The Last Page

VII

PAST.

Hers,

I paced through the mahal, as I waited for him to show up at the front door.
And when I saw his car pull in, I ran downstairs

My anklet, making every staircase, and every wall known that I was around.
My heavy choli also betrayed me.
But I made my way to the door as soon as possible.

Only to see him rushing in, looking for me.

And after seeing each other, we immediately jumped into each other's arms.
He pecked me on the lips, which was strange since he hated that.

"Kya hua?" I asked, 
-What's happened?

"Hell broke loose," he said, he was shivering under my touch. He was scared, terrified.

I only noticed it now. I told him to calm down and take a seat but he was too scared. He was in a panic, he was pacing and he didn't even accept water.

It didn't take me long to realize something serious went down,
I just didn't know what.

I thought of the worst-case scenarios, 

He didn't seem hurt. But his hair was dishevelled, and his kurta was messily put.

"Will you please tell me what happened?" I asked, in a calm and collected tone. Even if I was far from those.

He stopped pacing and dropped to his knees in front of me, making my heart beat faster.

I was already sitting down, so we were face to face now. And now I could see the small cut on his head, releasing a dramatic amount of blood.

"You remember those men right?
The ones that dropped off guns at my house, that day? I told you about them," he said, I nodded.

I remembered precisely, it was scary. The men were foreignly dressed, they wore this unwelcoming aura around them. But we only ignored it, thought it was for protection maybe.

Uncle would never get into that business. We had concluded.

"They came back, today.
They fired all over the place, M--," he said,

"WHAT?" I exclaimed, and he nodded. Tearing up.

"They said that my father had run away.
And now I owed them," He furrowed his eyebrows.

"some kind of money," he said, confused himself.

"They threatened me, with my father. My friends," he said, tears rolling down his eyes, now.

"I can't let them find you," he said, finally looking up at me.
I only furrowed my brows. 
I felt like he had had the rest of the conversation in his head.

"What do you mean?" I asked, he gave me the most heart-wrenching look, I could tell he was hurting. He was crying, he was terrified.

But I needed to know more before I could try and help.

"But Uncle only went off a business trip, like he always does. He'll come back. He'll handle everything," I offered,

"He was supposed to come back a month ago," He said, which only made my chest tighter.
Did something happen to him?

"Well then, there must- there must be a delay. he'll come back!" I exclaimed.

"He won't even pick up his phone! he gone,
he's run away" he shouted.

I flinched back, startled by the sudden shout.

"Well, so what do we do now?" I asked, answering for myself.