Page 67 of Clichés & Curses

It was Friday afternoon, and after a day of isolating myself in the apartment—moving from the desk in my room to the kitchen island, and finally ending up on the couch—I was left with one final part of the assignment. But trying to complete two assignments in a day finally caught up to me, as I began to struggle to write the conclusion.

For a second, I thought about just finishing it off later that night, and just take a break to recharge. But at the same time, I was left with one small part to complete the whole thing.

‘You can do this,’ I told myself.

Just as I was about to type, someone knocked at the front door.

At first, I thought I must have misheard it, and continued typing when I heard the knocks again.

I grabbed my laptop from my lap and put it on the coffee table, standing up to see who it was.

I wasn’t really expecting anyone, and Nina had her keys. Usually, she would text me in case she had forgotten to bring them and asked if I was home. Or it might be Lily or Claudia popping in for a surprise visit as they like to do occasionally.

But when I finally opened the door, it was the last person I expected to see.

Chapter Fourteen

‘Eliza?’

‘Surprise!’ my sister exclaimed with her arms open wide, anticipating a hug.

I blinked once.

And again, to make sure my tired brain wasn’t imagining her there.

Once I finally got over my shock, I let out an inhumane screech and went straight into her arms. She engulfed me in a bone-crushing hug, and I hugged her back with just equal fondness.

Despite our six-year age difference, Eliza and I had always been close, with her being my go-to person whenever I needed some advice. But it wasn’t until our parents’ divorce that we truly became inseparable. While I was going through my emotions of anger, confusion, and betrayal towards my parents as an eight-year-old, Eliza became solace for me to vent out my rollercoaster of feelings—without me feeling scared of being judged by her or to justify myself.

When she had started applying to colleges during her senior year of high school, one of her top priorities in choosing one washow close it was to home—to me, so we wouldn’t be too far apart whenever I needed her, especially when the wound from the divorce was just starting to heal. But knowing my sister as well as I did, I knew what her dream college was, and how hard she had worked ever since she made up her mind about going there and majoring in journalism. I wasn’t going to stand in the way of that, especially not when I saw how happy she was when she got accepted into her dream college.

I remember the day when she was listing down the pros and cons of the few colleges she was considering—chosen from her pool of acceptance letters, all of them not too far from home.

‘What are you doing?’ my then eleven-year-old-self had asked, sitting down on her bed.

‘Just researching colleges,’ she answered.

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m trying to figure out where I should go, silly,’ she said.

‘I mean, why are you considering other colleges? I thought you got into Northwestern?’ I asked, slightly confused. Northwestern was her dream college, why was she thinking of going elsewhere, if she had already gotten in?

Eliza was silent for a moment, before she said, ‘I’m not going to Northwestern.’

‘Why not? Going to Northwestern is all you could talk about ever since I was old enough to understand what college is,’ I said, my tone exasperated.

‘Well, things change.’

‘Things change?’ I repeated. ‘What do you mean things change?’

‘I just—’ she broke off. ‘I just changed my mind.’

I stayed quiet for a few moments, gathering up enough courage to speak my mind. ‘Liar,’ I finally said, calling out her bluff.

Eliza stopped whatever she was writing and turned to me. ‘What did you say?’

‘I said, liar,’ I repeated. ‘You and I both know how badly you wanted to go to Northwestern, how badly you still want to go there. You wouldn’t have applied there in the first place, if you didn’t want to go.’

---