It was nighttime. Her eyes opened. Mom was not beside her. She was scared. Afraid of dark. She closed her eyes again. Breathing slowly and calmly now. Suddenly she heard something clash to the ground with a furious voice of her mother telling someone to shut up. Mom?

Then she heard another a voice. A male voice. Her mom was fighting with him. She slowly got up. Still afraid of dark, she dared not open her eyes. In front of her was the long mirror. She had heard from someone that if you look into the mirror at night and chant Bloody Mary three times she will come and kill you. So, she just opened her eyes somehow, and stared blankly into the mirror. Then something whizzed past her nose, and she cried out in pure terror, falling back onto the pillow. Mother came rushing and sat right beside her, taking the terrified child into her arms. But she was now fine because she knew that the thing that had whizzed past her nose was just a mosquito.

She was only looking out of the half open door, secretly though, as her mother soothed her. As she was going to sleep again, someone entered through the door. She guessed it was the same man who was fighting with mom. She pretended as if she was asleep. Then the man produced a black polythene bag, kept it beside her, and went out. She then realized that she was holding onto mom so tightly that mom said, “what's the matter, Amelia?”

Amelia looked into her mother’s eyes and...

She gasped. Suddenly wide awake. Tears were flowing down her eyes. The same dream came to her every day, yet she couldn't handle it. It was this dream which always woke her up close to the dawn.

A more often yet depressing thought gripped her over. If only I had the courage to get up and walk out of the bedroom into the hall. If only I had not been that afraid of the dark. It had been seven years since then – seven years before, when she was in third – the year she had got to know that father had divorced mother. She had once confronted her mother with that incident, but her mother had disagreed of whatever happened that night and had said that it was just a fig of Amelia’s imagination. Since then the same dream haunted her, as if taunting her of how weak she was.

She sighed and checked the time. 6 o’clock. Time to get up. She got up and readied herself when her mother announced that she had some work to do and will not be back home early. She also said that she was leaving laptop back home so that Amelia could do her work once she had tidied up the house and eaten the lunch.

Hours later, when Amelia was ready and she had tidied the house, she sat on the table, opened the laptop, and began surfing the internet. After around an hour, it was time for some chatting. She opened the WhatsApp on laptop. It was linked to her mother’s mobile. Even though Amelia had completed her tenth, she hadn’t got her own phone. Depressing on its own right? But never mind Amelia. She herself had decided against it.

she opened the WhatsApp and went over to her friend’s chat. As she waited for her to come online, she saw a suspicious chat. It had only two initials, “AB”.

She opened the chat and read through from the start. As she read, her heart sank. The person was continuously asking her mother that if she had time to talk and her mother, though was evading him every time due to some reason, had eventually decided to call. Her mother had not told her a thing about this. Suddenly, the chat deleted before her eyes. She blinked twice. Was she hallucinating?

No way that this has to be. She decided to investigate. She was very fluent with computer. She took the number from WhatsApp and searched for the person on true caller. Then she slowly but steadily had his whole biodata in hand. She now knew that the person was of mom’s age and that he was a head of a well-known collage. That’s when he pinged onto mom.

Have free time to talk?

Mom was instantly online.

Sure! I'm free. Where to meet?

At our rendezvous point.

I’ll be right there.

Ook.

She was in deep shock at this point of time. Her mom had just lied to her. She had said that she has work to do. Is this what she meant. And what is this rendezvous point? That means they meet every now and then and I don’t even know? How can I even tell her that I know this?

What was she supposed to do? She stared at the chats for a long time. The words of her mother kept going round in her head for a long time. Right now she was soo angry that she decided to confront.

That’s when the door suddenly clicked open. She frantically closed everything and pretended to do studies. Her mom came in and looked at her, suddenly a worried look came on her face. “Were you crying?” she asked.

As she instinctively touched her eyes, tears rolled down her cheek. This was a right time to confront, but before she could say anything, her mom cheerfully said, “Never mind! What I am going to tell you, will make you happy for sure. Today I met the head of a collage... and guess what? He said that he liked your tenth board scores very much and wants you to join the collage. His name is Arnold Baskey.”

The initials A and B match his name, which means that mom was talking to this person. Then why’d she delete all the chats? As if reading her mind, she answered that she was talking to him way before that but didn’t tell Amelia, fearing that Amelia will get way to much excited.

Oh god! What was she about to do just now. She would have clearly depressed her mom. She gave a faint smile.

“Thanks mom!” she managed to whisper, concealing her true feelings.

A secret is best kept a secret because it is worth to see the pleasure in your loved one’s eyes.

.    .    .