Skin & Blister

7

CHAPTER SONG - BROTHER BY KODALINE .

"You can at least tell me where are we going." Ayaan said while I was opening my car's driver's seat door. "Oh hello, I'll drive."Ayaan added and tried to push me. But damn poor Ayaan. I was already for an assault from his side. Though he just pushed a little.

"Na. See my driving skills today and rate my skills on the scale of 10. And yes, I am not telling you where we are going. You better come and sit beside me. " I told him. I could see him pouting exactly like Neil.

...

"What the hell Ira! I'll die. Drive at a normal speed. I have the whole day free." Ayaan said and I could clearly see the creases on his forehead which said that my 18 years old brother was scared for his life.

"No. Unfortunately you are not going to die this soon." I said and he smiled. I looked at him and gave a smile back.

"Look at the road and nowhere else." Ayaan warned me and I laughed.

After a ride of almost 1 hour and 30 minutes I stopped the car and asked Ayaan to come out. It was a forested area in front of us.

"So rate my driving skills now." I said happily.

"Can I rate in minus?"

"What?" He was hurting my feelings.

"I practically died. You know that right?"

 "You are so rude." I said and started moving towards the forest.

"Where are you going?" Ayaan asked behind me.

"Follow me." I instructed.

We walked for almost 15 minutes and then we reached to our final destination for which I had brought Ayaan to Karnataka from Goa. A waterfall was there behind many bushes. The scene was very beautiful and of course vacant because very few people knew about that place. The tweeting birds were adding to the beauty of the landscape. There was a little shallow area where I gripped Ayaan's hand and took him to. I could feel the slightly chilled water tickling my feet. I pulled my jeans a little up to my knees. The smell of dirt, fresh water and leaves was creating a soothing aura. Ayaan took out his phone and clicked a photograph of the scene.

"I never knew that we have such beautiful and peaceful places in India." Ayaan said.

"I know that it is too beautiful but I don't know what this place is called." I told him.

"Let's click photos," Ayaan said with extreme excitement. I agreed and we clicked thousands of photos (Just a hyperbole) .We had two reasons for clicking so many photos : 1. We wanted them as a memory , and 2. Making Neil feel jealous was important.

We stayed at the beautiful place for half an hour after which I called Shrey and asked him to meet in the same cafe to which we went yesterday, in 2 hours. I wanted Shrey and Ayaan to meet .

Ayaan did not want to leave the place but to make him move I lied that I was hungry. I told him about Shrey and our friendship while we were measuring the distance back to Goa.

We reached to the cafe late because of Ayaan's filthy promise that I will drive slowly. I spotted Shrey. He was wearing black t-shirt and light blue funky pants. And I saw his footwear too today. He was wearing a military green crocs.

"Hey!" I said to Shrey and startled him by my sudden appearance.

"Hi." He replied back.

"Hi Shrey. You look cool!" Ayaan said suddenly. His compliment was weird.

"Hi back. And thank you mister." Shrey said and smiled. He gestured me to take a seat. How can he accept a compliment from any stranger?

"Okay so Ayaan this is Shrey," I said and looked towards Shrey "And Shrey this is-"

"Your twin , Ayaan. I understood." I was interrupted by Shrey. "Sit bro!" He gave the same gesture to Ayaan as he gave to me.

Soon Ayaan and Shrey started conversing about all the boyish stuffs and I went to use the washroom. After returning I found them talking about 'Marvels'. Rubbish. Why are boys like this? They were listening an audio recording on Shrey's mobile phone and laughing continuously. I asked them what was it about and they told me that they were watching a super new marvel movie's trailer and them listening to some reviews about it. This is made me crystal clear that yes boys are weird.

"Did you guys order something?" I interrupted in their happy time.

"Certainly not." Ayaan replied.

"And why CERTAINLY not?" I asked in shrill voice.

"Because we want you to choose. So ahead to the counter." Shrey ordered me.

I simply stood up and went. I did not want to ruin their happy moment although I was feeling very angry. I ordered pizza with extra cheese, coffees and garlic bread.

"I have ordered." I told them when I reached back to the table. I saw them exchanging phone numbers. "Hey guys please talk about something interesting to me also." I pleaded.

"Not our fault that you find Cinderalla and Rapunzel more fascinating than our marvels." Ayaan said and both the boys started chuckling.

"Yes. I have watched Cinderalla and Rapunzel and I have also found them fascinating. But all was when I was a kid. Now I do not give a damn to those show off queens." I said and pouted.

"Aiyaa.. Ira is going to cry just to defend her princesses." Shrey said and they continued laughing.

"You already know me Shrey since childhood. How can you be so obnoxious? And I am definitely not defending those bitchy lasses", I said. "And when this topic has started only then it's my time now to let the cat out of the bag." I turned to face Ayaan. " You know when we were younger, Shrey once cried almost for 1 hour when he accidently killed a cockroach. He wasn't miserable for the loss of the cockroach's life, but he was feeling too disgusted because he had the black blood of it on his shoes ."Shrey was continuously making stupid faces to protect his secrets. " And this Ayaan," I told to Shrey, "is a coward. Just 5 hours back, approximately, from the current time, he was pleading to me to drive slowly . Just because the coward infant was scared of my driving."I ended and gasped for breath after speaking so continuously. I always had this problem of gasping for breath.

"What did you order? " Ayaan asked to change the topic.