Sunshine in my Heart

Mishti tossed to the other side and pulled up the covers over her bare shoulders. The bright sun was shining through her opened windows. She could see the deserted beach from her position in bed as she rubbed her eyes. She swung her legs off the bed and lazily walked towards the bathroom.

She brushed her back into a clean ponytail letting a few strands escape and fall on her face. Splashing water on her face, she cleansed her face before brushing her teeth. Trying to not make any noise to wake the one’s who were still sleeping, Mishti let her Tweedy Bird slippers take her downstairs into the kitchen.

The kitchen was empty so Mishti began to prepare her own breakfast. Opening the freezer she took out frozen strawberry waffles and popped them into the toaster. Folding up her legs into Indian style, she sat at the table and flipped open the newspaper to read the headlines of the day.

Fifteen minutes later as Mishti was sipping her water, she heard Emily and her mother come downstairs. Emily mumbled an incoherent good morning to her and stumbled towards the fridge taking out a gallon of milk.

Laura smiled. “Good morning Mishti.”

Mishti excused herself and went upstairs to take a hot shower. Stripping her clothes, she stepped inside the shower and let the hot water soothe her tired body. Leaning down, her hands turned the dial to stop the water and stepped outside the tub. Rubbing her wet hair with a fluffy towel, Mishti switched on her phone by pressing one of the small buttons down.

Her eyes darted down as the phone buzzed. Thinking it was a text she missed after she went to bed last night, she was surprised to instead see a missed call. She looked up at the digital clock in the bathroom and saw that it was already around quarter after eleven so the call could have been at a reasonable time but she must have been sleeping. Sure enough, the call showed the time ten thirty.

Stifling a yawn, Mishti scrolled down to see who called and took a double take. Nick’s nickname flashed on the screen with a little indication of a voicemail. Tossing her damp hair behind her shoulders, Mishti brought the ear up to the phone and went to her voicemail.

“Hi Mishti. I guess you’re still asleep or I wouldn’t be leaving you this message,” Nick chattered. “But I’m kind of bored right now because Frankie woke me up about an hour ago, which by the way is such an ungodly hour, I was about ready to throw his stuffed animals out the window. And now I have nothing to do because we have the day off again. So call me back later whenever you get up. Bye.”

Mishti chuckled as she deleted the voicemail. Even early in the morning Nick succeeded into putting her into a good mood. She promised herself she would call him back after talking to Emily. Running a brush through her hair one more time, Mishti walked back to her room and dumped the clothes on her bedroom floor before proceeding to Emily’s room.

She didn’t bother knocking and strolled right on in. Emily jerked around quickly at the unannounced visitor but relaxed as soon as she saw it was Mishti. “Hey girly. Still exhausted from last night?”

Mishti sat down on Emily’s window seat and propped her feet up against the opposite end. “Just a little. We went through the entire zoo and my feet are aching.”

Emily laughed. “Serves you right. You are always so determined to see every single creature alive the minute you step inside a zoo.”

Mishti rolled her eyes. “Here’s something else you can tease me about. He called me this morning while I was asleep.”

She tilted her head slightly to the side. “The second date phone call already?”

Mishti scoffed. “Please. We haven’t even gone a date. We’re just friends.” Emily opened her mouth but Mishti quickly shut her up. “Don’t you dare start singing,” she warned.

Emily sighed dramatically. “You are in self denial, Mishti. Why don’t you just realize you like him? Or at least have a miniscule crush on him?”

“Because it’s not true. I barely even know him,” Mishti defended.

“You could get to know him if you call him back now,” Emily pointed out.

Mishti glared at her best friend but still obeyed her as she flipped open her phone. Emily was so persistent that it was almost impossible to do what she said. She let the phone ring but it went straight to his voice mail after the first. Mishti snapped the phone shut without leaving a voice mail.

“He must have his phone turned off.” Mishti shrugged. “He’ll call me back later.”

Emily frowned. “Well, at least you called him.” She shook her head carelessly and changed
the subject. “I was talking to Alex yesterday while you were gone.”

Mishti raised her eyebrow. “Who?”

“Remember him?” Emily asked excitedly. Mishti racked her brains and vaguely remembered Emily mentioning someone by the name of Alex a couple nights ago as they were getting ready for bed.

“Isn’t he one of the extras on set?”

Emily nodded. “Yup. He wanted me to come over tonight and hang out with his friends. Do you want to come along?”

Mishti opened her mouth to respond but was cut off by the blasting ringtone of her phone. She glanced down and saw Nick’s nickname appear once again on the screen. Funny how Nick always seemed to interrupt her whenever she was having a conversation.

