Chapter 69

[MEMBERSONLY]

64. Boat Capsized (II)

She had flipped through her graduation books, for some time; had looked at the soft drizzle outside. Under the street lamps, the raindrops glistened like pearl balls. She had pulled out old albums and flipped through the memories. Somewhere, in between reminiscing memories, and sending her brother the old pictures, she had drifted to sleep.

The sudden cold made her shiver, jostling her out of sleep; she looked around to find the culprit and found that the window had been left open through which cold, damp drafts had sneaked in. Half laying - half awake, she stretched her arm to pull close the shutter of the window. Flicking her gaze to the wall clock reassured her that not much time had passed. 

On her phone, there was a message waiting for her. Luckily, she had received it only a few seconds ago, so it wasn't too late.

‘I am in the third lane. Can you come out to meet me? Need to talk about something,’ he had texted her out of blue. 

‘Wait by the playground field. I will be there in fifteen minutes,’ She wrote back, lying in her grandmother's bed. She was feeling lethargic; even getting down the bed felt like a huge task. She had thought she was running a temperature but she wasn’t.

Why was he here? She wondered, cupping water and throwing it over her face, the gentle wet slaps to invigorate herself.

Even a homeless puppy kicked several times was known to become wary of approaching his assaulter. What was he made up of? Had she not pushed him away enough? 

She locked the doors starting for the field.

Why was he here now? It was a time when she was at her lowest. She had retreated to her haven -  the empty house that now housed ghosts and vengeful cats - to lick her wounds. 

Her life, her self-respect - everything - was in tatters, and that she was still on her two feet, holding it together and not dropping lifeless as the light-hungry insects drop dead after making wrong life choices, was in a feat itself. Under the porch lights, you saw their carcasses lying scattered. Before she broke and scattered in the same way, she had to send him away. This time for good.

She walked to where he stood, her heart trembling at every step towards him. He was leaning against a post, watching the football match going on in the dimly lit ground. 

Spotting her, he straightened up, meeting her halfway.

‘Are you doing well?’ He inquired. He was dressed in formals - a full-sleeved cream shirt and black pants, the tie still around his neck - looking like he had come straight from work.

‘Why would I not?’ The tremor and defense in her voice must have alerted him for he stepped closer, not too much but enough that he stood under the light now, his face acquiring a noble-like quality. 

‘You don’t look well. Is there any problem?’ 

His voice was a velvety whisper, the concern in it doing funny things to her; it threatened the tears she had been holding back, to flow. 

How was it that she met more than fifty humans at work, then a few at home in an entire day, and only he had the time to ask her this simple question? And from him, it meant a world.

‘Kirti?’ He held his hand out but remembering something let it fall by his side immediately 

‘Why are you here?’ She managed to bring coldness to her tone. Later, she knew the same cold would come to haunt her. She would cover herself with the thickest of blankets and will still shiver, yearning for warmth. 

‘I needed something urgent to discuss with you. It is about Mayank.’

‘Mayank? What about him?’

‘I saw him kissing some other woman,’ Taking a cue from her, his tone was unfeeling and direct. But his face told a different tale; it looked as if it pained him to reveal it to her. 

‘I stumbled upon them. I was going to the archive section to get a few folders. It was also the same time when the meeting with the models got over. I saw them under the stairs. This isn’t the first time.’

‘Oh,’ she said for the lack of a better response. 

It must have been too peculiar and anticlimatic a response for he looked at her quizzically before continuing, ‘I saw him getting handsy with a woman before too. He was engaged to you at that time. Even though the vibe they gave off was weird…,’ he paused to convey his meaning.

She raised her eyebrows innocently. What weird vibes? 

He sighed in frustration at her cluelessness.

‘It looked like they had been sleeping together.’ He spelled out for her.

You could see people and understand if they were bedmates? How much sleeping around one has to do to gain such intricate knowledge, she fumed. Images of faceless women in his bed flashed before her eyes. 

Kirti pursed her lips, angrily averting her eyes from him, going green with envy.

He took the gesture as her hiding away her tears. When she looked back, he assumed she had successfully restrained her tears.

Her strained expression rightly suited the anguish of a devoted wife who had been cheated. To someone who could read expressions, they could see both, jealousy and hurt swim together in her eyes. 

He, who made a hobby out of looking at he..people, albeit tactfully; to read her eyes as she stood right across him was but a child’s play. But she clearly could not read the miseries that floated in his eyes on seeing her being jealous and heartbroken over someone else. 

