Chapter 31
AKASH'S P. O. V.
"It's your birthday month! Know what that means?" I awoke to the sound of those words as Sid popped into my doorway. Glancing at my phone I saw that the date was September 1st. I sat up and turned back to look at my brother, frowning. As it is I hadn't been feeling too well over the last couple of days so I was strongly tempted to yell at him for waking me so abruptly. But I resisted the inclination and just stared at him.
"What does it mean now that it's September?" I asked.
"It means you leave tomorrow, and I get your room!" he grinned before running away as if he expected me to pursue him. In normal circumstances I might have, but his words seemed to echo in my room: "You leave tomorrow..." It meant I now had less than twenty-four hours in which to try and talk to Carrie. I knew that I just needed to see her for a few minutes and try and say what I needed to, but I also knew that she was working today and would need some rest after her shift was done. My only hope lay in her being free sometime in the evening.
My parents were insistent on spending the day in packing everything that I was supposed to take to university for the year. Since I wouldn't be living on campus, I would need to bring along a desk and bed along with the regular school supplies. However, the sight of the suitcases only made me more worried about how much time I had left in town; Dad had insisted we leave at seven in the morning tomorrow, so that we would have enough time to move all my stuff into the house where I would be staying.
I tried as long as I could to listen to my parents discussing the long list of items to be packed, but my resistance crumbled before noon. "I'm going out," I announced, walking into the rec room where my suitcases were lying open. Both my parents looked up at me.
"Why? Where?" Dad demanded, sounding a little surprised.
"Please," I said. "I need to see my friends, and I need to say bye. I'll have lunch outside, and probably dinner too if that's okay." For the first time in years, I could see something like understanding in my father's expression as he gave me a slight smile. He nodded.
"Go ahead, have fun seeing your friends," he said. I left the room and went to the side door. Mom stopped me as I was tying my shoelaces though.
"Mind if I say something?" she said. I motioned for her to go on and she smiled. "You have a really good choice of friends. Until Wednesday I had only heard about them from you, but that day I saw them both."
"Did you talk to Carrie too?" I asked with interest. "I know you spoke to Tracy since I was right there." She smiled and shook her head.
"No, I saw her at the start of the orientation though," Mom replied. "I recognized her easily enough from the pictures you've taken over the summer. Sometimes you can just tell when someone's got a good personality, you know?" Dad came up behind her and grinned at me too, while I simply stared at the pair of them; they were acting so strange today.
"I didn't talk to either of them," Dad said, "but I saw them too. Which one was the one right beside you in the auditorium?"
"Tracy." I answered. He nodded and I looked at the pair of them, but more specifically at Mom. "What makes you say all this though? That was the first time you ever saw them."
Mom smiled. "Have you ever just looked at someone and been able to tell that they're a good person?" I couldn't help but smile, who knew that better than me? She went on, "And also, they have something else which I don't know if anyone else noticed. There's a certain sparkle in their eyes, like a little star. It just made me think that they must be really nice girls, and good people too."
