Today was actually the day! We were going to Himachal, and I had been waiting for years. Yesterday had been a frantic activity-filled day—so much work to catch up on, as well as last-minute mall trip and shopping and packing. In the midst of the mad rush, the anticipation of the road trip bubbled up after all those long years.

We had planned to take all the elderly people in a bus, while the young lot would go in their cars. Just when I was thinking that I would have someone to accompany me, I came to know that I was the sole girl going along—only my brothers and Shivu Bhaiya's friends would be