Black Book VIII

Mel, thank you for the permission...I can finally update :)

Yoomi

P.S. It's an epic update... Take your time guys!


and it was only then I remembered Sidhi. The necklace was hers and here I was clutching it in bedazzled reverence but then I thought of the cookies and I knew she had packed the biscuits and so maybe she had wanted me to find it. It would be best to check though and I was distracted by the sound of footsteps at the door. I was willing to bet it was my brother. You always heads him coming long before he announced his arrival and who wouldn’t: what, with his stomping feet, his microphone voice. I liked Felix, sort of, but it was painful being his brother. He was the typical know-it-all and I didn’t relish him seeing the necklace. Questions were the last thing I needed.

I stashed it under the neat piles in my wardrobe as he burst through the front door. I knew his best friend, Mo, would be following loudly in his footsteps. ‘Keeeeeeeep, where are you? I’m home Kep. Kep, where are you? Flix is home.’

‘Like I haven’t noticed,’ I muttered. Off to face the kind and brotherly bully. I gingerly walked down the steps. I head Mo attempting to whisper ‘I don’t think he’s here’ and failing miserably. ‘Flix, Mo,’ I nodded politely.

Mo grunted. Flix looked away. Felix didn’t always dress so terribly. His clothes looked like carefully patched rags. I had often had the impression that when Felix actually bought new clothes (a rare and much-celebrated event), he would take them for a roll through some mud so they’d look as raggy as the rest of his wardrobe. ‘You just got home?’

Mo tapped his foot impatiently. The question surprised me. ‘Yeah, why?’

‘Went for a walk in the woods?’

‘You could say that.’

‘Quite a walk. Did you see that crazy woman?’

I took it he meant Sidhi. ‘No, I didn’t.’ I turned to leave. ‘How’d your exam go?’

He stared at me saying, ‘fine, just fine,’ as if I’d asked the most ridiculous question.

I wanted to leave. Sidhi’s words stood out in my mind. Unity, commonness. Why was I thinking of those things then? People have ceased to see men and women as human beings with feelings and thoughts and instead as strange entities. I froze. I sensed something wasn’t quite right with my brother but it’s not like we’re very close and inclined to discuss our lives with each other. Still, still, maybe it was an opportunity. Mo lumbered off to the kitchen. Flix followed him and I was left standing there with my indecision. I’ll speak to him later, I shrugged, later when Mo wouldn’t be around.

* * *
I don’t remember if I spoke to Felix afterwards. I suspect I didn’t. I think Mo stayed around for a few hours before leaving. I’m sure that by then I was utterly bewitched by the necklace. Such a unique piece and to think it was in my hands! For some reason, each time I glanced at it, I felt like Sidhi was once more speaking to me. Her words would be whispered in my mind and that made me happy. I knew she was important and I almost couldn’t believe I knew someone like her. It felt like all this time I’d been searching for someone who could help me negotiate the maze which is life and I just knew for certain that Sidhi would help me and I knew it with that same certainty she had known I was ready.

It was no surprise I slept happily that night. I had placed the necklace within the stuffing of my pillow and I imagine the warmth coursing underneath my head had little to do with the balmy summer night…

I waited for the following weekend with excited anxiety. I wondered why I had resolved to wait for the weekend but in retrospect it was for the bet. That didn’t stop me from returning to the woods though. Twice I went to the tree and spent a few hours besides it. Such calm times! I now had a place I could retreat to for some quietness, some solitude but the tree was the biggest mystery. One time I glanced over my shoulder, thinking I’m mad, even telling myself this must be a sign of insanity, and I tentatively put my hands on the tree. The bark, I thought, was like any other bark but it was special. It felt ancient, as if it had weathered the toughest times and yet still stood as a testimony that even the tougher times do pass. Eventually I withdrew my hands but only because I worried what an accidental observer might think. I believed I was too young to have a rumour attached to my name…

So on the Saturday, I took the path into the woods, heavily aware of the necklace in my pocket. Make no mistake, I was attached to it and I felt guilty over that attachment because I knew it did not belong to me. It was going back to Sidhi today. I walked to her home with thoughts of our first meeting on my mind. The more I thought about it, the more sensible her words seemed and those words had a genuine power in my mind. I wondered if I was to relate those same ideas to someone else, the other person would agree they were true, and of course, it bothered me that someone had only shared those ideas with me. Shouldn’t something important, crucial really, be widely known? I intended to ask Sidhi that but I forgot that day.

I called out at the gate. She peered out from the front window. ‘Have a seat. I’m just getting some drinks.’

I took it that she was indeed expecting me. Should that have surprised me? Perhaps it would have but at some point, I began to suspect Sidhi must be psychic or something. I occasionally joked to myself that she had a crystal ball. Somehow, it was not difficult to imagine her hunched over the crystal ball, but that was just my imagination. I believed she was getting her knowledge elsewhere, only I didn’t know where. Either way, it did not bother me. I liked her too much to be worried. I sensed she was more genuine than anyone I’d known. She didn’t leave me waiting and we chatted about our week. She didn’t have much to share. Perhaps it was simply because she spent most of her time alone. Isn’t it strange to think that perhaps all the news we talk about is really talk about other people. It’s peculiar like that, how the social world operates but Sidhi soon announced her topic of the day: the nature of happiness.