He continued, ‘but I ignored thinking they work together and perhaps it is a part of the drill - to flirt with your co-actor,  getting comfortable as they say.’ 

He had stopped speaking for some time, waiting for a reaction.

With downcast eyes, she was staring at both their shadows - his larger than hers. If she was ready to shift a little, they could be one. 

‘You don’t have to cry over that waste of a human being.’

Cry? Oh, yes. She should assume the role of a wife.

‘Is she beautiful?’ She asked. She was glad to hear that Mayank was living his life like before; it lessened some of her guilt. She hoped the woman was beautiful and made him happy so that he did not resent the woman who had forcibly occupied his home temporarily.

His brows crinkled in confusion. ‘I don’t know. I did not have time to notice the aesthetics and attributes of the parties involved.’ Then perceiving her trail of thought in his limited capacity, he added, ‘What I am sure about is she has got nothing on you. You are…’ He paused before continuing, ‘He’s a fool to have wandered off when he has you.’

Her eyes flew over him in surprise.

His gaze steadily held hers before she decided to break eye contact. It looked as if he believed every word he’d said. Her hands lying by her side itched to be engaged. She wanted to put her hands around him and rest her head on his chest and say, Thank you. I know you’ve said it to make me feel better because you think I am heartbroken. I am heartbroken but for different reasons. You don’t know but I am boat upturned by the storms of life. I will hang on to your kind words, using them as an anchor.

But that would happen in an alternate universe. Tonight, she had to send him away. 

There were questions she was aching to ask him. 

Were you the one to send me the notes? I know it’s so long back and silly but I need to know. Are you the one to send Buta? Did you send those candies? Do you go to visit Dadi every Sunday evening, leaving your smell lingering in your after-wake? Why do you care? Is it more than fulfilling an obligation, a promise given to a bedridden old woman? Do you also feel this weird equation between us? What is it, do you know? Why are you so kind at times and so cruel at other times? 

But the questions were stuck like stubborn phlegm at the back of her throat, refusing to come up. She knew left like that, the mucus would accrete into a disease fatal but she was already ridden with a dozen diseases, one more would make no change. 

She locked the questions in an attache and threw away the lock. It was of no use stirring a hornet’s nest. Her life was fraught with complications, and she wished to cut his involvement in it. At the crossroads in her life, she had no intention of dragging more people down with her.

If he was the one who had sent her the notes, then this thing between them had gone too long. 

‘What are you going to do about it?’ He asked.

‘About what?’ She asked distractedly.

‘His cheating.’ 

‘Nothing.’

‘What? Displeasure, disappointment, surprise all emotions cramped into one single word. ‘Why?’

‘Just like that,’ she replied carelessly.

He stared at her, searching her face before understanding dawning on him.

‘This is not a conventional marriage, is it? Are you stuck because of the promise? Do you want a way out but cannot? Kirti, if you need a way out, I am there. You just have to say and I will make it possible.’

It terrified her how perceptive he was. Or was it her own carelessness? Did she unconsciously want him to know?

‘Why would it not be a real marriage?’ She asked, irritated with the tumult going on in her heart. 

‘Because your reaction is not real.’ He was observing every movement of hers.

‘I am not given to theatrics. You said you saw him cheating. Thank you for the information. I will do what I have to do about it.’ She dismissed him.

‘I am not leaving anywhere unless you tell me what’s wrong.’

Why was he so stubborn!?! 

‘There is something fishy about the marriage. Nobody in the office knows he’s married ’

‘And so? That is how we wanted it to be. And, even if there is any problem, it shouldn’t be any of your business. You want to rescue women out of their fishy marriages, I am sure there are plenty out there?’

‘It is very like you to hide your problems behind impudence! It is quite evident from your disheveled state, you aren’t well. You do not have to suffer alone, Kirti. It is okay to ask for help,’ He reasoned. ‘The promise isn’t worth it. He isn’t worth it! Nothing is worth risking your happiness and peace!’

‘Nishit. There is no problem! I love him. Marriage is a private affair and so are its challenges. We’ll sit and talk, and find a way. You have no role to play!’

‘Love?!’ he spat the word contemptuously as if it was an abomination.

In a blink, his feet swallowed a few inches between them; his eyes deluged with emotions, he hissed, ‘Love, eh? A character failing or a misguided penance for some past wrongdoing? What is it that makes you fall for all the wrong men?!’

