An-EXIT

CHAPTER 4 (FIRST LOVE)

MITANSH

Knock-Knock, "Bro alert!" I said before entering my brother's room. He likes privacy and we all respect his decision. The moment I opened the door, I accidentally kicked a mountain of shoes.

"Did you wash them?" My eyes widened. Even by looking at the number of the shoes, my willingness to clean them died, while he actually washed them.

"Yes, I'm quite nervous!" He panicked while sitting between the pile of clothes and open suitcases.

"You should've called me." I walked closer to him, minding my foot to step on any of the alien things which were scattered all over the flooring.

"C'mon, they're just shoes, please don't overreact!"

"Now, what should I do? I thought I could be of help, but maybe you're all sorted." I made a silly face. "Or, I could just sit here and give you a little pep talk. What do you say?" I smirked and after a second my phone chimed with a notification. It was already the fourth message I'd received since I entered Maahir's room.

He observed my activity and asked, "Did you talk to Inayat? I thought she had some urgent news to share with you." He passed me a smile and continued to fold his rest of the clothes.

"It was related to An-Exit, nothing new." I slid my phone back into my pocket and noticed Maahir's bare hand.

"Where's your bracelet? I thought you would never take it off, even if your hand choked and died because of it." I made an obvious face and started to look here and there, pretending to search for it.

"Not funny!" He rolled his eyes and after a second he broke into laughter. I knew it, his humor is the same as mine. "Okay, as you've mentioned about the bracelet, so let me ask you for a favor. Can you please pass me that green coloured pencil box?"

"Ben 10 one? Sparky lime green one? The one which read, 'Do Not Touch' in bold letters? Like, no one is allowed to touch it except Master Maahir. You really meant that box which I can't touch, but still need to.... Because you know, you asked for it... right?"

"Should I wait, or is it more?"

"Here you go..." I grinned ear to ear. "Also what's with the bookish dialogue? It will be better if you keep them limited to your novels." I squeezed my eyes.

Ignoring me, he gently took out his rubber bracelet from the box and wore it. It was a cool, kinda girly bracelet with a combination of yellow and blue rubber strings intertwined at the center. The fascinating thing about it was that the bracelet was actually handmade.

"You better not talk about my books, I know that you haven't read a single one from my five published books!" He turned his face to look elsewhere.

"Hey c'mon, you know that I'm not interested in such types of things. You're a child prodigy, and I appreciate it, but you can't just force me to read them!"

"Don't make excuses, I know what type of things you're actually interested in!" He gave me a smirk.

"Hey-" I stepped forward.

"What? I meant software. God, what did you even think?" He started laughing. And for my revenge, I snatched the t-shirt which he was folding and threw it on his face.

It was quite strange, but I never questioned him about his bracelet. Honestly, I did ask him, and with utmost respect, I received complete ignorance in return! He never showed me or even denied telling me anything about it. Earlier, that little thing used to bug me like hell! Like, who gave him this? Why is it so precious to him? Is it expensive? Why does he always wear it? Okay, some questions were complete trash, so not to make a fool out of myself, I'm gonna keep them with me. But what's actually so special about that rubber bracelet?