ArHi SS-Seven Days *Complete* - Page 5

Originally posted by: EXPELLIARMUS

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Chapter Four

The grandfather clock in the hallway began chiming, startling Khushi. She subconsciously counted the tolls-- eight of them, the sound resonating with something deep inside her. She had been winding herself tighter and tighter over the last couple of days...over the last year perhaps.

And now, the spring seemed to have broken. Each resounding ding unraveled her from within and she sighed gently when the last vibration faded and silence surged back.

"It's a long story. Then again, neither of us have any pressing appointments to keep. We may as well sit down...Aryan."

He didn't miss the pointed emphasis on his name as she returned to the lounge and seated herself in one corner of the couch, tucking her feet underneath her.

She waited until he'd seated himself in a large armchair close by before beginning. His unwavering attention and the intensity of his gaze didn't seem to bother her-- she'd already started zoning out, drifting into memories where he had no part.

"You want to know why I married N.K, right? To put it simply, it's because I'd loved him. But the thing is, it's never that simple, is it? He loved her, she loved him, and they lived happily ever after...much as we want it to be, it's always more messed up than that. My apology if that sounds like it's out of a melodramatic movie-- occupational hazard."

Her laughter sounded brittle and hollow.

"I suppose the story really begins twelve years ago. I was a student at one of the country's top performing arts colleges. Like thousands of others in that city, I was young, I desperately wanted to make it big as an actor, and I lacked both the money and the connections to make something out of that dream. I'd figured that acting school was a good place as any to start. So by the time I was twenty one and close to graduation, I not only had to worry about landing a role, I also had mountains of crippling student debt."

Khushi's face looked so calm and unperturbed, he could have fooled himself that they were having a mild discussion about the state of the economy and education. Only the whiteness of her knuckles fisting into the comforter near her, gave her away.

"Also like many others in my class, I worked multiple jobs to make ends meet. One such job was at a little hipster-ish bar close to where I lived. It was a seedy looking, rundown place that smelled constantly of cigarette smoke and cheap beer. It had a very mixed clientele and to be fair, it certainly wasn't the worst place I'd had to work at. I waited tables there, and occasionally sang duets with the live performers-- who were all other broke music students trying to land a better gig. That's where I met Nick."

A sharp arrow of disquiet shot through him. He hated the way she said his name-- as though she still cared...

"Nick Kaczinski wasn't the hotshot TV-producer N.K. then. He was just...Nick-- a struggling writer with some serious talent and fierce ambition. He stopped by that bar one evening to drink away the frustration and bitter hurt of his eleventh rejection note for a script that he'd sent out. It had been a relatively slow evening and I'd been bored out of my skull when Nick had appeared. He was...good-looking, and sarcastic, and he had this cloak of brooding intensity that I found devastatingly attractive. Despite my attempts to draw him into conversation, he stayed aloof and left without giving me his number or asking me out. But he came back a week later."

Khushi looked at him, the corners of her mouth lifting in a small, tired smile.

"We didn't start seeing each other, much to my disappointment. But he seemed to like talking to me. He had a carefully cultivated air of cynicism-- that was fashionable, I guess. But he was nice to me. No, he really was. He treated me like he would a classmate or study-partner he respected. We weren't close enough to call each other friends, but I looked forward to seeing him every week."

He shifted in his chair. "So then what changed?"

"Everything. One week, Nick was uncharacteristically excited and cheerful. Turned out, his script had finally been accepted by a mid-size studio. He was over the moon. I was happy for him, of course. But I felt this strange sense of loss when he told me that he'd be moving across the country the following month. And he did leave. He was finally on his way. That first show was a surprise hit and it established him as a writer to watch out for. After that, there was no stopping him. I followed his career carefully via magazines and gossip columns. His successive shows raked in the money and positive reviews as well, and within five years, he'd set up his own production house and had morphed from struggling-TV-writer-Nick to billionaire-TV-producer-N.K. In the meantime, I'd hit a spot of luck as well. I'd been cast in bits parts in a few stage shows and musicals. I dabbled in theatre for a year or two before my first full-fledged film role. It was in a campy, low-budget horror film and I lasted all of half an hour before meeting a gruesome end."

