Heartbeats of Innocence

Akash and Gagan were over the moon today. It was their Ansh bhaiyya’s thirteenth birthday, and they couldn’t wait to dig into the delicious cake (they fervently hoped it would be Biscoff Lotus from their favourite Nik Baker’s) and relish the mini cheeseburgers, which was aunty’s speciality. 

“Behave like good boys,” their mom smiled, ruffling their curly hair.

“Mamma! We are not babies anymore,” cried the ten-year-old twins in unison. After waving a swift goodbye, they rushed out of their house. Ansh was their neighbour in Green Park Extension, and all three studied at Mother’s International School in New Delhi.

Red balloons and golden festoons hung from the ceiling in Ansh’s living room. Akash and Gagan were delighted to see a big Kit Kat cake placed on a white ceramic stand. A few children were playing merry-go-round, and some were discussing Harry Potter. 

“If any one of us gets a piece of the Kit Kat, we share it. Ok?” Gagan whispered to Akash. 

Akash fist-bumped his brother. “Deal!”

Ansh came and hugged them. He then led them to the table and called his parents. Uncle and aunty emerged from the kitchen. Soon, all the guests gathered around the birthday boy. The beaming teenager cut his cake. To their glee, Akash and Gagan both found a sizeable block of chocolates in their share. 

Aunty’s culinary skills didn’t disappoint the children. They shamelessly asked for second helpings of bread chat, veg coin pakoras, and her ever-popular mini cheeseburgers. 

Ansh approached Gagan. “Hey, I love your watch. Can I borrow it?”

Gagan took a step back. “No. Papa bought it from Mumbai for me.”

“I’ll snatch it from you,” Ansh pretended to be a monster, baring his teeth.

“Aunty!” A crying Gagan ran to aunty, wrapping his arms around her legs. 

Ansh’s mother giggled and bent down to kiss the adorable boy on his forehead. “Don’t worry, beta. Nothing will happen to you.”

Amidst the bonhomie, the children decided to play hide-and-seek. It was Akash’s turn to hide. He quickly scampered to Ansh’s room and hid inside a closet. He crouched, as he sensed somebody entering the bedroom. Suddenly, he heard a clicking sound. He realised that someone had locked the closet door.

Fat tears welled up in his eyes. 

“Ansh must have done that purposefully,” he thought. He remembered a movie he had seen on Prime, where a girl was trapped in a freezer room. 

“I’ll die too,” he wept. 

He heard Gagan’s choked voice. He was searching for him. 

“Where are you, Akash?”

“Help! I’m here.”

For a minute, there was complete silence. Akash heard other children’s voices. It seemed all were worried.

“Inside the closet.”

A minute later, he heard aunty’s Oh My God. Ansh’s mother unlocked the closet and hugged Akash. 

“I’m so sorry, beta, I didn’t see you. I thought Ansh had left the closet open.”

Akash continued to sob. “I thought I would die.”

Gagan began to howl. 

Aunty looked at him confusingly. “Now, what happened to you?”

“Ansh mistook Akash for me. It was him. He is after my watch.”

Ansh butted in. “Mamma! I was with you. Remember?”

Aunty asked Ansh, “What’s with this watch?”

Ansh pointed at Akash’s watch. “I told him I would snatch his watch. But that was a joke, mamma.”

Aunty began to giggle. Children! She extended her hand to Gagan and enveloped the twins in a bear hug. 

“Ansh was joking. You know he likes you a lot. He wished he had a brother who looked exactly like him. You two are so lucky. The superstars of Green Park.”

The sobs receded. Satisfied, Akash and Gagan shook hands with Ansh.

“You are our bhaiyya. So what if you don’t look like us.”

“That’s the spirit,” aunty chimed in. “Come on, now. You are all friends. Go and play now.”

The play resumed. When it was Ansh’s turn to hide, he chose his mother’s closet to hide. Gagan and Akash spotted him but pretended to look elsewhere, misleading the other children.

“Caught you,” they screamed, pulling Ansh out of the closet. 

“I wanted you to win,” Ansh said, unwilling to admit his foolishness of opting for the same hiding place.

“If only we could patch things up with our friends so easily!” Ansh’s mother said to his father as they stood outside their room, watching the mini-drama unfold. 

“Bacche man ke sacche!” he smiled, putting his arm around her. 

Meanwhile, the children got bored of hide-and-seek and embarked on a newly discovered game – to spend a couple of minutes inside a locked closet without fear.

 

Glossary:

Bhaiyya – elder brother

Beta – son 

Chat and Pakora – Indian snacks

Bacche man ke sacche – Children have a pure heart

 

Prompt of Story #4 –

Identical twins, a party invitation, a locked closet

Words –

765

Prompt by –

Authoropod