Chapter 37

Chapter Thirty Seven

Sleepless eyes stared through the sliding double doors at the star-strewn sky outside.

Behind her, Arnav was pacing once more. She caught random snatches of what he was saying.

'Whatever happens, whatever you have to do, make sure he can't come back to Delhi- whatever the cost.' There was a pause. 'No yet. When it's time to take action against him, I'll let you know.'

It was one thirty in the morning. There seemed to be no hope of sleep for either of them.

Khushi noiselessly slid one of the double doors open and slipped out. There was a curious cool that bathed the poolside, paired with the soft glow of moonlight, shimmering off the bluish water in the pool. The hush of the leaves as they whispered against the breeze, lulled by the sound of rippling water, had a soothing, calming effect. Khushi let out a long, deep breath, feeling the racket in her mind quieten, feeling her trains of thought reorganise themselves upon more lucid routes to follow.

There was no denying the spasm of fear that had jolted through her the minute she had heard that dreaded, hellish voice speaking her name. No doubt that for one moment she had felt as though the paths she had treaded, the new journeys she had embarked upon, the new sensations she had unmasked, had all been a fanciful dream, and she would wake up to face her tossing, mutinous sea of disaster once more.

But the fear was gone now.

Only moments ago, Arnav had looked her square in the eye, and informed her point blank what he intended to do. Shyam Manohar Jha was not going to find his way back to Delhi anytime soon. His escape to Lucknow had now become his exile, and Arnav would wield whatever influence needed, pull whichever strings required, to make sure he could not leave it. That, he had said, would buy them some time.

'...to let Di know.'

'But Arnavji...would that be safe? Especially now...when she's pregnan-'

'I know, Khushi, I know.' Even then, Khushi could glimpse the shadows of the epic forces locked in battle within him. 'But this man- you said so yourself- is capable of anything. And I'm not willing to risk anything. With Di...or with you.' The ring of finalty had made a response from her obsolete. 'He's going to stay in Lucknow until we manage to tell Di everything...and after that...'

He hadn't finished his sentence. But the implication in his silence was far more deadly than any amount of words could have been. Shyam Manohar Jha did not know it, but very soon he was going to face the worst hell he could have imagined.

Khushi believed her husband. Believed in him. Believed that while he was there, Shyam Jha could not lift a finger against her, or Di.

It could not be easy to make the decision he had made. To put on stake the one thing he had dedicated his life to protect. His Di's smile. Her happiness. Khushi's memory strayed back to a time that seemed to belong to another world, the film reel of her mind zooming backwards before stopping abruptly on a day at the steps of a mandir...on a woman sobbing softly as she sat on the steps...on the man kneeling before her, teary-eyed...reciting a nursery rhyme...

That was the day Khushi had seen the man, the person, the boy, that hid behind the rakshas. The day she had realised that he was human after all. That he could also love, could also fear losing love.

And today, Khushi had watched her husband take possibly one of the hardest decisions of his life. It had been Di's happiness that had been at the acme of his priorities. Di's happiness for which he had coerced Khushi into marriage.

And today, securing Di's happiness was the reason he was prepared to gamble away Di's present peace of mind...another rush of queasiness swept through her as she wondered whether Di's calm, composed demeanour would crack under the truth...puzzled over the cause of her sudden disconcerting lack of reaction regarding her husband...perhaps it was because of the baby...the doctor had told her not to stress to much...but even so...the way she had reacted in the hospital...she quickly suppressed the thought that, once Di found out everything, she might as well begin to hate her, blame her...she could not let her resolve weaken...

...uncertainty chewed away at Khushi, fearful of the consequences of what she knew had to be done...but at least Arnav would be by her side...

...if you apologise, then I must too...if you were wrong, then so was I...you think you wronged Di, but you were trying to protect her, just as I was... and if you blame yourself for it, you should blame me ten times more...

 And somewhere, she knew, his decision had also been fuelled by her...by a need to preserve a marriage that had started as a safeguard...and now become a lifeline. He had remembered his Di...but he had not forgotten his wife...

Khushi closed her eyes, and drew in a long deep breath, luxuriating in the feel of cool air flooding into her lungs, relishing in the rejuvenating feel. Her limbs had manoeuvred her towards the deckchair, and she slowly lowered herself on it. So much had happened here...the poolside with its swaying waters, dancing plants, twinkling lights had borne witness to so many life changing events in the last few days...her memory reel replayed vividly what had transpired here only hours ago...when her ferris wheel, stuck precariously above ground since the night before her marriage, had finally wound its way back to the ground...when her incomplete tale left unfinished on that night had been granted a happily ever after, unasked questions finally answered...replayed for her the evening when Arnav had fallen on his knees at her feet, broken with sobs, pleading forgiveness as he cried helplessly into her lap...

