I had seen Rahul's mother for almost six months now. And from what I knew she was a soft-hearted, loving lady. So I could not get the look of contempt in her eyes. And it was directed at me. That felt weirder. She looked at me like I did some crime.

We were dressed now. Aarohi and me. And we sat opposite her at the dining table.

Mother was staring at us as if we hurt her gravely.

"So this was happening under my nose all this time?" She finally asked.

"Not all this time," I said. Your son did not do it. I did.

"Aunty... Let me explain," Aarohi said.

"You don't have to explain, dear." Mom turned to her with sweet eyes. "You explain." She turned to me with contempt again. "Since when was this going on?"

"Since we had gone to Aarohi's parents' place for death anniversary."

"Oh...yes yes... You spend a night in a hotel, right? Why was I so blind to notice? How could I... But I trusted you... How could you two? You two are family. This is scandalous. How could you, Rahul... To your sister?"

"She is not my real sister, though," I said. "We are not related by blood."

Mom's eyes went wide. There was a madness in there.

"She is your sister." She hissed at me.

"AAROHI IS NOT RHEA MOM," I yelled.

But then I was slapped. Aarohi jumped up in shock. Mom looked horrified at the fact that she hit me.

"You killed your own sister and now you are trying to take away my other only remaining daughter as well?" Mom asked looking at me.

I got furious. I got up and walked away from the room and slammed the door of my room after me.

I had been noticing something weird with the mother ever since I came to this house. But I just assumed that she was just sad over her lost daughter and felt sympathy for her and tried to make her as happy as I could. But something more serious business was going on here.

I turned and saw my reflection in the mirror.

"You knew something?" I asked, Rahul. I could see his face in the mirror. "You ran away from it. You wanted to die." It was not a question. "Dude, why did it have to be my car which you choose to hit to kill yourself?"

I sat on the bed thinking...

There came a knock on the door. "Duggu, it's me," Aarohi said. "Can I come in?"

"Yeah," I said.

She opened the door and came in and sat by me. "How are you?" she asked. I shrugged.

"Show me your cheek," She said, placing her hand on my face turning it to her. It still pained there, but it was negligible pain.

"What did she mean?" I asked, "by saying that I... I mean, Rahul killed his sister?"

Aarohi looked sad. "It's just crazy. It's like Rahul knew it was going to happen." She said. She looked up at me with a pained expression. "There are a lot of things about the past that I have not told you."

"Tell me then," I said.

She took a deep breath, "Well, Rhea did not want to go to the amusement park that day. She wanted to stay home and play with her dolls instead. But Rahul wanted to go to the amusement park. It was Rahul's idea to go to the Amusement park." She looked down. "And the accident happened."

"That's it?" I asked. "A child wanted to go to the amusement park and for that, she blamed him his whole life for being responsible for his sister's death?"

"It's terrible," Aarohi said with tears in her eyes. "Uncle and I tried our very best all our life to convince her that it was not Rahul's fault. She will agree to our theories, and admit that Rahul did not know. But then she will be back to square one and rub it into Rahul some way or other that he is to be blamed. Rahul or aunty was never the same after the accident."

I looked away feeling sick.

"Duggu," Aarohi said, "I don't know where Rahul is, but where ever he is, I have so many questions for him. That night you know, he just took his bike and drew away. In the middle of the night. He won't do that normally... I am suspecting something happened. If I could have talked to him once... If I was there. He did not even wake me up and just went like that..."

I felt it was safe to tell her then.

"I don't know what happened that made him do it, maybe he was finally tired of the guilt, but in any case, Rahul's accident was not an accident."

"What?"

"He wanted to hit my car. He was coming straight at me. He was not drunk. But he came straight at me. He could see the car. He wanted to hit it. It was a suicide attempt."

Aarohi went pale.

"I don't know where he is. But I fear that he chose to not come back. He is choosing to stay away. He does not want to come back." I said.

Aarohi got up from the bed. And was looking around.

"What's wrong?"

"if he was going to kill himself...he won't go without telling me... He won't go without telling me about it. He must have left me something... A letter or something..." She ran to the table and started looking through the drawers. She seemed desperate.

"Roh, I lived in this room for six months," I told her. "There was nothing."

"There must be. A last letter or statement or something... Somewhere." She said.

"Maybe he wrote to mom?" I asked. The chances are there. 'Mom, I am leaving. Sorry for killing Rhea etc...'

"Could be," Aarohi said. She ran out of the room to the parents' room. Dad was now sitting beside the bed of mom. Mom was sleeping.

"I gave her her medicines," Dad told us. "Let her sleep a good night sleep and she will be okay. And I need to talk to you two. About what happened..."

"Later uncle," Aarohi said. "But have you ever received a letter from Rahul? Or do you know about aunty receiving one?"

"A letter?" Uncle asked.

"The day I got in the accident..." I said. "I probably would have left a letter to mom, or you. Probably mom..."

"Probably?" Dad asked.