“Hello?” Mishti answered. Emily looked at her confused and then it dawned on her who she was talking.

“Hey,” Nick said distractedly after a moment. A moment passed as scuffling and Nick’s voice raising could be heard in the background before Nick came back on the line. “Sorry. Elvis had my socks and he wouldn’t give them back.”

Mishti laughed. “Sorry to hear that. You called?”

“Hmm yeah I did. Did you want to do something later today?” Nick asked.

She looked up at Emily who was looking at her expectantly before answering. “Actually, I was planning to hanging out with Emily later today.” Emily began vigoursly shaking her head. She sent her friend a questioning look trying to decipher what she was wanting. “Just a second Nick.”

Mishti glared at Emily and mouthed asking what she wanted so Nick wouldn’t hear. “Do something with him tonight! Don’t say no!” Emily whispered loudly. Mishti quickly reminded her of Alex. “You can skip that. At least spend some time with him later if you want to hang out with me today.”

Mishti sighed and pressed the phone back onto her ear. “Nick you still here?”

“Yeah.”

“If you want we can do something in the evening. Emily has something planned so I can hang out with you then.”

“Okay. Do you want to come over to my house around five? We could just stick around here.” Mishti agreed to do so and hung up the phone shortly afterwards.
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Mishti couldn’t believe Emily. At the moment she was devising plans in her head on a way to kill Emily. The thoughts of killing her in her sleep was running through her brain as well as selling a picture of Emily’s kindergartener picture to the paparazzi. Yup, the second one seemed better.

Why did she desire to kill Emily? Mishti groaned to herself just thinking about it. Emily had insisted on dressing her up tonight. She didn’t understand why Emily couldn’t just get the crazy illusion of Nick and Mishti out of her mind. It didn’t make sense. Nick and her were just friends and Mishti planned to keep it that way.

Emily had gone all out and attempted to curl Mishti’s long hair. After much protest, Emily had finally gotten the bottom parts of her hair curled while shoving some outfit into Mishti’s arms and ordering her to get changed.

Which explained why she was decked out in a dark denim mini skirt that she hadn’t seen in forever. Emily was quick to inform her that it was she who had taken the skirt and kindly forgotten to get it back. Mishti tugged down on the light blue cami fidgeting as she waited for the door to be opened.

It had taken her forever to get past the security at the gate but she had finally made it up the long curvy driveway. She had stood there for a few seconds before working up the courage to ring the doorbell. She wasn’t even sure why she was nervous. There was no reason to be, right?

Mishti’s head snapped up as the huge mahogany colored door swung open in front of her. Casting her eyes downward she came face to face with the youngest Jonas member of the family peering at her.

“Hi Mishti!” Frankie said cheerfully. Mishti followed Frankie’s lead and stepped inside house and stifled a gasp as she did. The mansion looked bigger than it did on the outside. The entire structure of the house looked professionally done from the colors of the stairwells to the flowers arranged on the tables in the living room.

“Hi Frankie,” Mishti said smiling. Frankie grabbed her hand beckoned her to a leading door. She could hear loud music coming from the descending stairwell as Frankie pulled her down the stairs.

She turned around a corner and saw the backs of three boys all resembling each other. Her eyes followed their lead and recognized the TV screen to be Guitar Hero. She rolled her eyes. Typical boys.

“Nick, Mishti’s here!” Frankie interrupted them excitedly. Nick pivoted around quickly and broke out into a large grin.

“Mishti!” Nick walked over and immediately wrapped his arms around Mishti. She smiled into his shoulder as she returned the hug. She was instantly reminded of last night and thought to herself how he still smelled the same.

“Hi,” Mishti said shyly. She greeted Nick’s older brothers who welcomed her with the same heartwarming hugs as Nick.

She was pulled into a game of Guitar Hero the minute the awkward greetings were over with. After protesting countless times, Mishti reluctantly found herself in playing one game. Even when her brothers played, she found that Guitar Hero was a pointless and useless game.

But as Mishti was battling it out on the miniature guitar, she kept sneaking glances to the right of her to Nick. His laughter made a smile appear on her face and kept her mood elevated above the ecstatic mark. The squeals escaping out of her mouth as she tried to keep up with Nick almost puzzled her why she was acting like this. As Mishti’s fingers pressed down against the red and yellow buttons, a new feeling emerged in her.

A feeling that she had kept hidden inside of her and too afraid to show. But now as she sat here in the presence of him, Mishti was almost willingly ready to agree with Emily.