I ran into the kitchen at an award-winning speed and noticed my brother sitting on the breakfast table munching away while my mother was busy at the stove tossing dosas onto a plate. Rohit had completed twelfth grade and his college was starting in a few days, so he was practically jobless these days.

“Trisha, you have only ten minutes left for your school to start. Hurry up! First day and you will be late,” my mother said in the motherly way we are all so well aware of, as she placed a plate in front of me and put two dosas on it.

“College, mom! College,” I exclaimed through the food in my mouth.

I know that, mom and that’s why I am practically gulping down my breakfast without even chewing it, I wanted to add in, but of course I didn’t.

My alarm had gone off an hour ago and I had slept through it. No surprise factor there. But it was the first day at college and I didn’t want to be late and looking at the clock in the kitchen, I was sure that I would definitely be running in late.

“You ready to ride in my ‘grease lightning’?” Rohit asked me, his mouth full of food.

“Your what?”

“My ‘grease lightning’. You have seen grease, right?!”

“Yes, I have. But how does your second-hand car count to that?”

He groaned at me while I sneered at him. But suddenly my face went pale.

“I am not the first person you are giving a ride to, right?” I asked in a tiny voice.

“Yes, little sister. You are the first,” he said, grinning from ear to ear as if it was the best thing in the world.

I wasn’t feeling anywhere happy about it.

“Then I am so going to die! I don’t want to die, I have so many things left to do and to see! I am taking a rick!” I said jokingly, increasing the speed of my eating.

“What do you mean?!”

“That will be so much safer, Trisha,” my mother said, sitting down beside us.

My brother pushed his plate away and stood up, his eyes full of rage.

“Okay, take an auto!” he shouted at me, heading to the door.

“No, wait! I already told my friends that you would be dropping me today. They must have already left, and I won’t find any empty rickshaw at this time of the day!”

“Do I look like I care?” he said, grabbing the keys of his car (which was his advance birthday gift).

“Where are you going, Rohit?” my mother asked with concern.

“Call me back home when you are ready to trust me with the fact that I won’t kill your daughter by driving her to her college!” he shouted back before shutting the door close.

My mother massaged her temples before smiling up at me. I guess she was used to her teenage kids’ angry outbursts. The angry hormones always took us over.

“Wait, Rohit!” I said, pushing my plate aside and jumping up from the chair. I grabbed my bag and rushed to the door.

“Great! Why do I even bother making breakfast?” my mom groaned.

“Bye mom! Sorry mom!” I screamed before shutting the door close and running down the building stairs.

***

Halfway down the stairs, I heard an engine start. I should have taken the stupid lift, I thought as I continued running down the stairs, doubling my speed.

When I reached down finally, I watched my brother drive right past me, ignoring the crazy, jumping girl waving frantically at him to pull over. Yes, that would be me. I watched him drive down the road without glancing behind once. I sighed and looked up and down the street, crossing my fingers for an empty rick. But as suspected there was just me and the road for a long while.

And finally, I saw a black three-wheeled vehicle coming down the street. I jumped up and down in relief and glanced down at my watch. There were about eight minutes still left and if I could catch this rickshaw, I would be able to make it in time as it was a five-minute drive to my college. I stuck out my hand and waved it in front, but the auto honked in return. That’s when I realized that there was an old lady sitting inside. Embarrassed, I put my hand down and sighed. As the auto whizzed past me, the old lady gave me the look which clearly stated, “Ha ha, I have got a rick while you can stand there all day and watch the grass grow.” I so wanted to stick my tongue out at her but that would be the least sensible thing to do when I was running out of time to get to college.

I was giving up hope when another minute passed by and there was no sign of an empty rick or at least a taxi. Finally, I decided to take up the fifteen-minute walk to my college and forget about attending the first lecture. What a great start to the term!

As I took a few steps ahead, a car honked behind me and I spun around. There sitting behind the wheel of a battered car was my brother giving me the ‘will-you-get-in-today?’ kind of look. I ran to the passenger side door and pulled it open.

“You came back!” I squealed in delight as I plopped down into the seat and closed the door shut.

“Of course, I will come back! I am your brother after all!” he said, grinning and pressing the accelerator.

