In The Stars || AdiYa FF

Chapter 9 - Talking to Strangers (Feb 14)

Zoya decided she would not think of what had just transpired downstairs.

After the unexpected... Zoya had made excuses of being tired and had withdrawn to her room upstairs. Aditya was with Ivy and Frank, helping them clean up. The other couple, Stefan and Kate had retired to their room as well since she had heard the door, next to theirs, close.

She exhaled once more, deeply, like she had done for the past God-knows-how-many minutes. It was just a harmless peck on the lips. It didn't even last for more than a sec- she had nothing to feel bad about. It didn't mean anything.

She plopped on the bed, the mattress bounced under the sudden exertion of her weight.

She had to forget about this... minor kink, she told herself again. If she didn't think about it, she would soon forget it even happened. And moreover, once the car was out of the muck tomorrow, she would reach Limerick in a couple of hours and then another few hours to Dublin- to Yash!

A ping noise cut through her thoughts. It was the faint beep of a cellphone. Her cellphone! She stood upright abruptly and fished her mobile from her handbag. One bar of network on her phone! She exclaimed a small "yes!" and unlocked her phone.

There were a few messages from her parents and Noor, asking her generic questions about her trip. She scrolled down without reading till she saw 2 text messages from Yash.

-Feb 11| 01:20 pm-

It was a long and tiring journey.

At home now with Mom and Mahi

Talk to you soon. Love you.

-Feb 14|05:45 pm-

Happy Valentine's Day

Love you.

The last text was just a few hours ago. Zoya felt a bit odd about the lack of more texts. She hadn't spoken to him in 4 days, surely he would've thought about that. Though infrequent communication when they were apart wasn't rare. Yash traveled a lot for work so sometimes they would go for a few days talking only via texts.

She shrugged aside the weird feeling and dailled Yash's no. Since she was using her India sim, he wouldn't know that she was here in Ireland and wouldn't spoil the surprise.

She muttered a few "please, please" whilst the call was getting connected due to 1 intermittent network bar. She heaved a sigh of relief when the sound of ringing erupted from the other end.

After about 4 rings, Yash received the call.

"Hello," his voice was hoarse.

"Yash!" she exclaimed in joy at hearing his voice. She hadn't heard his voice in 4 days. 4 awful days.

"Zoya," he muttered sleepily.

She looked at the time on her wristwatch. It was a few minutes after half past nine.

"Since when do you sleep so early?" she grinned.

"It's way past midnight!" he replied, between sleep and what she sensed, annoyance.

"No, it's 9:40pm," she corrected him, "Are you all right?"

There was a silence for a few seconds before he spoke. This time his voice was much clearer, like he had woken up completely, "Oh, yeah. I was so tired, I slept early I guess."

"Tired?" she asked, "Aren't you on vacation?"

"It's Mahi," he responded, "she wants to leave her job and open her own business- event management. I have been helping her."