Chapter-3a And 'it' started

"I suppose that's one of the ironies of life is doing the wrong thing at the right moment." -Charlie Chaplin

Chapter- 3a "...And 'it' started"

I watched the facade of running trees and houses as the taxi sped along the streets of Pristin-town, a beautiful city where technology met nature, perfectly blending into one frame as a flawless painting.
I observed various motor boats floating down below the bridge that I was riding on. Distant horizon waved as a mirage, where blue waters of ocean met the white sky. A mid-day warm and salty breeze blew on my face as I rested my arms on the half opened window of taxi.

I revived every detail of my extraordinary day and memorised, not that it was super-special or super- odd or anything, just that I wanted to. No, a correction there; I had to tell everything to Alita. Not that I had a choice but she couldn't hesitate to eat me alive, if at all, I wouldn't.

I stepped out of the cab after I paid the driver his money.
There it was, my old little door of house-32. I let out a long sigh as I knocked on it, it didn't open.
I stuffed my hands into pockets of my blue jeans to search for the key, but by then it had creaked open.

I undid my blue jacket and hung it over the hanger behind the door, but neither did I see my evil aunt- Kiara Roy, nor did I see my devil cousin Barbie roy. No, I am not kidding, her name was literally inspired from the real 'Barbie dolls'.

I opened my room and slumped on the bed, its smooth covers were comforting and I felt at peace as I smelled the familiar fragrance of home.

But behind the back of my head, there were two questions that hammered, making it impossible for me to sleep.
First was that, the Neon-blaze never appeared in the daylight, but why did he today?
That, and secondly, why was he spying on me?
I shivered as I remembered his silhouette floating in mid air that I saw until my taxi left the premises of Nova-Gen.

My heart skipped a beat and then skyrocketed​, as I heard a familiar​voice screaming, "Boo!" from nowhere and then it continued into an unstoppable giggle.

"Barb! Stop it! Pease..." I yelled, as I bent down to notice her small cheerful face hiding underneath my bed, with two pigtails sticking out of her head as if they were devil's horns, which did actually make sense, considering her nuisances.

I yanked her out into the light. But for a naughty kid she always was, she squirted a jet of cold water from her pink gun.
Not only was her water gun pink, but her entire room was just pink and purple. Be it bed, covers, curtains, as far as the pooh-bear that she cuddled with was also custom made, in pink.

I gasped as the cold water ran down my face and then along my chest, soaking my white shirt and I had it enough. I jumped out onto the floor and chased her, but as tiny as she was, it was not difficult for her to hide efficiently either.

"Ok Barb, I give up!" I winced as my belly knotted after running for a while. I held my hips and bent down to take a breath. Her giggles grew louder as she appeared from a cupboard of the kitchen, not just any cupboard, but the one which was way up above my head. Yes, that was typical of Barb.

Nevertheless, I went and struggled to pull her out of the shelves and she always had to be adamant, so it was just as difficult as that of separating water from milk.

I sometimes dreaded the possibility of accidents that could happen with a naughty home-alone child. But the school van dropped her off the school every evening before I could even make it back to the house.
And as far as my aunt was concerned, well she never did much.

I cooked some pancakes for Barb to eat before she finished her homework, which again fell on my shoulders and that sometimes made me presume that I was her 'default-mother'.

And the hardest part was that of putting her to sleep, the ritual involved every Barbie story ever written on this earth. Not only that, but also a live re-enactment of the story, using her entire collection of Princes, princesses and a huge purple castle.

"...and they lived happily ever after!"
I finished the last line of her last selection of the day, she yawned and her eyes were droopy enough that I took a chance to cover her sheets and kissed her on forehead.

As I tiptoed out of the room pulling the door slightly close, my hands followed the switch board - for once in years and unknowingly. Then the lights went off.
And then 'IT' started.

Barb started calling out my name in distress. And in between all of those ear bursting screams, she started hyperventilating, it escalated quite quickly​.