Forgiveness...a lump crammed itself into her throat. A few fresh tears sprung into her eyes.

She had wanted forgiveness from him today. Forgiveness for keeping Shyam's secret hidden...

He had called it 'one mistake'...one mistake that he could not blame her for. And yet she had feared blame...had dreaded blame...and been torn apart by foreboding, the harrowing terror that he might hold her as responsible just as much as she herself did, whether he admitted it or not. She did not know, in that moment of blind panic, how she could have withstood his accusation- ten times worse because this time, accusation would not be far off the mark, accusation would not be unfounded and baseless, undeserved.

So if for 'one mistake' she had felt this tormented, how must he feel if...

...If that was a mistake, Khushi, that was your only mistake. And if you are apologising for that one mistake- what am I supposed to do for the hundreds of mistakes I have made?...

Breath snagged in her throat, and the poolside disappeared from before her eyes.

Listen to your heart...

Her heart failed to register the half-hearted attempts of her mind to remind her of everything that she had gone through because of him. For some reason she could not hold it against him. For some reason she could not wish she could hate him anymore.

For some reason the last thing she wanted was to punish him.

It hurt. It hurt so bad.

***

'Khushi,' he whispered as he stepped onto the poolside, to find his wife gazing out at the cavorting waters, little flecks of sapphire frolicking across her flawless skin. He did not feel the need to elaborate. It took just her name upon his lips, and it would feel as though he had laid his heart and its contents bare to her.

She rose at his voice, turning about to face him. His breath caught painfully.

The tenderness in her demeanour was unmistakeable, even in the muted light by the pool.

He found himself approaching her, extending a hand towards her as he did, murmuring, 'It's going to be OK...I won't let him come back, I promise.'

His heart did a rather complicated somersault the minute her hand instinctively rose to meet his. He grasped it eagerly. Caught in the madness of events that had unfurled in rapid succession, leaving him giddy, the ground shifting beneath his feet, it was only now, with the shadows of impending doom fading, that his thoughts returned to what he had considered a very pressing concern.

Khushi was supposed to be leaving Shantivan for two days.

For the time being, there was nothing more he could do about Shyam. All his pre-emptive steps were in place. And if nothing else, the calamity of the name of Shyam had taught him one thing- and that was, time was priceless. Every second counted.

And his dark dreads had been proved unfounded...Khushi hadn't fled from him, had not distanced herself...she was still here, with him, supporting him...that had to count for something...

Unthinkingly he drew Khushi towards him. She complied, unresisting. His free hand lifted up, his fingers hooking onto the hairband holding her hair into a loose unruly ponytail that hung over her shoulder.

'I've told you before,' he heard his voice grow unintentionally husky, accounted for by the sudden malfunctioning of his respiratory mechanism, 'I like your hair down.' As he spoke, the luxurious locks of her hair came loose, and were caught by a playful breeze, fanning it across her face. Black velvet across white ivory.

He dropped the hairband unto the deckchair, his hand, as though under some sort of mystical charm, carefully brushing the errant strands off of her face, not prepared to stand their intrusion with his view. The tips of his fingers grazed the velvet of her cheek, marvelling at how heartbreaking pink bloomed into the cream of her skin wherever he touched her, marvelling at how soft she felt to his touch. He gulped. Once again, anything, everything, apart from the apparition before him, was ceasing its existence.

***

Her eyes felt heavy, begging her to drop shut, drunk with a half-crazy urge to relish in the fire that he was trailing across her with his teasing touch, a moth indolently swimming towards the flame, not caring that it may be singed. Her nerve ends were alive, blazing like live wires, and mind was plundered of thought. Through her half-veiled eyes, Khushi gazed into his face, without feeling timorous for once, gazed into the lanterns of gold burning for her, only for her...

She did not even notice as her hand obediently bowed before the enthusiastic eggings of her heart's thundering dhak dhak, and rose up to trace the dark shadows that clung below his eyes. Very, very carefully, her forefinger lingered over the slight depressions, her heartbeat waning somewhat, a little pocket of displeasure bursting open.

'You really need some sleep,' she whispered lightly, solemnly.

'So do you,' he whispered back, the fingers that had been playing with her hair shifting to trace the shape of her eyes. The touch was so feathery, so very light, Khushi had to battle with herself to keep her eyes open and not fall prey to their blissful temptation, slipping into dreamland. She shook her head stubbornly.

'You need to rest,' she insisted doggedly, peering up at his face, 'you'll need all your strength to...to...tell Di...stand by her...'

