A lie i told

“Toot. Toot. Toot…”I held my mobile phone clinging to my ear, hand trembling. I did not know whether I hoped the call would be connected or not.
“Hello?” finally it was connected. A familiar silvery voice came into my ear.
I took a deep breath and tried to speak normally, “Hello. How are you these days?”
“Sister!” my cousin shouted, full of excitement. “I’m fine. So what’s the matter?”
My heart beat faster and faster; my perspiration was running down my checks; my breath paused. Finally, I told a tie, as I had planned. “Nothing, I just want to call you.”
Actually, there was something. I knew she was seriously ill. I wanted to ask her how she felt, I wanted to encourage her and I wanted to tell her I am concerned about her. However I could not do these, because her illness was a taboo in our family. I occasionally got to know it when my mother leaned it out unintentionally. The reason why it was a taboo was that she did not know her state of illness exactly. What she knew was only that she fainted few days ago.
“Now I am in your home. We are having dumplings!” her laughter pulled me back to the reality. “Today is Thursday. How can you be in my home?” “Err, I have a fever.” It was her turn to tell a lie. What I could do was just to let our lies go on. Perhaps the lies would last until her surgery. Fortunately, through the simple lies, at least I found her condition was much better than I had thought.
I understand profoundly it is painful to tell lies to our beloved ones. However, more or less we will get some comfort since the cause of the lies is love.