Somewhere in Between

Barely Functioning

Mornings, she recalls, had never been her favorite time of the day.

Even if a certain someone had made her appreciate them a lot more than she ever did before.

The dim light paints their room with a soft yellow hue. A gentle warmth that always reminds her of her beloved.

KS shivers.

Mornings had never been her favorite, she corrects herself, unless spent with the one who made waking up worth it.

Despite the fact, that it was often at the break of dawn.

It's her fault anyway, for going and falling in love with the girl who adored sunrises.

And the lovesick fool that she is, KS flipped her whole routine around to be the one next to her, with a cup of coffee and a blanket to share.

It is the first morning in a long time that she hasn't woken up to the sweet 'good morning' from her beloved cuddle monster, in her raspy sleep voice that sounds entirely too enticing even when she's pretending to be not-HM.

KS comforted herself with the thought that no matter how well she acted as Urmi, some habits HM just couldn't break.

Of course, there were differences. Where HM would follow up her greeting with a flurry of kisses on her face, Urmila would instead launch into mindless chatter about everything under the sun. But the main result was the same: hers was the first voice KS heard every day and it quickly became her favorite thing to start the day with.

KS frowns all the same, missing her cute little chatterbox.

It didn't help that she couldn't even speak to HM on the phone.

How could she? They were still on their ridiculous mission.

As such, KS couldn't even call and talk to her love without coming up with an elaborate excuse for calling Urmi in the middle of the night and without making everyone suspicious.

This meant that she had not only been restless the whole night but also bored too.

And it definitely made her all the more cranky.

But all those matters take a back seat when KS walks to her wardrobe and realizes the biggest problem of this ridiculous arrangement they've been put in.

All her clothes are at HM's house.

Great.

Fantastic.

Absolutely brilliant.

As if she needed more reasons to hate this morning.

KS groans in frustration.

Don't get her wrong, she still had clothes at PJ's house. But it was all either fancy wear or sleepwear. And the select few casual clothes she had were all collecting dust in the laundry basket.

Since this whole Urmila mission started, KS hadn't spent more than a single night away from the room she shared with HM. So much so that her wardrobe consisted of pretty much two things that she alternated between, her uniform and HM's sweaters. And that meant she never stayed at PJ's long enough to really need clothes to change into or have time to wash the ones she changed out of.

Alas, sleep-deprived and cranky, KS feels too tired to even be angry anymore and prays that she can survive the day without further nuisances.

A while later, dressed in a pink sari that was simultaneously too fancy for her, yet the least fanciest thing in her sister's wardrobe, KS stands in her kitchen chugging the heaviest dose of caffeine she can whip up.