A Mazed Heart

08. Answer

A Mazed Heart (Rifa Fathma)

08. Answer

"What do you think it can be?" She asked and swirled her head to her right.

Haadi leaned against the tree in their school play ground. His head was tossed up as he stared at the sky above, a disturbing flicker in those black orbs. His eyebrows were sewed together as his mind was all wired up in search for answers.

Answers. If there was someone who could give the answer to her big brother's question with ease, then it was Haadi.

She had been holding onto the thin line of hope that Haadi would have the answer to her brother's question. But judging by the silence that radiated off of him, her heart dropped to her knees.

Didn't he always carry around answers to basically everything? Whether he sat in the class or at his home or whether she and Aahil walk up to him with questions, Haadi had always been quick in answering right away. As if they all were so naive for not able to answer such an obvious question.

As if the answer was at the tip of his tongue.

How come he ran out of answers this one time when she was in a desperate need of one? She bit her lower lip helplessly.

She turned her head to her left where Aahil was slouching on the bench. His school bag was recklessly placed on his laps, his crossed arms over it, as he leaned forward, exhaustion taking over his features. He rested his chin over his hands. "I think, it's Santa Claus!"

"Santa Claus?" She straightened up. Why didn't she think about it before? The faint flicker of hope in her heart picked up speed. A mysterious man who sneaks up at night, slips Christmas gifts for children and disappears. A perfect lie popping straight out of some fairytale.

"How ridiculous!" Haadi wondered out loud with an edge to his tone, irritation taking over his otherwise stone-cold face. "Don't expect her brother to be a knuckle-head like you." He tore his gaze away from the sky as he flopped back his head and gave a side-glance to Aahil. "Look at it through the eyes of a fifteen year old."

Aahil drew his eyebrows together, his jaw slowly clenched as he straightened in his seat. "Sorry to disappoint your highness but I can't possibly think like a fifteen year old. I don't have the brains of a fif-"

"Knock it off, you two!" She raised her hands out impatiently with a frown. Could they ever engage in a civil conversation?

Aahil shut his mouth at once and glared at Haadi who didn't even spare a glance at him. But she was sure he had rolled all his witty comebacks up his sleeves over whatever Aahil would tell him. She narrowed her eyes at her cousins who held their tongue back grimly. If only. If only she hadn't cut them off, a neverending banter would have been on the loose.

She sighed. "Please don't start you two. We need to come up with an answer as soon as possible. Yahoo would never open his mouth until I feed him up with a proper answer. I beg you to not fight atleast now."

She felt a sudden urge to sit somewhere as pain shooted up her knees. She made her way around the bench where Aahil was sitting on and slumped beside him. "Besides, I don't think it was lame." She opened her right palm in the air, picturing it as one of the weighing pans. "A Santa Claus." She raised the other weighing pan - her other palm - in the air. "The biggest lie someone can ever come up with."