Part 9: No Way
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The lights went out. I couldn’t see a thing. I heard gasps and whispers, but no one knew what was going on. “Abi? Is that you?” I hear Niru say, as he grabbed my hand. “Ya, what happened to the lights?” I asked him. “I don’t know..” his voice trailed off. He walked me over to a table and we sat down. There was dead silence for about two minutes, until a pink light flashed on and off the stage. “What the..?” Niru said. I squeeze my eyes and try to get a good view of what was going on, until I heard music. A male singer was humming through the speakers. Everyone faced the stage until blue and white lights were stable on a male figure. My mouth dropped. “Is that who I think it is?!” I asked myself out loud. The figure spun around and winked at the audience, as the crowd cheered and whistled. “It’s Ashwin… or Aadhi!” Niru laughed. Ashwin spread his arms out, until more male dancers joined him. Ashwin was mouthing the words, and surprisingly he was actually very good at dancing. I laughed and clapped, until I realized… Lakshi wasn’t anywhere in sight. I quickly scanned the banquet, but no luck. I looked back at the stage and I realized Ashwin and the male dancers were gone. We all clapped for him, until we realized the show wasn’t over. There was a spark of confetti flying on each side of the stage, and a pink light glowed over the stage brightly. There was a slim girl facing the opposite direction from the audience, with her long curly black hair behind her dancing to a female humming. “Oh s###.” I thought to myself. I turned my head to see Niru’s reaction. Niru was wide eyed and his mouth was opened so wide, it was like a whole watermelon could fit in if I plopped one in. Lakshi turned around, flipped her hair and walked down the centre of the stage. She blew a kiss to the audience and everyone cheered for her.
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Lakshi danced with very colourfully dressed dancers and they all did wonderful! I was impressed with Lakshi, as she seemed to be able to curve every single part of her body. Honestly, I always knew she was a good belly dancer, but today she has showed it to the world. Sooner or later, Ashwin showed up again and the both of them started dancing together. I clapped and mouthed the lyrics to the song with Niru and Krish. I saw Aadhi turn around and look at me, mouthing “What the..”, he was definitely as shocked as I was. I smiled at him and looked back at the stage until I realized Ashwin was coming towards me. Ashwin came running off stage and put his hand out in front of me. I looked at him and he smiled and said, “Will you join us?” I froze, and I looked at Niru, who motioned me to go.I mouthed to him “What. What. What.” I looked at him, astonished. “I assume that’s a yes!” Ashwin exclaimed as he grabbed my hand and pulled me onto the stage. I almost fainted.
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Lakshi ran up to Aadhi and put her hand out. “No.” Aadhi confirmed. “This isn’t my choice it’s your brother’s.” Lakshi looked at him and said. Aadhi didn’t respond. “Please? We hardly have ever talked, but maybe this one favour? I promise I’ll owe you back, I am so tired, I got stuck in your brother’s stupid mess too.” Lakshi begged. Aadhi looked at Lakshi, and then smiled. “Fine.” Lakshi held Aadhi’s hand, just to make sure he wouldn’t escape, and walked onto the stage.
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Lakshi and Ashwin stood on the sides of the stage as they pushed us forward. Aadhi looked back at Lakshi as I looked back at Ashwin. “Dance!” Lakshi and Ashwin mouthed to us. I froze. “No. No. No.” I thought to myself. Maybe Lakshi can do this, but not me. I didn’t know what to do, as I closed my eyes and opened them again. My eyes lifted to Aadhi’s, and I felt like I was able to read the feelings behind his eyes. I slowly nodded at him, as Aadhi nodded back at me. “Dancers.” Aadhi said quietly to Lakshi. Lakshi nodded and waved to the dancers, signaling them to get on stage. They did as they were told and Aadhi danced. He danced with them, but it didn’t seem like he was doing this for fun. It seemed like a challenge. The way he looked at me when he danced and the way he smirked, it felt like he was challenging me. Of course, I didn’t want to dance, but I also didn’t want to let him win. “Let’s do this,” I thought. I waved to my dancers and they got up on stage and posed beside me. I slowly moved my arms, twirling them into perfect circular figures. I carefully moved my feet to the music. I smiled to the audience. The audience was silent, and I swiftly twirled my hands down. Then I looked at the audience, and the music got faster. Dancing felt different, it showed me who I really was, and it showed me what I can do. I stopped, and we all scurried off of stage. Right when I thought it was over, Aadhi came back, and… he looked like he was glaring at me. Then he started dancing very fast, and smiling at the audience. I looked at him. I’ve never seen him interact with an audience before. I saw a light in his eyes while he performed. I wanted that light to be in my eyes. SO he got off and right when he thought he won, I walked on alone. I walked onto stage, and I don’t think I’ve ever walked that confidently before. It was silent, and then I started clapping. Then I glanced at Aadhi, and he raised his eyebrow. I kept clapping, and then the audience started clapping. Then the audience made their own rythmn, as they kept clapping the same rythmn. I then started dancing to the beat. Everyone was smilng and partying. I was finally done and ended off standing on the edge of the stage with my hands clapped together so I could say thank you. I looked at Aadhi and flipped my hair, and judging by the expression on his face, he knew I won. “Serves him right”, Niru thought, as he remembered seeing Aadhi staring at Abi before. *****************************************************************************************************************