'I'll manage', he mumbled dismissively, without warning slipping both arms about her waist, and pulling her closer to him. For some reason, even though her dhak dhak rocketed to a more erratic frequency, she did not find this alarming. All her attention was riveted on the eyes that smiled into hers, 'as long as you're standing by me.'

And Khushi jumped up to assure him, without pausing to think.

'I'm with you, Arnavji...'

As those amber eyes gazed back at him, burning with a zealous, consuming flame, Khushi's own words sank through to her with the force of a cannonball. Whatever flush might have coloured her cheeks now burst into a deep, heartrending crimson as her eyelashes fluttered uncontrollably, as though the picture before her had become too overwhelming to take in all at once. Yet, even if her mind were issuing commands to retreat, Khushi, a slave of her heart, paid no attention. She did not even manage to grasp what was happening when he secured the hand that had been tracing the bags beneath his eyes, now resting lightly against his shoulder, in a tender hold. Was not fazed until she realised he had raised it to his lips.

Next thing she knew, they had pressed themselves ardently into the cup of her palm. The dream-like trance she was in was dispersed in a flash, a field of dandelions caught in a windstorm, as soon as she felt his firm, demanding mouth brand its mark onto her skin. Millions of volts of current blazed through her from head to toe, every fibre alight, ablaze. She trembled from head to toe, watching, hypnotised, as his fingers caressed hers to give him better access...and then his travelling lips, hot breath sending her skin tingling, reducing her to a puddle where she stood, found her fingers, kissing them reverently, one by one, inch by inch...

And they sunk lower, lower, his fingers wrapping about her wrist to hold it in place as he continued with his assault...his lips grazed the length of her palm, every tremor magnified in her body, shockwaves of sensation pulsating through her as they found the inside of her wrist...pausing over her pulse...her pulse that roared through in her veins, a fast-flowing brook, throbbing in time to her fervently dancing dhak dhak...giving away the typhoon of emotions she was being swept through...agony...wonderful, wondrous agony...

She was breathing hard, so hard she might have swum her way to shore through a cyclone...throat parched, conscious thought a distant memory, she watched in a daze as Arnav raised his eyes to her once more, and Khushi would not have been surprised if she had passed out just from looking into them...they looked ravenous, ravenous and awed, disbelieving and smitten, humbled and triumphant, all at once...

'Khushi,' he whispered in that low guttural growl, sending shivers flittering up and down her spine, goosebumps shooting up the back of her neck, 'I want to listen to your heart too. Will you let me?'

The thought of refusing never even crossed her mind, which seemed to have gone into standby, capitulating all control to her heart. She nodded.

And in a heartbeat, he had swung her up into his arms, and was carrying her back through the glass doors they had left open.

***

Arnav could not understand why it would hurt, when he held his life in his arms, carrying them into their niche in the world, his heart pulsing so hard it risked puncturing itself, or if not, rupturing his ribs. Could not understand why his windpipe seemed to have collapsed in upon itself, and it was all he could do to keep breath in his body. All that sustained him, despite the powerful clenching and unclenching possessing his entire body, were Khushi's eyes. Her arms had wound themselves about his neck as soon as he had cradled her up into his embrace, and now those two wondrous pools of coffee-black, swirling with awe and what (he prayed he was not mistaken) looked like...love...

Drinking in their depths, he did not even dare blink lest he be brought to reality, lest it appear that he had been dreaming, and that he was once more alone in his bedroom, waiting to thrash out another night without sleep. He lowered her carefully onto the bed, and felt a pang of tenderness render him almost incapable of standing as Khushi's awed eyes swept over the canopy of stars, the only light left in the room, and was grateful for his foresight in turning off the main lights before he had gone to Khushi. Because he could ask for no bigger reward for all his exertions over recreating the night sky for his wife, so she may feel closer to her parents, so she may find their light comforting...her face was aglow with an innate pleasure, little lights dancing with joy in her eyes, laughing in their happiness, a smile hovering over her lips, light as butterfly wings...as he leant over her, he could feel himself smile too, could feel something warm and sugary and thick drip in his heart and cocoon him in its cosy embrace.

 She gasped as he swooped in suddenly, without warning, and Arnav, with the side of his head laid against her madly pounding heart, thudding against his ear, in tune with the drumbeats in his chest, was convinced that he had finally found heaven.

So, how was it? I would really appreciate it if you guys took out a minute of your time to leave a comment about what you thought of these chapters...I'm actually sitting up at 2 AM because I don't think I can sleep until I post these :P I'd love to hear feedback :) 

And I've been replying to comments...will get through all of them as soon as I can :) 

I reserve all rights over this work of fiction and request that readers do not reproduce/copy/modify it elsewhere and/or claim credit. Thank you :) 

your reaction

2

nice

390

awesome!

5

loved

0

lol

0

omg

0

cry