraya is running late. Where did she go so early in the morning? That too only a few hours before her Haldi,” Angana asked worriedly.

“She said something extremely important came up.”

The same moment they heard Miraya's car honking outside. Miraya gave the keys to a driver and entered the house.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I got late,” She smiled and ran upstairs to her bedroom. Angana too went after her to help her in getting ready.

Miraya got dressed in a white full-sleeved Anarkali dress with a matching dupatta. Angana quickly combed Miraya's hair and did a little makeup.

Shashank was already seated on a low stool. Miraya sat beside him on the other low stool, passing him a full-blown smile.

Soon the ceremony began. The air was filled with the scent of turmeric. Family members and relatives applied Haldi on Shashank and Miraya's face. Raghbir and Abhimanyu kept rubbing Haldi on Shashank until his face didn't start resembling a peeled potato.

“Shashu Bhai, you look like a peeled potato,” Ansh laughed.

“Shut up or I'll make your french fries,” Shashank glared at him.

Ansh rolled his eyes before he put Haldi on Shashank's head. Now Shashank looked like a boiling potato, ready to beat Ansh like dough.

But before that could happen, Shashank and Miraya were sent to take shower. But later Shashank took his revenge by mixing lots of salt in the bowls of Kheer served to Raghbir, Abhimanyu, and Ansh with the help of Aas, who in return got the permission to post their wedding pictures and clips on her very popular Instagram page.

The day of Haldi ceremony passed in bliss of laughter and joy and salty Kheer. By the end of the evening, Shashank resembled mashed potato. And Miraya wanted to eat him so bad but they couldn't do more than a hug in front of the family members before they said goodbye to each other.

•••

Thoughts 💭