Dusk to Dawn (The Legacy Duet - 1)

𝕱𝖗𝖆𝖈𝖙𝖎 𝕰𝖙 𝕬𝖙𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖙𝖎

𝕿hwack!

The tennis racket swung across with brute force, smacking the ball across the court. Azaan returned the serve, his eyebrows nearly up to his hairline, sweat dotting his forehead. I reached out and shot the ball back with more force, letting the pent-up energy in me take charge.

I didn't remember a lot about Asfand before middle school, other than he was just there.

Once when we were little, we would have been seven, maybe - our families were in Monaco sharing a yacht. We'd docked, and our parents had decided to lounge at a beachside bar while we played on the shore and I fell off. That was one of my earliest real vivid memory of Asfand before we got to middle school - him diving in, and pulling me up to the surface. "I've got you," he had told me as he dragged me out of the water. He'd carried me back to the shore. Dumped me in Taimoor's arms.

To this day I didn't know why he jumped in. Why he'd bothered. No one else had. Not even my brothers who were supposed to be watching me.

And it just fucking figured that after all this time, he'd look the way that he did somehow. The same, but better in every way. I'd successfully avoided most pictures of him, Taimoor had been notoriously touchy about his friends, and the only times I'd (mistakingly) looked him up over the years, his accounts were private. But all the things that needled me so thoroughly were still there in all their glory.

How was he here? Why was he here? Did Taimoor know? Why now? After all those years of radio-like silence...

Thwack!

"You don't have to kill me Nia," seeing that he wasn't going to win today, Azaan gave up, throwing his hands in the air, tapping the racket on his hip, and jogging towards me.

"You'll be pretty hard to kill with a tennis ball."

He surveyed me. "Not from the way you were hitting it."

"You've lost your touch."

"You would think you'd go easy on your favorite brother," he whistled under his breath, picking up and rolling a towel around his neck.

"That's what you think," grabbing one of the Gatorade bottles, I sucked on the top and drank the liquid down to cool myself off. Sweat trickled down my face. My muscles burned.

Azaan stepped over one of the chairs and spritzed some water into his mouth, sitting beside me. "Don't be like that. Last night was hard for all of us."

"Didn't seem like it," he grimaced at the bite in my tone. "You were having a grand old time. So was our dear old brother, happily stuck to his wife like a magnet."

"Okay, I'm not going to touch that. I'm just trying to say I get it. You miss Taimoor bhai. But he left us..." he wasn't telling me something I didn't already know, but I wilted a little all the same. "He's up in the mountains, a recluse, doing God knows what. Maybe you shouldn't take out your frustration on me?"

"Azaan... I'm really not in the mood for this conversation."

"Nia..."

"Ma'am?" a hesitant voice dragged my attention from the verbal lashing my younger sibling was about to receive. If Azaan had any idea the actual shit going on all over my head, sliming its underbelly, he'd huddle under his bed every morning refusing to come out. I was like a duck. From the surface, I looked unbothered and serene. Floating around and enjoying life.

Underwater, I was working hard to stay afloat.

"Yes, Baila?" I met the steady dark gaze of my personal assistant as she shrank into herself, her shoulders curving in. One of these I'd stop scaring them away. One of these days, they'd stay.