vi.

R I G E L » the foundation

Tara flashes me a smile as I walk into the car with two cups of coffee fitted into the holder. "Hey, here it is. Your coffee."

She tugs onto the coffee cup from my hand, and inhales the smell of coffee. The smile on her face tells me that she simply loves the smell of it.

A sigh escapes my lips as I finish the last sip of my coffee, when I see Tara wrapping her arms around herself. I realize that the temperature of the place is unusually low. "Are you cold? You can take my hoodie for a bit of time because it's getting too cold, and the last thing I want is you catching a fever or cold because of me."

Tara laughs, shaking her head a little. "Why are you babbling, Virat? Chill, it's not like I'm dying." She turns around, and grabs the hoodie, and pulls it on. It's a little large for her, and she tugs at the hem of her sleeves and pulls it to cover her palms.

"I know but there's a part of me... always worried for you. I can't help when you are a living magnet for danger."

"Maybe that I am." she states simply, and tips her head against the headrest. She doesn't look at me, and closes her eyes, silently breathing. Tara has been quiter than usual, which amuses me a little.

"Tara, why are you so quiet and submissive today? Are you feeling okay? "

"Yeah." she smiles at me, her eyes twinkling back to her normal self which reminds me of the stars every now and then. "It's just not a practice for my friends to wake me up at four to ask me to accompany then on a drive." I wave her off and mutter a whatever. "If you're tired then I can drive you, you know?" Tara suggests sounding serious.

I laugh, "Tara, you seem to be the driving sister of Lewis Hamilton. So not really, thanks."

Tara's jaws drop to the floor, as she fakes a gasp, "Excuse me, I am a very, very, very capable driver. Don't talk shit."

"But I am not allowing you to drive. Sorry." I shake my head in denial.

Tara sinks into her seat, and puffs her cheeks in exasperation. "Fine. I am turning on the stereo then." she taps the button, and turns on the volume to its maximum. A small smirk forms on her lips, knowing that I hate this type of music. But somhow, her laughters melts into my heart, matching my heartbeats.

I shrug, "Remind me why I am driving since five hours for you?" I ask. Instantly, Tara's laughter dies down, and the trace of her beautiful smile becomes invisible.

She looks out of the window. "Why are we driving to Himachal?" I ask again, secretly hoping we aren't going to the place I never want to.

"We are driving to Kasauli." Tara simply states, and the horrors of that incident unfolds in the front of my eyes. I hadn't faced that night, but somehow whatever I felt feels more real than the reality itself.

I shake my head, and almost add incredulously, "Don't tell me we are driving there to see them."

"Virat, I just want to tell you that trust me, you want this. You need this closure more than anyone else. Do you really think your best friend would be happy thinking that his death is the reason for your nightmares?"

"That night... I can never forget how the bus upturned because of that horrifying landslide. People call it miracle that I was alive, but I feel so empty on the inside. It's been three extremely excruciating years, Tara, and I don't think they would even forgive me for not turning up when I was needed the most. And why are you doing this to me? This is not a jigsaw puzzle. We are not supposed to find its pieces and fix them together to pass our time." As I say it, I feel like I'm shrinking onto my skin.

Tara keeps her hands atop of mine, and gives it a slight squeeze. "Maybe it's not that way, Virat. Maybe we are the pieces. The fragments that need to be fixed. You need to stop rewinding the past in your head, and move on.. without this endless buffering. Because that's exactly what Shaurya wants."

"So, you're not letting this go, are you?" I ask in a small voice.

"No. And I'm going to wait like hell for you to understand. Wait just like the mermaid waits for the day when she has human feet."

I scoff at her reply, "As if.. No one can wait for that long, Tara."

Tara's face dissolves into a smile as she says, "I can wait. For you."

"If that's real, I want to say," I break into a smile, "Thank you." I say, and I mean it.

•••

My mind disintegrates when we ring the doorbell. Everything was the same. The street blur, the raindrops skittering down the window pane, the small garden outside the porch, every single thing.

My heart forgets to beat. I do know this moment would put a kink in the arc of my life. Tara waits for someone to answer the door, while I suffer a plane crash, lose everything in a fire, plunge over a waterfall. I die a thousand times as I wait for someone to open the door.

The door finally opens.

It's Shaurya's mom, and somehow I don't even know how to face her as she looks at me with an appeasing smile because I know I simply don't deserve that. "Virat? It's so good to see you here." her voice is sweet, all dipped in saccharine. And I don't deserve that.

Tara's hold on my hand only tightens as mutters a go inside.

