The book of snippets

Two birds

Abir doesn't know what to do.

The one thing he was supposed to do has already been done and undone.

He did everything, everything to prevent this. To protect Nanko. Yet he failed.

He was going to tell Kunal the truth that he himself hadn't properly come to terms with, so that maa wouldn't be able to manipulate him. 'I will listen this time' he'd said to himself, 'I'll do what it takes.'

Except he never even got the chance, his worst nightmare was real and it was still unravelling.

What was worse was he didn't know how to stop this, how to make it okay...

He didn't know what to do when he was desperately looking for an answer.

"Bhai?"

It catches him off guard, but he drinks it up too. Cause Nanko is speaking again, he's calling him bhai again. A small soft smile breaks the fog on his face.

"Mujhe poora sach jaanna hai..."

The smile slips off his face as his breath freezes in his chest.

Bonus

Abir's not a stranger to sharing rooms, he's done it countless times with complete strangers, but it still feels new, feels special.

When they were kids, Kunal had followed him around everywhere, wanting to be just like him, doing everything he did.

'Outdoors' was the one place where he drew the line. No, Nanko had to stay home, in his soft bed with feather pillows in lush pajamas.

It was such a surprise that he had asked to stay today, truth be told, Abir was a little excited. He's always wanted to do something like this with him.

For now, he puts everything, old problems, new revelations, everything aside. Everything else on pause, to enjoy this one moment of camping with his little brother.

He fluffs the pillow a bit more and dusts the bed once more and then moves on to set his. Kunal walks in before he can lay down, "Kahan tha?" he asks full well knowing where he was.

"Woh main" Kunal stumbles, he smiles, "acha chal aake soja.."

Kunal is a bit too happy for the leeway, he walks to the bed smiling and plops down. Abir checks to see if he is comfortable, to tease if he squirms. Kunal however presses his lips together and pulls out his phone.

"Phone neeche rakh nanko" Abir orders all too gleefully.

"Aap bhi" Kunal parrots in the same tone.

Abir just nods and smiles. Then they're actually sleeping and Abir is waiting for the low and long 'bhaaaii' before the complaints begin. He waits and waits and... waits.

Kunal's breath evens out telling him that his little brother has indeed fallen asleep. Abir turns to him in disbelief, he has to struggle to be soft and quiet, so he doesn't wake him up.

The smile on Abir's face is blinding before it turns fond, "haaye" he chuckles before turning around to sleep himself.

It's a little under five minutes when he hears it, a soft, low whine. Followed by another, then a couple more. Abir turns to look at him, curious if he celebrated too soon.

Kunal is still sleeping, except it's a disturbed sleep cause there are mosquitos hovering around him.

Oh Yeah! The mosquitoes!! Abir had gotten so used to them that he had nearly forgotten about them.

Then, Nanko throws his hand across the bed, stretching it. He's half asleep now, reaching out to him, "Bhai" he mumbles low.

But Abir hears it anyway, he shakes his head and gets up, "Aaraha hoon.."

He goes to grab a straw fan, he's never done this before, warding out mosquitoes physically as Nanko slept, but he's also done this so many times, staying vigil until his brother slept peacefully.

Fin

I don't even know what this was honestly...

It started great then it got muddled I guess...

I just feel the reveal deserved to be left alone and not mixed with like three other arcs.

A tidbit I liked was Abir going 'maa keh dijiye yeh jhoot hai, kya hai yeh' and Kunal going 'yeh sab jhoot kyun nahin ho saktha bhai' after 'knowing.'

Abir is barely even allowed to deal with the fact that the brother he loves very much is his half brother. Brother only because of man he disowned, an evil selfish man.

Meenu was particularly screwed up for doing that ngl.

Also, I don't think she would have gone through it, ironically she is the one who knows Abir and Kunal the best, she knew Abir would have picked Kunal.

TheCalmInTheChaos and Not_for_sale_4419

Tagging you both cause you're my only moots who read yrhpk stories..

Meet you in the next chapter...

Oh and something is coming!