Nitya paused deliberately before a particular room during her aimless wandering. The room which belonged to her parents. She batted away her apprehension as her hand coiled around the doorknob, gently prying it open. A wave of lightness bled into the room as the lights flickered on autonomously. Traces of dust floated undisturbed, a sign of its neglected state. The bed sheets were disheveled, as though recently in use. The room remained untouched, a living memorial to her parents.
Nitya's suppressed sorrow audibly cracked her voice as she gravitated towards the adjoining balcony, half expecting to witness the cheerful banter of their threesome. But only emptiness greeted her, accompanied by an overwhelming silence. The accustomed seat at the balcony Keanu preferred seemed to taunt her with the palpable absence of her father.
Bitter tears clouded Nitya's vision as she allowed them to fall, "Oh, how I yearn for you," she choked through her sobs.
Crying hard, she made a dash for the door, only to find her sleeve snagged on the knob of her parent's wardrobe. "Ouch!" She stopped to disentangle her sleeve, musing if she should open the wardrobe. After wrestling with her thoughts for a few minutes, she finally did.
The doors groaned open, and she saw it was her mom's wardrobe. Multiple shelves were filled with her mom's clothes, arranged with meticulous care.
Nitya took one of the dresses from the neatly aligned stack, it still held the scent of her mom's favorite perfume. Settling on the floor, she wept into the soft folds of her mom's fabric dress, her tears leaving marks. "Oh mom..." She sobbed, nestling into the dress.
Memories flooded in as she remembered the time her mom had worn it on a mini vacation at the beach. The memory was vivid; she could almost see herself, her dads and brother, laughing together and walking barefoot on the sandy shores. Her mom was holding her dad, Keanu's hand while her brother, Freddie, was perched on her hip and her other dad, Daniel, was busy making them laugh with his jokes. Nitya gave a heartbroken sniff. They had been so happy.