He felt ice cold hands on his eyes. “Avni?” he said and soon the hands were no more there on his eyes but his shoulders. He felt a kiss on his cheek and turned to meet his gaze with her. “Avni?” he said once again not able to believe his eyes. He closed his eyes for sometime and then opened them again. “So you’re really here, Avni so much happened and you didn’t tell anything to me? Why? Am I not so trustworthy for you? Couldn’t you have trusted me? Am I that bad? Why didn’t you tell anything and went just like that?”

He kept on blabbering non-stop and she kept her finger on his lips. “Shhhh,” she said and turned her back towards him. “Why are you doing so much for someone who isn’t even alive?” Avni asked, a lone tear escaped her eye. Neil came and stood in front of her. “For the one who isn’t even alive ? Avni, if you aren’t alive so what? You died because of someone to who you didn’t do anything bad, you’re still in this world even after dying and haven’t reached your destination because of that someone, Vyom Bedi.”


Avni looked up to meet her eyes with him. “Oh, so you found out everything, great, Vyom is a creep, a blo*dy lier, what had I done to him that he did this to me?” she asked while shedding tears, he palmed his mouth seeing her cry. “Boys like him think of girls as toys, they play with them, they do whatever they want to do with them, kiss them, hug them, their bodies are just like toys for them, they break their bodies into tiny pieces just to satisfy their needs and then they throw them away when bored.”

Avni said sadly with tears dripping down her face. Neil looked on sadly. “I thought that every man’s intention is the same like Vyom, and every man is also the same as him, but whenever I thought about Ali, I felt like why didn’t we got into a relationship earlier so we could both have been fine, none of us would have committed suicide, neither would I have this abusive marriage, dad died because of me, mom too died while giving birth to me. Ali died because of his aunty and uncle, cruel world. Everyone is cruel, no single person is nice.”

Avni sat on the bed with a jerk while crying badly. Neil approached her slowly and sat beside her not too far and not too close to make it look not too awkward. “But you did get good friends, Ali, Nandini and you got a friend in me as well,” he said and she lifted her face to meet her eyes with him. “How do you know about Nandini?” she asked. “Nandini is my little sister, the same Nandini who was there with you in the pictures,” he told her and she pressed her lips in thin line.

“Nandini and Ali were my only friends, while I was alive, I lost Ali and when I died, I lost Nandini, I don’t know when I will get to meet them both,” she said wiping her tears. “I can call Nandini here but I don’t know about Ali, but hey… If you tell me where he used to live, then I can go at his house and see if I can see and hear him as well,” he said and she nodded. “Actually he used to live in a house which is nearby, Villa no. 402, it is four streets away.”

She said and stood up and started leaving. “Where are you going?” he asked. “You might be hungry.” She went from there as she replied. Neil smiled thinking that now she won’t go anywhere leaving him. He picked the paper he was about to read earlier before Avni appeared, it said:

“Did you know sometimes it frightens me,
when you say my name and I can’t see you?
Will you ever learn to materialize before you speak?
Impetuous boy, if that’s what you really are,
How many centuries since you’ve climbed a balcony?
Or do you do this every night with someone else?
You tell me that you’ll never leave and I am almost afraid to believe it,
Why is it me you’ve chosen to follow?
Did you like the way I look when I am sleeping?
Was my hair more fun to tangle?
Are my dreams more entertaining?
Do you laugh when I m complaining I’m all alone?
Where were you when I searched the sea for a friend to talk to me?
In a year where will you be?
Is it enough for you to steal into my mind filling up my page with music written in my hand?
you know I’ll take the credit for I must have made you come to me somehow.
but please try to close the curtains when you leave at night,
or I’ll have to find someone to stay and warm me.
will you always attend my midnight tea parties–
as long as I set it at your place?
if one day your sugar sits untouched
will you have gone forever?
would you miss me in a thousand years–
when you will dry another’s tears?
but you say you’ll never leave me
and I wonder if you’ll have the decency
to pass through my wall to the next room
while I dress for dinner
but when I’m stuck in conversation
with stuffed shirts whose adoration
hurts my ears,
where are you then?
can’t you cut in when I dance with other men?
it’s too late not to interfere with my life
you’ve already made me a most unsuitable wife
for any man who wants to be the first his bride has slept with
and you can’t just fly into people’s bedrooms
then expect them to calmly wave goodbye
you’ve changed the course of history
and didn’t even try
where are you now–
standing behind me,
taking my hand?
come and remind me
who you are
have you traveled far
are you made of stardust too
are the angels after you
tell me what I am to do
but until then I’ll save your side of the bed
just come and sing me to sleep”
“I don’t know what is this for, well I will ask Avni later and visit Ali’s house later as well, but now I need to know about the video,” he said and opened his laptop and signed into his account again. He saw Nandini was online and her message for him was also unread. He opened it and it said, “come online on Skype, I want to tell something on video chat.” He signed out of Facebook and signed in to Skype and video called Nandini.