Arnav & Khushi FF || Serendipity #1 || Link to Thread Two: Pg 1 - Page 3

Hatred was the only emotion Arnav now felt for her. Hatred for betraying him. Hatred for making him dream of his future... perhaps, their future. Hatred for making him believe in a happier world where faith and love could conquer the demons of his past.

The pelting of pouring rain distracted him, and he felt the reoccurring guilt gnaw at every free nerve of his body, forcing his feet to swing off the bed, and trudge to the french doors that peered into his garden. The silhouette of a motionless girl came into vision as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, rainwater cascading down her drenched body, an abandoned comforter kicked aside and forgotten.

"Shit."

Every practical instinct that suggested he should derive a sadistic pleasure from her suffering was forgotten, as Arnav Singh Raizada ran into the pouring storm and picked up his unconscious, trembling wife into his arms. He laid her on his recliner and scurried to find a dry towel, returning to delicately dry her soaking wet face, her arms and her hair. He winced as he traced the bruise deep circles beneath her hazel eyes, the sickeningly pronounced cheek bones, the imprints of his unforgiving fingers around her wrists.

She was no longer Khushi. She was a broken rendition of a carefree woman he once knew.

He should have felt victorious at witnessing the pathetic condition, but his heart seared in burning and unruly guilt, as he traced his fingers on her fever ridden frame.

**********************

Arnav observed her from afar, pacing his room nervously as he waited for her to regain consciousness. He was practicing the diatribe he would recite to condemn her futile pity parties when she awakened, only to curse his vulnerability every time he glanced her way. Her fragile body trembled despite the blankets he had layered, and he realized the convulsions would not end until she was changed out of her drenched clothes. He had hesitated, contemplating whether or not to call her sister, but quickly scrapped the idea as the absurdity of a soaking wet Khushi and a husband ashamed to undress his wife settled in. The loud rattling of shivering teeth brought him back to reality and he renounced his anxieties immediately. At this moment, Khushi's health was his sole priority.

He shut the light off the blaring lamp on his bedside, and feeling his way through the darkness, he returned to where Khushi lay silently -- a broken porcelain doll wrapped in blankets that swallowed her whole. He sat towards the foot of the recliner and lifted her lightly by the shoulders, laying her limp body so it pressed against his own. His eyes were determinedly focused on the frames of the paintings upon his wall, refusing to look down at the woman who rested peacefully in his arms.

Arnav swore mentally at the wayward thoughts of how she fit into his embrace. His fingers found the zipper of her sopping kurta, and tentatively he pulled it down, forcing his tempted, traitorous hands to immediately return to her shoulders after they completed the task. She stirred as the warmth of the room hit the expanse of her revealed back and nestled deeper into him, trying to absorb the heat that radiated from Arnav's body. He stiffened as he controlled an unknown, feral urge to drop his lips and capture the rain droplets that he knew would be present on her shoulders. To taste the sweetness of God's tears clinging to her fragrant skin with a parted mouth, as he pulled the kurta off her damp body.

But his eyes never left the frames of the paintings that hung on his wall, and his hands never lingered. An unnamed feeling he had chosen to disregard and label as 'loathing' bubbled to the surface and conquered once again.

CHAPTER TWO: U N C E R T A I N T Y