‘Men? Wrong men?’ She bristled in anger at his accusation and sputtered, ‘Yes, I fell for the wrong man,’ she confessed and admitted both at the same time. ‘If you’re here to talk me out of it, alas it is too late. I am at a point of no return. Nothing you do or say is going to undo my feelings for him.’

He reeled back as if stricken. 

‘Now if you will stop interfering in my life! How many times have I told you to keep away? In what language should I repeat? In what way do I have to show that I do not need either your assistance or company? By what right do you keep coming? We are not friends! Can never be! Any man with a functioning self-pride would…’

‘That’s enough,’ he said frigidly, ‘You’ve made yourself clear.’

She fell silent as he stepped closer, this time only an inch between them, and Kirti witnessed their shadows blissfully merging. ‘You’re right. Any man with healthy self-respect and pride…’ he swallowed the hurt and spoke again, his eyes chagrined, ‘You aren’t worth it. I have been a fool...for a long time now. I promise I will no longer be. You do not deserve my attention!’ 

Look at that Kirti, she told herself looking at the shadows, etch it to your memory because that’s the only kind of union you are getting in this life. Unreal, intangible, and one that has no existence.

But in the given moment, neither could it be erased or destroyed just because certain mothers didn’t like you in their son’s spheres, a voice whispered. Let it be known to her that in time and space, this union - even if it was intangible, and lasted only for a minuscule second -  is indelibly imprinted; and Rimjhim Ma’am can do nothing about it.

Looking up and holding his bitter gaze, she tipped her chin in an appearance of boldness and nonchalance. His eyes were shaped like elegant petals of some exotic water lily. His nose had a sleek lining ending into a pointed tip. His lips...she looked up and was gutted by the look he carried in his eyes, staring down at her, the air between them crackling. She knew he was restraining in a flood of emotions; it was visible in the way his chest breathed laboriously and a muscle ticked hard in his set jaw. 

‘Thank you for your time, I will never bother you again,’ he forced himself to speak at last. ‘Remember to not cross my path, either.’ His eyes roamed over her face for one last time, lingering for a very short minute over her lips, his adam's apple bobbing - she imagined it, obviously; she was a wanton woman with no self-respect - before he turned and walked away. 

She watched him walk his purposeful gait until he took a turn and disappeared. 

Kirti stood there under the lamp, dazedly looking at dozens of similar balconies - with potted plants hanging from the grills, washed linens left on the clothesline - opening into the area.

She glanced at the sky, it was devoid of stars. The men playing in the ground continued to shriek and cuss at intervals. Panting and sweaty bodies running after a single ball. At that moment, they had only one thought in their mind. Goal.

It came upon her very suddenly that she wanted to run - run until there was no air left in her lungs; run until her every being felt it was on fire and until her mind was too numbed to be able to entertain any thought.

XxxX

‘Put him there, yes, on the couch, yes right there,’ She instructed her driver. ‘Careful with the vase.’

Hardiik, who had been busy on a call with a client, stepped out of his room hearing all the commotion. He sighted their neighbor splayed like a crumpled bag on the couch of their room; the driver and Ahilya both looking down at the sleeping man.

‘Is there anything, Ma’am?’ The driver asked. 

‘No, you can call it a day, Gopi. Just be ready tomorrow at sharp eight,’ she said, ignoring Hardiik’s inquisitive glances.

As soon as the driver had left and Hardiik had excused himself from the call, he jumped on her with queries. ‘What is he doing here? Where did you find him? Why did you bring him in?’

‘The neighborhood bar, I found him there. Actually, he found me, and then he started spouting some drunken gibberish that you know I have no patience for. I started leaving but saw he was too wasted to be able to drive. So…’ She shrugged her shoulders, taking the single-seater.

‘So you brought him here?’ 

‘The plan was to drop him at his apartment. But before Gopi could make him reveal the password for his flat, the man was out.’

‘So you should have left him lying outside his apartment.’ 

‘That wouldn’t have been a very neighborly thing to do, would it?’ She raised her finely made eyebrows.

‘That he drank beyond his capacity or got knocked out of sense is not our problem. Let me just throw him out,’ He started towards the unconscious figure of the man.

‘Let him be, Hardiik. Let him sleep it out here. The moment he gains consciousness I am sure he will leave on his own.’

Hardiik, irritated and provoked by the concern in her voice for the wasted man, asked, ‘What are you thinking?’ 

