“Did you check the bottom drawers?” Shrey asked.
“They disappear when I need them” Jai continued, unheeding and rummaging the closet.
Shrey had seen all the ups and downs in their year old live-in, in Jai’s mental illness. But they shared an unlikely bond that surprised even them.
Jai was an eccentric, wild child, while Shrey was composed, caring and a silly romantic, trying to get those three precious words out of Jai, in vain.
Shrey moved to the bed and lit the bed lamp.
“Why don’t you switch off the lights and come to papa?”
“You think this is all funny?” Jai retorted.
“No, I was just trying to..”
“I thought you knew that nothing will cheer me up when I’m like this. Go get your peaceful sleep”
Shrey sighed and turned on the other side, as Jai continued to look for his medications.
After around an hour, when ghouls inside him calmed down, Jai came and sat at the corner of the bed.
Looking at the messed up closet, he mumbled, “Shrey, you awake?”
“Mmhmm..”
“Why are you still with me?”
“Because you are my kind of crazy”, Jai giggled at the reply and switching off the lights, moved closer and spooned Shrey from behind.
“I know you are trying to make me say it and I am being unreasonably hard to get, but you mean a lot, so here it goes; I…”
“I know”, Shrey said, cutting Jai’s words and pulling him closer to him.
The window curtains floated in light wind and the pale moonlight seeped inside their studio apartment, as clouds cleared in the sky, for the night.