C28 In the Past...

He just stood still at his place, looking at the retreating back of this strange girl. He then sniffed his arms and his jacket around the chest area and said, "Is it that bad?" As she entered the washroom, he turned around and started to walk on his way, just then he stopped after a few steps in his track remembering something, and said, "Anna?" with a surprised expression on his face.

As Evan entered the hall, everyone started to ask him where he was. Aiden came to him and took him to where all the siblings were present. Adam was there too. Asher and Adan recognized each other. Evan was surprised to see him after a long time. They smiled and shook hands.

Asher, Evan, and Adam were best buddies in the past. After Adam moved to the states, everything changed. Life of these three friends took different turns and all three were busy coping with it. Finally, they had met but they could feel the distance between them. If it was in the past, these three must be jumping with happiness while hugging each other.

In the washroom, Anna sat there while cursing herself. She spent a long time sitting there and didn’t want to come outside. But after some time, she got fresh and walked outside of the washroom, and headed towards the hall.

In the hall, everyone was busy chatting with each other and most of the guests moved toward the buffet section to enjoy the tasty dinner.

When Anna reached inside the hall, Adam called her to where everyone was sitting. She went there and felt awkward seeing Asher. He just smiled slyly and didn’t show any traces of the deed on his face. Aiden was still staring at her with an unhappy gaze which she ignored. Adam asked her to sit beside him and introduced her to Evan.

They were sitting in a Circle. As so many guests left the hall, they were able to arrange the chair in a big circle to accommodate everyone, the current and young generation of Whites, Smiths, and Williams.

"Sis, meet Evan. Did you remember him?"

She looked at him and was quite surprised to see the same man from the corridor. She smiled at him awkwardly and he smiled back. They both didn’t mention the incident in the corridor.

In the past, Anna used to stick to these three friends like glue. These three always protected and took care of her more than anything else. It was like she was the centroid of the triangle made by them. Adam took care of her, Asher Loved her and Evan always protected her. But after all these years, things were different for her too.

After some time of chatting, they all had dinner too. The guests started to bid farewell and left one by one. Now it was time for the White family to bid farewell too. Party was over and everyone left for their homes.

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At Smith Mansion...In the Asher’s room...

Asher got fresh and came out of the bathroom in a white towel which was loosely wrapped around his waist while drying his hairs with the another white towel in his hands. He threw the towel in his hands in the chair, went to the wardrobe and took out a set of white cotton shirt and a pajama. He was just about to close the door of the wardrobe, his sight stopped at something. It was an old wooden box which was in the bottom shelf of his wardrobe. He wore his clothes, carried that box with him and sat on the corner of his bed.

He opened that box and took out some old stuff like few handmade greetings cards, tiny and colourful paper toys such as birds, flowers, cranes, stars etc. There was a colourful wrist band on which his name was written and an old keychain having a tiny soccer ball hanging to it. At the bottom of that box there were few photographs. He took out them and started to check it out one by one. He had a pleasant smile on his face while he was going through those pics.

He held one photograph in his hands, in which three boys were standing behind a small wooden block in the garden and a girl standing on that wooden block. Three boys looked like around the age of 14-15 years old and a girl arond age of 9-10 years old. She was standing on that wooden block which made her match up to the heights of the boys standing behind her. All four were smiling showing their white teeths.

A girl had an ear to ear smile. Her eyes looked like an inverted Crescent moon because of her wide smile. Her long eyelashes were hiding her eyeballs. She looked too adorable in a peach colour dress with her hairs tide in two side ponytails. She was carrying a cute snow white kitten, holding in her hands in front of her chest.

Asher kept staring at the girl in a photograph for a while that made his smile even wider. As he was going through all those photographs, suddenly one pic caught his attention. In that pic a boy and a girl were sitting on a bench. Both were smiling while looking at the camera. He took that photo out and wind-up all the stuff back in the wooden box. He leaned back at the headrest of the bed and kept staring at that photograph. He closed his eyes and started to remember something.

It was a sunny day. A girl in a pink top and cute Jean’s short pant was sitting on a semi circular bench in a Patio of Lu mansion’s garden with a boy at her left side. He was wearing a light blue t-shirt and a black three forth pant. She looked very sad. The boy asked, "Anna! Will you tell me what happened? Since yesterday you are like this. We came here to enjoy the weekend and here you are carrying a sad face all the time."

"Brother Adam! In school everyone hates me and nobody talks to me." Anna said in a sad voice, lowering her head and staring at her fingers which were busy in pulling out the petals of a flower.

"What? How can someone hate my sweet sister? They must be stupid?" Adam said looking at her sad face.

"They said that I am very bad as I get angry immediately." Anna looked hurt and was about to cry.