‘What am I thinking? Well to hit the bed. It was a long day.’

He looked at her suspiciously. 

‘What? Why are you looking at me like that?’ She asked then, reading his gaze, ‘Oh. Oh. Reign in your filthy imagination, Hardiik. Men flock to me. I do not have to resort to such monstrous ways to get them in my bed. This isn't modus operandi.’

Chastised, he looked away.

‘Any which way, you can stop being in a twist around him, for I have decided to go for plan B.’

‘What? So you are no more going to…’

‘I am not.’

‘What is plan B? Direct approach?’

When she did not reply, he changed the question, ‘Why the sudden change of heart, though?’

‘Doesn’t suit me, no?’ She asked, playfully. ‘Let’s just say I found out something.’

‘Found what?’ He asked, walking to her and leaning his ears, conspiratorially. 

She smacked his head away. ‘Some new priorities.’

‘What priorities?’

She remained tight-lipped.

‘At least, let me know, do I get to  be a part of those priorities?’

‘It depends,’ she answered mysteriously, making him insecure.

Both their minds occupied, they looked at the form of their passed-out guest before leaving for their respective rooms.

XxxX

Nishit opened his eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling; looked around haphazardly, squeezing his eyes shut immediately at the brutality of harsh rays of sun streaking from the huge windows. When his brain registered that it was not his apartment, he quickly got up, cursed as a sharp pain shot through every body part he was aware of and some that he was discovering, thus slumping down back on the furniture. Cradling his head in his two hands, he groaned in misery.

‘That seems like a grandmother of hangovers. Feeling terrible, aren’t you?’ A man asked, his voice like the jarring drone of a bulldozer on a construction site.

His throat hummed in affirmation as he looked up - moving his eyeballs hurt - at the man. It was the neighbor whose eyes knew only one phrase of expression - a perpetual dead stare.

‘Well, you deserve it. Facing some identity crisis? Mistook yourself to be a sponge? Next time you decide to drink, let it be on the farthest end of the earth - it’d be nice if it’s a Hell bar - so that when you pass out, it’s conveniently, to never wake up again.’

Nishit’s only response was, ‘Can you speak slowly?’

‘Hardiik, it’s only six in the morning, and you’ve started cursing people? At this rate, you’ll be going out of space to store all the bad karma people are sending you in return!  At least wait for the sun to rise properly, huh?’ Ahilya walked into the living area, with a mug in her hand. Greeting her guest, she said, ‘Ah, Nishit, you’re awake?’ 

Nishit acknowledged the new arrival with a wince.

Hardiik scooted over to make room for her beside himself, where she gracefully sat down. ‘You look hideous, Mr.Aggarwal,’ She remarked, taking a sip from her pristine blue mug. 

‘How did I come here?’ His mouth felt like he had stinky arthropods for supper last night

‘We’ll come to that but first, Shabri, get him a hangover drink.’ She called out. 

He hated her fake nasal drawl, the way she would call his name out sometimes, Oh Nishit. 

Thief! She was sure he had stolen the picture!

The drink appeared within minutes and was offered to him. He eyed it warily; it was tempting but he refused politely. 

‘How did I end up here?’ He repeated.

‘Did you forget? Oh, but we had so much fun!’ She emphasized the fun part, looking at him suggestively and he felt the content of his stomach climb his throat. 

‘It was such a memorable night for me.’ 

He panicked, his long-repressed anxiety coming to the fore. He looked down at his clothes crumpled with creases and stinking from alcohol.  

‘I have no such recollection,’ he stood up swiftly, his head dizzy at the hasty act.

‘You don’t?’ she said, tilting her head to look up at him, ‘What a waste! We should do that again sometime,’ 

He fled from the place on his shaky legs, her raucous laughter trailing him like a malicious Jinn.

Every part of his body ached as if he had fallen from a high building a few times over.

In the safety of his apartment, he made a beeline for the bathroom, throwing up; his insides sorely retching.

The mirror reflected his bloodshot eyes and the puffy bags under them. His gaze roamed over his entire self. The clothes didn’t look like they had been removed. The tie was still in place, tight like a noose around his neck. The imprint left by the belt on his waist burned. No, nothing happened. But he had no way of knowing for sure. Is this how women felt when taken advantage of? Violated, disgusted? Was he taken advantage of? Had he taken advantage?

Under the rivulets of water spraying, he scrubbed himself clean. 

