When you have a few weeks left to live, the only other tragic thing that can happen to you besides dying is to fall in love.
For Ariha, love means helping her best friend, Aarya, get the boy she has had a crush on since sixth grade. When life is so...
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It was entirely my decision. After all, who would want to spend the last of human days couped up in a room? Certainly not me. I wanted to live my life like any other high school girl for one last time.
So, even when my neurologist suggested not to stress out over my studies and recommended homeschooling as an alternative, I had made up my mind. I wanted to make the most of remaining life as normal as possible.
I begin to reconsider my decision as the last period nears its end. And as Aarya looks over at me from the front row with her eyes sparkling with excitement, my anxiety picks up speed.
It is all my doings. I had wanted to work as a cupid for my best friend and when the time came, I realized it wasn't such a great idea as I had thought initially. If I hadn't gotten too deep into the world of the boy Aarya secretly crushed on, I could've escaped what I'm about to enter.
While Mrs. Aiyyar solves yet another integral for the class, I plot out plausible reasons to escape the encounter. Yes, the encounter with a certain Rehan guy. That's the problem with being a rookie cupid. You can't decide how and when you might get caught up in a situation. And in my case I know exactly what it is.
"Psst!" Aarya pulls me out of my panic-stricken phase and passes me a chit. She turns back around as soon as Mrs. Aiyyar's eyes travel across the class. I quickly fist in the chit and avoid any eye contact with her.
This is something we're used to do for our primary school. When we get bored or need a distraction in the class, we gossip passing chits to each other. Although, I've grown over it, Aarya seems to still enjoy it. Also, I think she is better at keeping a poker face than me hence she never gets caught while doing it.
Until now.
"Aarya," Mrs. Aiyyar calls her out, and I curse under my breath. "Since you're more interested in wasting your time instead of solving the equation, it's only fair if you stayed after class with the rest of your friends under detention."
Shit! Aarya can't be in detention.
If she is in detention, who is meeting Rehan after the classes? And since he wants the payback from me. I'll certainly have to be there. Only I have no reason to meet him alone. It's all for Aarya. And I can't get involved after knowing his secrets and the possibilities of ruining my own plan.
But it's Savitri Aiyyar's detention, and no one can escape it. I look over at Aarya with a helpless look on my face as she tries to reason with the teacher.
"I...I just looked back once, Ma'am." She stutters as Mrs. Aiyyar crosses her arms across her chest and peers down at Aarya's notes. I'm sure she hasn't gotten any notes done there. Mathematics isn't her favorite, and on top of that her mind can't focus on two things at a time. I smile at her silliness but realize she's in the middle of getting an assured detention. Why can't she quit being cared for once in her life?