“But seriously, if I die, you are going to be seriously haunted!” I said with a solemn expression, pointing a finger accusingly at him.

He glared at me for a while before we both burst into laughter.

***

There were two minutes left for the first bell to ring to start the day. Turns out that Rohit had learnt to drive pretty well because I had actually reached my college alive and without any injury, though he was driving at a deadly speed enough to make a traffic police man have a major heart failure and me to grip my seat belt so tightly that my knuckles had turned pale.

I ran across the huge campus and reached the gigantic oak tree which had low branches and a heavenly shade. Under it, my friends were gathered around just like I thought they would be. After all these years, the oak tree still defined us, and I always thought that the tree was the reason we were still together even though we were an amazing bunch of misfits. Gathering under it with all my best friends before the start of a day at school was like the best part of the day for me and I was both relieved and happy to see that the tradition was still alive.

My friends looked up at me when I approached and instead of the friendly hellos that I was expecting I found deathly glares coming my way.

“Hi!” I said weakly.

“Wow you are early,” Soham said, sarcasm dripping from his voice and then they all exploded around me.

“Where the hell have you been?!” they all screamed at once with obviously more colourful language and not exactly the same words, but they all meant the same question.

“Uhm… had a fight with Rohit in the morning,” I said in a tiny voice. I saw all of them relax immediately. Obviously, they had assumed worse scenarios that might have happened that had made me reach just in the nick of time.

This scene was nothing new. I was always late if I didn't come to college with any of my friends. But still I had this gut feeling that something was different, very different. I scanned the crowd around me. There was Tanya, Jeremy, Shreya, Siddhant, Nimisha, Soham and Arnav.

Wait, Arnav?!

ARNAV?!

ARNAV?!

He was leaning against the tree, biting into an apple and looking amused.

“What is he doing here?!” I asked, pointing a finger at him.

Since years, we have bullied everyone away from the tree as it was a private spot for us lot. We people were like the seven musketeers of S.A.P. There can’t be an eight one to us.

Soham pulled me away from the tree and whispered to me, “Okay, I am not with this either, but we all did this voting thing for Arnav and looks like apart from both of us, everyone wants him to hang out with us.”

“What?! Where was I?”

“Well you went home early yesterday, and we all thought that even if you did veto it, it wouldn’t affect that much because it will still be a two against five.”

“Who decided to ‘vote’ him in?”

“Siddhant.”

I groaned.

“What is up with you and him anyway? Any ‘past’ which I should be knowing?” he asked, suspicion written on his face. His tone also had accusation in it.

“No!” I practically shouted. Soham of all the people should know me better than that!

“Why did you veto him?” I asked crossing my arms.

“He is new. We don’t even know him that well! Just stay away from him,” he said, looking away from me.

Okay, enough was enough. I know seeing Arnav here was quite a surprise for me and he did try to flirt with me during the wedding, but I honestly felt that he was a nice guy. It was not that I was looking for more than friendship with him, anyway. Soham was crossing his limits by prejudicing him.

“Will he be a rapist? A terrorist? A murderer?” I asked.

“Why are you defending him?” he asked me, narrowing his eyes.

“Because I know that you liked him at first but after he gave me that ‘hello’, you stopped liking him!”

He turned away, avoiding my gaze once again and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Soham! Look at me!” I said angrily. His hazel eyes met with mine and I knew that he knew what I was going to say even before the words left my mouth.

“Stop acting like an overprotective brother, for god sake!”

“I am just looking out for you!”

“I am sixteen years old! You have to stop making decisions for me. I think I know who wants to just be friends with me and who wants more than that. Trust me when I say I know.”

I could feel six pairs of eyes on us as we quarrelled and then we all heard the first bell of the term ring out through the huge campus.

“You don’t, Trisha. You so don’t,” he said calmly before picking up his bag and storming towards the college building.

Wow. I didn’t remember how we ended up having that argument, but I had been noticing his ‘protectiveness’ for a while and I wanted to speak to him about it some or the other day. But I so didn’t want it to be in the first few minutes before the college year started. Well one thing led to another…

All I knew was that it was the worst start to the term ever.