2.

Chapter 2 of 'So Far, So Close'.

Before. 

It was a cool morning. We were both on my terrace, on the patio bench that no one ever uses. The sky was open, and clear and a beautiful cerulean blue. We were talking.

“It’s just so stupid.” I said, shaking my head and looking down. 

“What’s so stupid?” He asked.

“Life.” I said, “Death. You dying. I mean... dude? You’re fourteen. I’m fourteen. It’s not fair. To anybody.”

He laughed and ran his fingers through his hair. He spoke after a moment of silence, “There’s nothing we can do about it.”

“It’s just... freaky. You’ll be gone, one of these seconds. And you’ll leave me.”

“I’ll come back for you.”

I looked up to his face, dangerously close to tears. “If only.” I said and looked down again.

He just smiled and squeezed my side in way of comforting me. “If only.”

***

After. 

I hadn’t quite gotten over it, to be honest. No one had, really. His parents hadn’t, my parents hadn’t, Kyra (Mathur)-our other best friend-hadn’t. It had only been a month. And it was okay that we weren’t over it. Yes, we were comparatively mentally prepared, but it was okay to grieve. That’s what my parents told me. And my Mum’s a psychologist who specialises in adolescents, so sure as hell, I blindly believed her. But I was coping with it, somehow. People’s deaths become a part of our lives and we have to learn to move on. And even if we don’t, time does. Time goes on, not giving a s**t about the people that it is going on for. It’s one of the other b*****s in Bitchland. 

He went in early April, and left us in misery for the entirety of that month as well as May. And then the summer vacations kicked in. “Neevy,” he had said, when he was healthy, and well, of course, alive, “If I make it till school’s out for the summer, I’m going to teach you how to make soufflé. And you can’t say no because I’m a dying boy.” I had punched him in the arm, but then he didn’t make it. So I decided to make soufflé on my own, even though I couldn’t chop an onion. It was a nostalgic day. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. Him and his stupid pretty eyes and his stupid talks and his stupid death. I wasn’t crying. I was just remembering him, wondering why he died. What had he ever done? Nothing. Except for owning too many action figures from his childhood.

The door opened, and I was still sprawled and the floor, my back against my wardrobe, hair a mess, and I didn’t even care to move or change my position. I looked up at the door, and saw Kyra walk in, a sad smile on her face. 

“Sup?” she said, sitting down next to me.

“Chocolate soufflé.” I said.

“The one Adi told you about?”

“You put the butter and the chocolate and whip it.” I said, trying in vain to fling the topic of Aditya.

“I miss him too.”

“Yeah.” 

“How’s homework going?”

“Nowhere. It’s going nowhere. That blasted sheet is still folded and in my bag. I’m not reading it any time soon.”

“Hmm.”

“You?”

“Home Science.”

She just stared at me for a moment. “What?” I asked.

“You’re never getting over it, are you?”

“No.”

“Are you even trying?”

“No.”

I didn’t want to. I liked thinking that he was still around. I knew it wasn’t true. But it was a likable scenario, and I found it better than the unlikable reality that I was living in. 

***

We did try to make the soufflé, if walking down till the kitchen and asking Mum for help and then realising that we were all out of chocolate (which had a lot to do with the fact that I couldn’t resist chocolate and neither could my Mum) constitutes as trying. Instead, we just made ourselves some cheese sandwiches and took them up to my room. We just sat down again, talking about everything and nothing, i.e. the weather and how she was planning to dye the tips of her hair red and her Mum had even agreed and how she had kind of gotten into EDM music and how I was sort of done with EDM and that this summer was so boring and hot and both of us were obviously thinking about Aditya but neither of us dared to mention him. It was like we were turning a page. Like we were trying not to mention him so that we could forget about him, but that was actually one way of remembering him and it was more than mildly frustrating. 

Kyra, Aditya and I had been friends since we were eight. Of course, Aditya had guy friends too, but we were the three best friends and no one could break us apart. There was a time when Kyra and I got into typical feminism and hated it when boys tried to show that they were superior to girls, but even then, Aditya used to humour us with his thoughts on feminism. We had grown up together. It was the hardest thing to just have someone out of the trio disappear without even a proper goodbye. It was soul-crushing, to think that he would never come back. We missed him, more than anything.

And yet, we didn’t dare to mention him. 

At one point someone rang the doorbell. A shrill, hasty screech entered my ear. “I hate your doorbell,” Kyra said, as if reading my mind.

“NEEVY, GET IT.” My Mum called from downstairs. She was on a two-week holiday, so it surely wasn’t any of her patients. 

So I went down to get the door. Kyra followed behind. It was the postman. Or well, that’s what I thought, because there was a letter in the otherwise empty letter slot, and by the time I was downstairs, he was already gone. I checked the letter. The cover simply said ‘To Nevaeh Jacob’, and then there was my home address on it. No sender’s address. No stamp. 

“Huh.” I said.

“Open it.” Kyra said.

“Let’s go upstairs.”

“TEAR THE BLOODY ENVELOPE.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, letters just get me excited.”

“It’s probably another advertisement from the NSO.” NSO being National Science Olympiad, which our school made us compulsorily participate in, every year. And they sent in advertisements to many students. But this one didn’t seem like one, really. But what else could it have been? The only person I ever wrote to was my cousin Lavanya, and she was vacationing in Hong Kong, and we hadn’t spoken in ages, so I didn’t expect it to be her, really. 

“OR MAYBE IT’S AN INVITATION TO HOGWARTS.”

“Kyra.” 

“I’ll shut up.” 

I didn’t open it until both of us had reached upstairs. Letters excited me too, but I didn’t expect it to be anything but an NSO advertisement. I was so terribly wrong. I opened the letter, and Kyra peeped from behind, to find only a few sentences in the name of a letter, in the middle of the page. A few sentences that confused, shocked and scared the s**t out of both of us.

Dear Neevy,

     I’m coming back soon. I miss you. Wait for a letter. 3:33 pm tomorrow. See you. Oh and, and we’ll make the soufflé. I wasn’t joking about it. Well I kind of was, but we’re going to do it. Tell Kyra I miss her. 

Love,

Aditya.