Translucence - Finished. - Page 18

Disclaimer: Chapter is unedited. Apologies for errors in advance.

Chapter 5:

"Don't run too fast Geet, Maan isn't going anywhere," Pratap Handa gently admonished his daughter. His ten year old daughter who was running towards the other entrance to the estate gave him a toothy grin and waved her hand without slowing down.

"Hi Maan," Geet chirped at the ten year old boy who was sitting in porch waiting for his friend to come. As soon as their eyes met, the boy burst into tears.

"It's okay Maan. Papa said 'This is life Geet; meeting and parting is a natural thing'. I did not understand what that means but it sounds good to me." The little girl put her arm around her friend who was at least four inches shorter than her.

"But why did she have to die?" Maan wailed. Geet wiped his tears and watched him as he sniffed and took shaky breaths.

"Was anything wrong with her?" Geet asked as she and Maan walked inside his house towards his room.

"She had fever yesterday and she didn't even eat her lunch properly. I went her to the doctor who said everything was okay. She didn't eat dinner either. And when I saw in morning she was not moving at all. You know she always looks at me when I call her name?" Geet nodded at this vigorously. "Today morning she didn't. That is when I knew that something was wrong. So I went running to mom who told me that Starbuck was dead." Maan sniffed.

Starbuck was a pet rabbit and was a present from Geet's father to Maan. The lonely child had been severely attached to the rabbit and the rabbit's death was something the little boy couldn't handle. It was the first time he was exposed to the subject of 'death' and it had left him confused. He had bawled for most part of the morning which had made his mother take extreme measures to calm him down – call Geet.

"I am sure the doctor didn't know what was wrong with her," Geet who was equally disturbed after listening to the story, fumed.

"That's pretty strong allegation on a professional young lady," a deep husky voice said from doorway.

"Hello Damini aunty!" Geet said happily looking at the beautiful woman who was holding a tray with two glasses of lukewarm milk and cookies.

"What if Geet is right mom?" Maan tried to bargain. Damini looked at two children who were ignoring the snacks and trying to find reason for their pet's death.

"Look kiddo, Starbuck was old and that's why she died, okay?" Damini tried to explain as simplistically as possible. "And I am sure the doctor knew exactly what he was doing." She said looking at Geet and pinched her cheek. Damini knew that the kids didn't believe a word she was saying. She smiled to herself and turned to leave the room when Geet's voice stopped her.

"Dad said that I will not be coming here as often as I do now. Do you know why aunty?" Geet asked Damini. Maan looked at her in surprise. He wasn't aware of this news.

"Why?" He asked looking at both Geet and his mother. Damini knew the reason to an extent as Dileep Khurana had mentioned it to her in passing but she didn't know that Pratap Handa would go this far to disassociate himself from the Khuranas.

"I think I hear the phone ringing," Damini gushed and escaped from her son's room. She knew that Dileep trusted Pratap the most in his life. He trusted the man more than he trusted his wife or children or even her for that matter. She had shifted to Dileep's ancestral home but wasn't welcomed. She didn't blame his grown up children who didn't hide their discontent or detest in her presence. Her living quarters were in a separate wing with its own entrance and completely cut off from the main house. This way she was near to Dileep but wasn't technically part of the main household. It was one of the things that she tried very hard to make Maan understand but only to have her bright son's questions imprint a slap on her face.

"I have decided to become a doctor aunty and will always help Maan," Geet said seriously when Damini entered the room an hour later. She was little taken aback at the finality in Geet's tone but passed it off as the whimsical fancy of a young girl. However she unconsciously turned and looked expectantly at her son wondering if he had already decided a career path.

"When I grow up I am going to tear this part of the house and we both can go live in the main house," said ten year old Maan. Tears sprung in Damini's eyes.

"Geet, are you in there?" Pratap's voice was heard from outside. Damini hurried outside to receive her guest and hid her tears. Maan was a little boy who couldn't understand why his brothers and sister treated him cruelly or ignored him completely. He had retreated to his shell when he realized that no matter what he did, they weren't going to accept him.

"Are you okay?" Pratap asked her once he had come in. Damini nodded and averted her eyes. Pratap frowned but didn't comment much.

