II

My dream that night was unbelievably incoherent. They say, the human mind dreams of those things, that are running in their subconscious mind, right before they sleep. I could have so proved this theory wrong. I am pretty sure there is a limit to the number of thoughts the sub-conscious can hold at a time. Mine was a disjointed collection of ideas, incidents, thoughts and feelings. Some real, while others that were completely self-fabricated.
It began with the day I had first joined college; suddenly I was transported to my first big fight with Ayesha; all at once it was interrupted as I was being dragged away from it all by an invisible force; in the next bit I stumbled home, where everyone was happy to see me; suddenly I was back at the edge of the lake, while walking towards the back of who I figured was Noah. When he turned around, I was scared out of my wits at the monstrous face on him. That’s how I was jolted back into reality.
I lay in bed a while, troubled by my own dream. The first rays of the sun had started to peer through the gaps in the curtains. It was chilly. Against my better judgment, I decided to wake up early at least once during the time I was home. I got out of bed and drew the curtains. I had always known I lived in a most beautiful town, yet in the recent past, I had hardly taken a moment to admire it for what it really was. My room was on the first floor of the house. The window opened to a small terrace that faced the great Himalyan mountain range which surrounds the Doon valley. As I watched, a flock of some native birds rose from behind them and flew in the distance.
I put on some warmer clothes and freshened up. I could hear movement in my parents’ bedroom, and I knew at once that my father was up and about. I made him his first cup of tea for the day. I felt warm and content with everything around me and looked forward to being home for a good long period of time. I did my ritualistic cleaning that day. It began with unpacking three years worth of luggage and putting it away in the right places. Creating the space was a skill that I had acquired over the years. Over the next couple of days I cleaned the whole house from top to bottom. This annoys my mom as it makes her feel like she doesn’t do a good enough job of it. However, there was no arguing about it now that it’s become a habit.