I love waking up to his deep voice..the incoherent murmur from far far away accompanied by crackling sounds. I wish this was what every morning was made up of.

We believe we are sorted.
Hence we play agony aunts and shrinks each day of our lives. Smug aunts and shrinks who scold condescendingly and judge. We even laugh sometimes, other times we feel bitter about the mess that they are in. And that's because our lives are sorted.

Except that we are not. Sorted, I mean. We go back home to our own mess. We carry a fear at the back of our mind, of becoming like the ones we laugh at. The ones who fall apart, except that there are bits of us too, scattered everywhere. There are pieces that are falling, some we have already lost/left behind. We are them too, except that we don't see it.

I was their 8'o'clock Cinderella. Their Red Riding Hood in a world full of wolves. And their Lakshman-Rekha was endless, limitless...all consuming.

Until Sita picked up the car keys and stepped out. Until Red Riding Hood decided to go drinking and dancing with the wolves. Until, finally, Cinderella decided to wake up past her bedtime and dismiss the pumpkin and the mice...