"Did you tell Maan about the thing we talked about last night?" Pratap Handa asked his little daughter. Geet nodded wordlessly.

"But you will be coming to my birthday party right?" Maan asked little worried.

"Of course silly. We will come here, wont we papa?" She asked her father. He gave a non-committal grunt and looked at Damini wearily.

"Why don't the two of you go play in the lawn?" Damini said kindly to the children. "I am sure you two want to discuss the birthday party, right?" She goaded them. Damini sighed deeply when the two children ran outside hand in hand.

"You are taking this too far Pratap," Damini said tonelessly.

"It's the only way to curb the competition Damini. Dileep is neck deep in scandals and the stock prices aren't all that great. The group is losing reputation by the day and we have to do something to repair all this. That's why the idea." Pratap answered.

"But still Pratap, the risks are far too great. If someone figures out what you are doing and for who you are actually working it will all come crashing down." Damini said. "What about Geet?" She added when she failed to get a response from Pratap.

"She is going to be fine Damini. She is a motherless child and she knows how to survive. I am moving out to other part of the city so that none of us cross paths even accidentally. Being strangers is good for our strategy," Pratap shrugged.

"You aren't going to come to Maan's birthday party are you?" Damini asked narrowing her eyes. Pratap couldn't meet her eyes and averted them within a moment.

"If there is press hovering here then…" Pratap didn't finish the sentence.

"Are you marrying her?" Damini asked after moments. Pratap had fallen in love with a woman who was a widow with a daughter of Geet's age.

"I honestly want to Damini. I want to marry Maya but I don't know how Geet is going to react. And Maya doesn't know how her daughter, Nayantara, is going to react either."

"So the two of you are playing what? Ping-Pong?" Damini asked incredulously. Pratap sighed. Damini felt sorry for the man who was going to be the last hope in reviving Khurana group. If it didn't happen in next six quarters, the entire group was going to collapse.

"Think about it again Pratap. I think it may be good for all of you." Damini said. Pratap nodded and stood up.

"Take care Damini. I will call you frequently to know how everything is going on here. Dileep will tell you your role in this one. We will be in touch," Pratap said and walked out.

"Let's go Geet," Pratap called his daughter.

Damini and Maan walked with the father daughter duo till the gate. Maan kept waving at Geet who had her head outside the car and waving at Maan with equal gusto.

"She will come to my birthday party, isn't it mom?" Maan asked his mother who was staring blankly at the road. She smiled at her son and ruffled his hair.

"Of course she is going to come, love." A wide smile broke his face and he skipped inside the compound happily.

The next time he met her face to face was when Pratap Handa had died. It was also the first time he met Geet's step mom and step sister.

-- o00o --

He shook his head at the memory that had suddenly bombarded his mind out of nowhere. 'Like Geet said, I must be one big sissy', he sniggered at his own thought. She indeed had become a doctor like the way she had decided on that day. He however had changed dramatically as a person and also as a son over the course of time as life threw surprises and disappointments at him in fast succession. It was a miracle that he was still sane, he thinks. He saw Geet coming out of the hospital main door and looked around the parking lot. He waited for her to spot him and when she finally did, she sent a smile in his direction and walked towards him.

He couldn't help but notice the total contradiction between his memory and his reality. While in his memory Geet was walking away from him, today's reality had her walking towards him. It was one bloody cosmic joke. He watched her walking towards him head held high and her stride casual. She was exactly who she wanted to be and was proud of it. He still had some unfinished business and it was in that moment he decided that it was time to take them up.

"Thanks for dropping me home Maan," Geet said sliding into the passenger seat as he held the door open for her. Maan shook his head and smiled. Neither spoke for minutes as Maan navigated through heavily populated narrow roads and finally broke free to much wider and less congested roads.

"Geet, would you mind dropping by my home first?" Maan asked her slowly. He knew that there was a high probability that she was going to flatly refuse and maybe even rub it on his face for months to come. She looked at him curiously.

"It's not going to take much time. But if you are busy today then I can…"

"No, its fine Maan," Geet said looking out of the window.