We all danced and laughed as us and the dancers got off the stage and joined audience. Everyone got up and danced, and we were all laughing and enjoying ourselves. Even Anjali and the groom were dancing together, and I was glad that their smiles seemed tensed-free. Aadhi somehow got through the dancing crowd as he smiled and said, “Your dance wasn’t that great,” Aadhi smiled. “You were pretty bad yourself.” I said as I smiled back at him. He was so jealous. “Our siblings are definitely something…” he said. I smiled at that, “yes they are.” We stopped dancing as we looked at each other for a couple of minutes.I couldn’t stop looking at him, but at one point, I had to look away. “Aadhi! Come here!” I heard a female voice call. “Huh?! Oh.. Ya coming!” He called back. He smiled at me, and then he disappeared. *****************************************************************************************************************
After all that dancing Lakshi and I were laughing and chatting as we were leaving the banquet. Grandma and Krish soon joined us and they both smiled. “My girls are stars!” Grandma said as she kissed our heads. Just then a few ladies came by and said good job to us as they were heading out. Lakshi and I quickly put on our jackets. Just then, Ashwin appeared and smiled. “We’re news!” He said, beaming. “Definitely are!” I said. Lakshi didn’t look at Ashwin until Ashwin said her name himself. “Thank you.” Ashwin said. “No need, I owed you one. Just don’t bother helping me out again, because I can not owe you back AGAIN.” Lakshi said smiling. We all laughed. Soon, we all waved off to Ashwin and finally got into our car.
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We were driving home and Niru didn’t say anything. Grandma sat in the seat beside Niru in the front. After coming back from an event or occasion, Niru usually would give his opinion about the event, and we would all discuss and agree on our opinions, so it was a shock when I noticed Niru wasn’t talking. “Everything okay?”, I asked him, and I could see that Lakshi was about to ask the same thing. “Uhh yeah… nice dancing by the way, you girls were great.”, Niru said, and with that, he didn’t talk again. I looked at Lakshi and she shrugged at me. Krish was asleep because he was tired from playing with his cousin Arnav. Niru didn’t even put on the music, so we listened to Krish’s snoring all the way home.
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The next day we went back to school on Monday and as I and Lakshi walked to our locker, we saw Aadhi… or Ashwin. We couldn’t tell who it was from a distance, but he was talking to a pretty girl who looked like she was our age. Lakshi pinched my shoulder. “OW WHAT WAS THAT FOR?!”, I asked Lakshi in frustration. She looked alarmed. “That’s the beautiful girl! She was at the wedding!”,Lakshi said impatiently. “Really?”, I asked her, and she nodded. “Are the boys close to her?”, I asked with hesitance. “I think so… Ashwin was talking to her at the wedding”, Lakshi said. Then we tried to go to our locker without them noticing… but it was too late. “Hey Abi and Lakshi”, I heard a voice say, and I was pretty sure it was Aadhi. Lakshi and I were facing the locker, and the voice was coming from behind us. I narrowed my eyes at Lakshi and she quickly glanced at me too. We turned around and said: “Hey Aadhi…”, at the same time. “OMG! Twins!”, The pretty girl said excitedly. “Ughh”, my sister quietly said, and then I elbowed her, but tried to keep the smile on my face. My sister and I hated how people pointed out that we were twins, because we already know who we are! But you couldn’t blame her either. “Hi, I’m Abi, and this is my annoying, obnoxious sister, Lakshi.” My sister glared at me as the pretty girl laughed. I noticed the pounds of makeup on the pretty girl’s face. Lakshi and I hate it when girls wear makeup to school. “It’s not a fashion show, it’s a place for education”, my grandma would always say, and we grew up to agree with her. Therefore, we do not wear makeup to school. “You guys are very cute!”, she said. “Thank you”, Lakshi and I said. “I’m Harini”, she said. “We’ll it’s nice meeting you.”, I said, and Lakshi nodded. “Yeah, I’m new to the school. Except Aadhi and Ashwin told me a lot about you two.”, Lakshi and I looked at Aadhi, and he looked back at us with a denial expression on his face. “No, he said good things about you,” she said as she giggled. Then my sister and I smiled at him, and he smiled back. “Okay, we should get to class”, Aadhi said. “Okay”, I said and I grabbed my books for class. “Then I noticed Harini following us. “Oh is your class near ours?”, I asked her, and she looked at Aadhi. Then they started laughing. “What’s so funny?”, I asked them in confusion. “Her first class is with us, and then her second is with Ashwin and Lakshi.” Aadhi said. “Oh.” I simply said. “Well then let’s go!”, I thought, hoping this didn’t mean trouble.
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Next Part: Melting Me (Chapter 2, Part 10) CHAPTER FINALE