In the shower, the images of a different woman, her words, assailed him. When he came out wrapped in a towel, his head still thudding excruciatingly; his hands joined in prayer in front of the deities, when he swore off alcohol. And her. 

XxxX

‘Is this your Plan B? Scaring him so much that he never returns?’ Hardiik asked as soon Nishit left.

‘Oh, but do I detect a tinge of disappointment in your tone? Aren’t you happy to get rid of him?’

‘He was a means to an end,’ he reminded her. ‘I was against your method but we do need him. Why did you do that?’ He asked exasperatedly.

‘That should teach him a lesson. Drinking like a skunk!’ She said, somberly. ‘He needed that reality check.’

Hardiik looked at her oddly. ‘Have you by any chance developed a tendre for him?’

‘What? Tendre?’ She laughed derisively. ‘He’s a child. A complicated one at that.’

‘Woah, child?! When did this happen? Where had this motherly affection disappeared when you very crassly sowed seeds of doubt in his mind about the night? Quite inconsistent of you!’

She ignored his rebuttal. ‘Aaaand...I’m over that tendre shit, Hardiik. Committed too many such frivolities to last for seven lifetimes. You, out of all people, should know that.’

XxxX

‘Did something happen last night?’ He caught her off guard, by appearing out of thin air. He had washed off the alcohol stink from him; now dressed in a fresh pair of ironed clothes, he smelled of lime and exotic woods. ‘Did I misbehave?’ He asked feebly. ‘Crossed a line?’

Giving her wits some seconds to return to her - she had almost jumped in alarm at his appearance- Ahilya arched her brows. ‘You’re still stuck at that?’

‘Please. Don’t use that fake tone; don’t beat around the bush. I asked a simple question, give me a straightforward answer.’ 

‘You are too naive and gullible. Can’t believe you are Rimjhim’s son! Wait. Scratch that, can’t believe you are your uncle’s nephew.’

His jaw clenched, he waited for an answer.

‘Okay, I will tell you. But there’s a condition. Let’s have a deal.’

He raised his brows hiding his disinterest and annoyance.

She stated her condition, his brows touching his hairline by the end of it.

‘If you fulfill your end of the deal, I will spill the beans about the night.’

‘What do you need that information for?’ He was watching her in a new light. She was more dangerous and underhanded than he had given her credit for.

‘Revealing my motivation is not a part of the deal. So? What do you say?’ She asked, looking up at his face.

A few beats of silence passed before he answered, ‘No.’

No surprise flickered through her face as if she had already anticipated this answer. ‘No? Well, then you don’t get to know too.’

‘Fine,’ he nodded his head decisively, turning to leave.

‘Nishit!’ She called out. ‘Wait!’

He turned to face her, his expression wary. 

‘Nothing happened. I was merely messing up with you.’ He thought he had schooled his expressions into a dispassionate one, but she was quick not to miss the relief that had lent his face a serene light in the first few seconds. It was a solid blow to her amour propre.

‘In the bar, you wearied me with your drunken hogwash, ruining your impression with each flying minute. Then you passed out and my driver carried you up. We did not know your code to your apartment so…’ She let him imagine the rest.

‘Thank you,’ he said graciously. ‘Sorry for all the inconvenience.’

She nodded her head silently. Then said, ‘A word of advice. Two, actually. Don’t let your guard down. Ever. And, don’t show that you care, like you did today. Or it gives people an advantage over you.’

Gobsmacked at the changed persona and tone of her, he stared on blankly, searching her face for a clue. 

 ‘If you think I am going to get you the information, just because you…’ he was saying stiffly when she cut him off.

‘This isn’t to get the information out of you. So breathe easy, my boy. The information you will bring to me on your own accord. Today or tomorrow, but you will.’ She said confidently and he stiffened some more. 

‘The advice,’ she continued, ‘consider it a favor returned.’ 

He looked at her cluelessly. ‘Sorry?’

‘You will know. Someday you will,’ she said mysteriously. ‘Now, if you will get out of my way.’ The nauseous drawl was back. He nodded and left.

Perhaps, she had developed a tenderness for the boy. Just a tendre of a different kind.

Seene mein uthte hain armaan aise

Dariya mein aate hain toofan jaise

Kabhi kabhi khud hi maajhi

Kashti ko dubota hai

Aye dil dil ki duniya mein

Aisa haal bhi hota hai

Bahar koi hansta hai

Andar koi rota ha….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7TOAehFEeY