"This is it," he said opening car door. After a thirty minute ride they had arrived at a three storied building that looked luxurious and lavish from the outside and Geet knew that it was probably much grander inside. He handed the keys to the security as they saluted him and opened the gate leading them inside the front porch.

"The building is rented out to a private firm. My house is on terrace." He said closing the elevator doors. Geet merely hummed. The ride was quiet and she mutely walked behind him as he led the way to his home.

"Come in Geet." He said and opened the door fully. His apartment wasn't something that gave a notion that a spoilt rich brat lived. It was a large space with lots of book shelves and odd furniture here and there. One corner housed open kitchen while the other corner opened to a stairway which led to open space which Maan probably used as bedroom. The wall was covered with posters from movies, musicals, dramas et al.

"You look surprised," Maan said.

"Three months ago there was this article about you and your girlfriend in a tabloid. Tara was reading that aloud to me one morning standing by the bathroom door as I brushed my teeth. Your girlfriend talked about your apartment which apparently was a reflection of your exuberant lifestyle. She didn't seem to me someone who would have Harry Callahan pointing a gun at you in her living room," Geet said thumbing at the poster of the movie 'Dirty Harry' hung behind her.

"Your retention capability hasn't lost its luster, I see." Maan commented. Geet shrugged.

"I have several apartments Geet but this is my home. Except for the woman who comes here thrice a week to clean and refurbish supplies, you are the only other person who has ever set foot in my home. Maggie?" Maan asked her after taking a cursory look at the kitchen cupboard. Geet stared at him. What was he up to?

"This is who I am Geet," he said widening his arms and spread it around him. "And here no one else is invited. This is where I spend most of my time. Everything that is personal to me is in here. Those apartments provide a good camouflage to my private life." He turned away from her and got busy with whatever he planned to. "Look around if you want," he called.

Geet looked at the movie posters and ran a hand over his bookshelves. There were lots of books covering many genres. She stopped and looked around the house which had an order in its own chaos. There was something extremely intimate about the whole experience and she felt the stress of the day leaving her.

This was the Maan she knew as a child not the man she had been dealing with for the past decade.

She smiled when she saw that he had dedicated a whole shelf to the subject he studied in MIT – Physics. She picked up a thin bound book which was lying on top of other books which was probably read recently.

"That's my thesis," Maan said coming out of kitchenette with a big bowl of Maggie and cutlery.

"Einstein's Twin Paradox: A new interpretation." Geet read out the title aloud and raised an eyebrow. He grinned at her.

"Back in school, I was having trouble in finding a good thesis subject. Somehow nothing was appealing to me and the time to submit abstract was closing in. I called you one day still undecided about the thesis and we spoke for about twenty minutes. I was talking about a party I had been to and you were listening to me as usual. After few minutes you spoke to me about the health camp your medical college had organized in a village and how you had cried on the way home remembering the lack of infrastructure, basic medication and rampant poverty. After I hung up I realized that in that one evening you had seen a part of life that we read about in newspaper or watched in documentaries but never truly lived amidst them to understand it. I felt that you had grown older, more experienced in that one day. The phone calls we exchanged in following days proved my point and one day, I think almost a week later, I felt that you had aged five years in those seven days." Maan said handing her a plate filled with Maggie and a fork stuck in it.

"You said something about seeing enough of pain and suffering to last for a lifetime and it was in that moment I remembered the Twin paradox. The two of us lived in our inertial frames evolving and growing in our definitions of space and time. You felt that you had lived half the life you were given in those years of school and your social service activities while I felt that I was still adventurous about the things to come like a teenager. In our respective perspective, our calculations were correct and so was our interpretation. This thought gave me my thesis idea." Maan finished and looked up from his plate to see that Geet was looking at him and had stopped eating.

The implications of his words weren't lost on her. He had written his physics thesis on them. How weird could it get? She didn't say anything but ate slowly.

"I have decided to help Varun to run his company," Maan said looking down at his plate. He could feel Geet's eyes boring at him.

"You said you won't get into it Maan," she whispered.

"I am sorry Geet. I am not doing this for your or my sake. I am doing this for Pratap uncle."

Geet stared at him wordlessly.