"Do you know?" Aarohi asked.

"Well..." Dad tried to remember. "Oh wait... I think I saw your mother with a paper with something written on."

Aarohi and I looked at each other and Aarohi ran to the handbag of mom's which was placed on the table. She rummaged through this.

"What is all this about?" Dad asked. "And is it true that you two slept with each other?"

Aarohi now found a paper neatly folded placed inside her bag. She opened it and she looked at me.

"You found it?" I asked. She nodded. I walked to her and took stood by her to read the letter. It went like this.

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Mom,

I can't write 'dear mom' because I am not sure if I love you anymore.

I came to know about the truth. I had been suspecting for a long time. But now I know. You had been blaming me, your own son for something for years to which I had no responsibility of. But rather you had.

Rhea did not want to go. She wanted to stay home. I did tell her to stay home if she wants to stay home. But you sent her with me anyway. 'You' did. I did not know that you sent her with us on purpose. You insisted that she comes with us. Because you could not have had her at home. Because you were meeting someone else that day. Your lover... I heard you had sex with another man that day. A man that was not our dad. Does dad know?

But now I know the truth. I heard from the guy you had sex with that day. Your old colleague and friend.

I don't hate you for cheating on dad. I don't hate you for sending Rhea with us. You did not know I am sure if you knew she will die, you would never have sent her.

But I hate you, mom. I hate you for dumping your guilt on me. For blaming me for Rhea's death and making my life miserable all this while. I had sympathized with you before, thinking that you loved Rhea so much that you will hurt me for that. But now I know that you were just trying to get rid of your own guilt. Wiping your dirt off on me. Your son. You did not mind one bit in using me, hurting me like that.

For that, I hate you... And I curse you. For you to lose both of your children instead of one.

Rahul.

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Aarohi and I finished reading. It was too much than I had expected.

"What is it?" Dad who was still on the other side of the room asked coming to us.

"Nothing," I said scrunching up the letter in my hand. "It's nothing."

"You said it is a letter from you," Dad said.

"Yes. And I am taking it back. I am the owner, I have the authority to take it back." I stuffed the letter into my pocket.

"Okay, if you say so," Dad said. "But what is that I hear about you two."

"We already heard something from mom," I told him. "Do you disapprove of it as well?"

"Well, actually no." dad said. "If you two like each other I don't mind. But if you are just having a fling, and break up over it and never see each other ever again. I can't support that."

"That won't happen," I said. "Can we go now?" I was desperate to go now. Because this was big.

"Are you sure?" Dad asked.

"Well, I can't prove anything. But time will show you, right?"

"True," Dad said.

"Let's go," I told Aarohi and pulled her out from the room to my room.

"She knew it, right?" I asked her. "She read it."

"I guess yeah..."

"But she never talked to me about... I mean, she never..."

"Maybe she thought you forgot. You had Amnesia initially, remember? And she was really interested in it." She looked concerned. "I can't really believe it. Should we tell uncle?"

"What? And jeopardize their marriage? And how are you going to explain Rahul's suicide? How is he going to feel when he comes to know that his son tried to kill himself because of his wife?"

"But...but... he should know. If aunty knows, she is not in any right state of mind herself. She..."

"It's so much of a relief that Rahul did not die, at least in their eyes and I am here. Coz if he had actually died..."

"Don't even talk about it."

"I guess mom was really happy to see me wake up not just because she loved Rahul, but because she read this letter. She knew it was suicide. All this while."

"We should tell uncle."

"Do you want them to get divorced?"

"No. But... I feel so worried for aunty. I am scared."

"You should be scared for someone else too."

"Who?"

"Rahul. I am positive now that he is intentionally staying away. He is determined to die. This is just a guess. But he caused this soul switch." Things were making a bit sense now. "he was a nice kid. He saw what happened to me. His body was surviving while because of him, I was dying. He could not die but ended up killing someone. He wanted to die and save me at the same time. My body was damaged beyond help. This was the only way he could save me."

I could see that it made sense to Aarohi as well.

But then we are back to square one. He was missing and not found as usual. I hell did not know how to bring him back or go back to my body. Only he could do that.

"I guess we need to make him want to live again, for him to set things right. Because I think only he can set things right again." I said.

"No." Aarohi's eyes widened in anger on that. "Then where will you go?"

I failed on that. "To my original body, I guess," I said.

"No." She shook her head. "No... We don't even know what condition your body is in. For all we know your body might already be dead.."

"But I don't have a choice, do I?" I said. "When I did not know how and what to do, I need not have cared. But now that I know... I can't just..." My voice chock a bit, "As you have said, I am not a complete asshole,"

"No." She cried. "Duggu. Duggu, listen to me."

"He is your brother. His parents need him. You need him. You all love him. Dearly love him... We need to get that idiot back here and let him know just how much you all love him. Okay? And we will do that."

Tears were spilling from her eyes. She was crying... It crushed my heart. But this was the right way. I could not be a parasite for the rest of my life.