A Chronic Secret

“We have to be through with this before they are back.” I said as we entered the bedroom in hurry. “You check the other closet. I’ll check here. Come on, make it quick. They may be back anytime.”

“Yes chief!” Sanaya thumbs upped obeying her commander, me.

I nodded and approached the dressing table. I rigorously went through each drawer, twice; but discovered nothing.

I rushed to the side table besides bed. Though it was heavy for me, I almost wholly pulled out the drawers. I continued returning more disappointed from each next drawer.

I did not want to leave even the tiniest corner undetected this time. To inspect beneath the bed, I paralleled floor; my right cheek pressed against carpet but eyes failed to find what they starved.

I was tired of failing every time. It had been more than five years since my mission had continued failing. It was an uncalled for rivalry that I had ignited five years back since I had identified the ritual. They didn’t care though.

I was fed up with turning up embarrassed and a loser in front of them. I seemed no way closer to breaking my losing streak this time either.

The panic of not being able to crack it was getting to my nerves. I couldn’t determine what was running out faster, time or my patience.

“You found something?” I asked Sanaya to divert my mind from irritation.

“Not yet boss.” She said and continued hunting.

Her ‘yet’ had a hope. She seemed more optimistic than her commander. Though this mission was not as significant for her as for me, just for the sake of my satisfaction she had joined in the mission three years back. Ever since she had joined the team, she had put in ample efforts and ideas to get us closer to the breakthrough than ever before.

Just as I was about to give up, an impulsive clue from my proficient soldier popped; and I boosted.

“Hey, Hey, Hey!!” She said with arms on her waist and eyes wide open. “How did we miss the store room Aarav?” This hint from her enlightened the detective within me.

With a rejuvenated brain, I ran across the hall straight to the store room in the backyard. Sanaya followed like my shadow. Store room was locked.

“This door is not locked, generally. Right?” I said.

We looked at each other and smiled. Sanaya patted on my back.

The lock embossed the prospects of us inching closer to conquering the case. We were just a step away from the never tasted victory.

I rushed back to the hall and pulled out the little drawer on the side of the TV cabinet which was almost overflowing with bunches of keys and mostly useless little metal stuff. Sanaya followed and stood by me peeking from a side. The drawer looked similar to key maker’s room from the Matrix. There were fifty plus keys. We chose to pull the drawer out and bring it to store room.

We started trying our luck; nervously, one key at a time.

About ten minutes and twenty keys had passed since the first key had entered lock. The task demanded tremendous patience.

Click! And our eyes sparkled. It unlocked.

We threw the lock and keys aside and rushed in. It was a dark room. We widened our eyes as much as possible to get a sharper vision.

“Here, in the trunk. It has to be here.” Sanaya said and tapped on an old, dirt roofed, huge metal case. She was performing worth a medal.

The dust from a not so frequently visited room was causing us to cough. We still kept our focus. We got together to put all our strength at work to flip open the heavy metal box.

In the hardly accessed trunk, we upturned almost everything but failed to find anything which was worth all the effort. Just as we started scanning the other potential sections of the store room, we heard a car approaching.

Immediately, we dropped all that we had in hands, along with our plan, and rushed back to get everything back to as-it-was. We locked the store room; put keys back to drawer and drawer back to the table, in no time.

Being so close to closure, or maybe not, yet returning empty handed felt nerve wracking.

I looked at Sanaya and we sighed.

***

The next morning was on track. As expected, I woke up with “Good morning! Wish you a Happy Birthday my prince!!!” and a peck on my cheek.

I opened eyes and hugged mom who had climbed up to me to the upper floor of our twin bunk bed. I kissed mom back.

I leaned down watchfully across the edge to peek underneath. Dad was sitting by Sanaya, wishing a lovely birthday to his princess.

It was her birthday too; we were twins. We had got the bunk bed as one of the gifts on our third birthday.

From upstairs, emphasizing necessary words to annoy Sanaya, I said “Sanaya, your elder brother wants to wish a Happy Birthday to his little sister.” She hated being called little, especially by me.

“Aarav! I’m as old as you are. Dad, tell him no?” she was daddy’s li’l girl and dad was her shield, from me, always. “We were born on the same day, stupid. I have turned nine today, and so have you! I’m no little.”

“Yes, you are! I am six minutes your elder. Elder by a minute, is elder forever.” I said as I followed mom stepping down from the bed.

On the thought of it being her birthday too, I spared her at as much leg pulling for the day. I hugged her and wished her with a smile this time. Mom, Dad smiled.

Celebration of our previous day’s mission’s failure was about to begin. The much awaited moment’s unveiling was waiting our arrival; mom and dad held our hands and brought us to the living room.

“Happy Ninth Birthday My loves!” dad said with arms wide opened presenting to us the treasure that we had failed to discover despite vigorous efforts the previous day.

As every year, neatly wrapped eighteen gifts – nine for me, nine for Sanaya, one for each year – were stacked on the center table. My boxes were draped in shining, blue wrappers; Sanaya’s were in pink.

Me and Sanaya looked at each other and smiled. The previous day’s mission flashed in front of our eyes. We knew that our attempts to reveal the chronic secret untimely were known to them since long.

We were still wondering when they did it, how they did it, every year. How do they always escape under our radar? They were always one step and a generation ahead, I guessed.

At that moment, just like every other year, seeing the heap of their well kept coverts, I had no regrets of failing to crack the mission. Some secrets are valued the best when they are unrevealed.

With an even stronger determination to prematurely leak their hush-hush next year, I and Sanaya raced to our respective piles.

Mom and dad stood happily with folded arms, feeling proud of being the best secret keepers of the house.

They had won, the undisclosed battle; and our hearts, all over again!
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