"Where is Anvi?" I ask quietly. The sweetness drains from her face. She tries to open her mouth, but no words come out of it. So instead, I speak for her, "She still hates me, doesn't she?"

She doesn't say anything.

Anvi still hates me.

"Aunty, I know I shouldn't be the one speaking here - but Virat needs to talk to Anvi. He cannot lose his nine year long friendship for something for which he isn't even responsible." Tara speaks softly.

"I'll get her down." Anvi was Shaurya's younger sister. We three are - used to be best friends until Shaurya was swallowed into the void. Anvi and I stopped talking after that incident. I stopped because I simply had nothing to say, and Anvi stopped because my silence hurt her.

"How can I see hatred in her eyes, Tara - " My words come out in wheezing indents like I am the broken casstete at a corner. "How can I -"

Tara puts her warm cheek against my cold one, and I feel myself calm down at the sensation of it, the warmth, the fuzziness - I only focus on that.

Our bodies lose contact as soon as Anvi comes down the stairs with a smille, and I realize she hadn't changed even a bit. The memories, they never fade. I let myself swim in the absymal ocean of the sweet childhood memories wherein it was all simple. No complications, no crying.

I realize her smile is still beautiful like she used to be. But hatred spits into her mouth as she looks at me with her stoic face - devoid of emotion. Her face had grown a lot paler, and she had lost more than she chew, and somewhere inside my heart, I feel I'm the reason behind her condition. I feel that I'm the one who snatched the last string of hope from Elpis herself.

"Virat?" she speaks out my name as if I am some toxin she never wants in her life. Maybe I am a toxin.

Still I give myself a chance, "Anvi.." I breathe out incessantly, as I try to stand and not fall weak. "I'm sorry."

"You are? Really Virat? After all this while -"

"- I know I wasn't there for you when you needed me the most. I'm sorry for being a coward."

"Then why are you here? To witness how broken and battered I am.. now?" she asks, furiosuly pushing me backwards. "I fucking lost my brother, and I thought that at least my friend would be there to help me. But no, he didn't because he just thinks that crying is a weakness. And you pushed me so much, I was looking for death's prescription because Shaurya means so much to me and you -"

"- I lost my best friend too." I hug her tightly as I say, "I was too soaked in emptiness, Anvi. And I didn't want to stay because I couldn't witness - what Shaurya had left behind. That void, it hurts much more than the his death itself. But now I want to heal, Anvi."

"I can't heal, Virat. Never. Because I'm just like a broken vase. It can never heal."

Maybe all of us are broken vases. Once a heart broken, the pieces of it remain astray. As much as you try to patch the shredded fragments after fragments, some wounds never heal back to their normal.

But love heals everything. Every single wound. The infinity of love is like time itself stopping. And maybe.. just maybe I am healing.

"Love heals everything, Anvi." she looks at me with an expression of I know.

"And I can very well see that." she says, looking at Tara who's talking with Aunty. "She's too pretty for you, you tiny little rodent."

I pull her hair teasingly, "I don't know why I always end up being a filthy rodent in your imaginations." We fight until both of us are exhausted. I look at Anvi's smiling face, and I can say she hadn't laughed so much in a while. "I missed this, Anvi. I missed you."

"I missed you too, Virat. So much."

•••

After an hour long of debacle and fights, Tara and I decide to head to Dehradun before it turns dark. As we step outside the porch, Tara elbows my stomach hard out of the blue, and looks at me questioningly, "I thought that you almost forgot me."

"Oh really? I can smell something crashing and burning here." I laugh at her, and hop into the car.

"Nothing's burning, doofus. I just said that you forgot me." she says accusingly, and gives me another smack on the shoulder.

I purse my lips together as I reply, "Of course not."

"Really?" Tara asks me, her voice almost resembling a five year old.

I smile, "Really. The coast can forget the ocean waves, the earth can forget about the sun, the lungs can forget how to breathe - but Tara - the moon can never forget about the stars."

Tara raises an eyebrow at me as she asks innocently, "Why can't moon forget about the stars?"

"Because Virat can never forget about Tara." I reply, and I mean it. Tara laughs at me silently, and I'm left flabbergasted at her reaction, as she cannot even take my subtle hints. "Why are you laughing, Tara?" I ask in a solemn voice.

"You just called yourself moon. But in reality, you're a moron."

"You really don't know but I was a very cute and chubby kid. Girls used to swoon over my looks, and they would call me moon as well.. sometimes."

Tara rolls her eyes, "I used to call my seven year old niece moon. You're not moon, Virat."

I nod slowly and poke her cheeks as I say, "You're still very much a star, Tara."