My heart started racing up. I reflexively swung the door open and turned the lights on. By then she was curled up into a tiny ball, shivering and frantically gasping for more air.
I jumped over to her bed and carried her on my hips and nervously went through the drawers to find her Asthma medicine. Finally, when I found her inhaler I quickly put it to her mouth and her breathing slowly became shallow and rhythmic.

I gently made her sit on the edge of her bed. I myself was gasping for air by then. I wiped the tiny beads of sweat that had formed on my face.
As guilty as I felt, it wasn't undeniable either, so I hugged her planting a kiss on her cheek,
"sorry Barb! I will. Never. Do that again, okay!"

She nodded, and it took another long half an hour to put her to the bed. Then I went and sunk into the couch, which by any means didn't help a little. I needed more air.
I took the liberty of taking a break and walked into the terrace when I saw little Barb sound asleep.

I felt the night time breeze hug me, as its microscopically tiny icicles pricked every part of my skin, but some how, it always never bothered me. The starry black rug over my head made me feel at home, as if darkness was my BFF. Every twinkle I witnessed was in sync with my own heart beat.

I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my navy blue karate club's jacket, and my shoulders shrugged shivering in the cold.

But, as it goes in a wise man's words, 'the irony of life is that, the wrong thing happens at the right moment.'
And there he stood, the archenemy of my life- Nick Oberoi.
I didn't know for what stupid reason, my gaze shifted down to the floor from the terrace I was standing on, but I ended up witnessing his arrogant knuckle-head. And he stood there squaring my gaze; after he had thrown his trash bag into the can, which was placed right in front of his doorway and that unfortunately stood right in front of our house. (Or I assumed so, since it was half past ten in the night and that was the oberoi family's routine.)

Living in the same neighbour hood where Nick lived had been painful enough by itself, upon that he never dilly-dallied to ridicule me every other day.

"Hey yo! Bruce Lee."
He yelled crackling his deep voice and of course showing his imaginary middle finger, which for no apparent reason I could and only I could see.

"You know what? I don't understand this fate's logic," he paused stuffing his hands into his trouser pockets, looking down his white sneakers, as they played with the dirty mud of their lawn.
"I end up seeing your grumpy, annoying face, when I exactly don't want to and that should include every other minute, right?"

Well, I wasn't good either. I took every chance to stick my actual and anatomical middle finger in the air, not one but two, one each from my hands and then there was always that good old eye roll that I never hesitated to give. I was exhausted to snap back. I was tired of us fighting for no good reason, so I cursed under my breath, 'Jerk.'

He cocked his head, tugging up his pink lips into his annoying grin. "Fair enough," he yelled again, spoiling the cool air around us into a toxic storm, and then he trudged back into his house. That was exactly what I wanted for the moment.

If he wasn't my archenemy, even I could of easily fallen for 'the high-school heartthrob', like every other girl who studied in the Pristin-high did, including junior girls. But I had my reasons to hate him and I didn't regret a tiny bit of it.

I covered myself in the hood of my jacket as the winter wasn't a kind one, I rubbed my both hands vigorously and in between blew on them with my warm breath. I waited, I watched every car that drove across the street, thinking that it would stop by our house and my drunk aunt Kiara would step out of it. An hour went by, nothing happened. Still, I waited, she had to come anyways and I was the only one who had to help her.

Within a minute I heard the same calm robotic voice,
"you know, you shouldn't be standing out in this cold weather, certainly not at this hour."

A chill crept over my skin, I gasped as I turned back to notice the same black and green suit, a tall figure, gracefully floating in mid air. Only thing that appeared different at night was his hair, glowing even brighter neon.
Okay... the thunder bolt on his broad chest looked even shinier as well, and the whole of his self was even more grand and majestic.

I gathered back all of my fallen courage and leapt forward to go near him. But for every step that I took further, he floated away distancing half a meter from me and finally, he was just appearing as a green glow under the shadows of the willow tree of our backyard, whose branches were spread across our terrace as a canopy.

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