This time, her eyes shone with genuine amusement.

"I could have sunk without a trace after that, of course. But in a lucky twist of fate, I caught Sharon Grey's eye. She had a secret weakness for bad horror films, and that was how she first saw me act. Something about my performance appealed to her-- and she called me in to audition for a role in her next big-budget romcom. I landed the lead role and there was no looking back. That movie received pretty awful reviews, but was commercially successful. I drew largely favourable comments, though, and was signed on for a three-film deal with Phoenix Films. It was at a party thrown by the managing director of Phoenix Films that I bumped into Nick...N.K. again."

He realized with a start that he didn't really want to hear this anymore. These revelations...they felt too...raw...too intimate.

He wanted her to stop-- as much for her own sake as for his. Hearing her talk about this was like watching her pick the scabs off wounds that hadn't quite healed.

He knew with certainty that he wasn't ready to deal with the hurt that would flow after she was done.

Torn between an insane desire to go and comfort her somehow, make this easier for her, and stay where he was and listen to her, he chose the latter with some difficulty.

"N.K. looked better than I'd ever seen him look, but in many ways, he appeared unchanged. He still sported that casual look of disdain for the people fawning around him-- as though he knew he was smarter than them. He had this habit of looking over the heads of people talking to him and meeting your eye across the room as if to share a private joke about how terrible all of this was. Of course, it was rude, but it worked like a charm on most people. That's how he caught my eye soon after I'd arrived at that party. He did more than that, actually. He excused himself and came over to talk to me. He'd recognized me, of course. He congratulated me on my debut-- he'd assumed the Sharon Grey romcom was my first-- and then on my three-film deal. Word gets around quick in the fraternity. Among a bunch of glittering strangers and music so loud that we could barely hear ourselves think, we slipped into our old easy banter. He'd say something disparaging, and I'd respond with something even snider. There was one difference, though. The way he looked at me had changed."

She took a deep, rattling breath.

"I could sense a new kind of sexual awareness in the way his eyes lingered on me, the way his hand brushed casually against my arm while talking to me. I was thrilled. My old crush flared up with surprising intensity and suddenly, I made a silent promise to myself. I would act on that awareness. I wouldn't let him slip away again. I would use every weapon in my newly gilded arsenal and hold on to him. And I did just that."

The fire in her eyes silently dared him to judge her, despite her bone-deep weariness.

"I asked him out before the evening had ended and he accepted. We met for a couple of casual dates and were soon in a serious relationship. It was...not perfect...but it was felt just right. I'm wary of perfection anyway. Our work ensured that we stayed apart for long periods, but it added a heightened sense of anticipation when we did meet. N.K. and I were both passionate about films and we spent hours watching all sorts of movies together-- Goddard, Kurosawa, Ray, Bergman, Welles, Fellini right down to Kubrick, Spielberg, Tarantino, Nolan. We also watched all kinds of trash-- including my debut. We went out to eat at hidden, indie eateries where the decor was inexplicable but the food delicious. We went on vacations together to whatever place caught our fancy."

The wistful expression on her face somehow made him angrier than his actual encounter with the man had made him. How could she possibly still feel this way?

"I'm telling you all this not because I harbour any hopes about getting back together with him or because I'm viewing a bad relationship through these rose-coloured lenses of nostalgia. No, that's not it. I'm telling you this so that you understand just what this relationship meant to me, and why I don't care anymore."

She took a deep breath and he had a nasty feeling that the good times were over.

"Within a year, I was head over heels in love with him. I was happy. My films were doing well-- I had a growing fan following. I had never looked better either. At the end of our second year together, N.K proposed marriage. I was thrilled. I had always secretly feared that I didn't mean as much to him as he meant to me. I told myself that I was being unnecessarily insecure-- N.K. loved me, he just wasn't a very openly affectionate person. And that was okay-- neither was I, to be fair. His proposal obviously meant that he seriously wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. I accepted, of course. I just had one request-- a long engagement. I had a couple of big projects lined up and I wanted to concentrate on nothing else for a few years. That probably led to our first big fight. Before that we'd argued lots of times-- but nothing of this magnitude. It got ugly with N.K accusing me of putting my work above our relationship and I gave it back in kind. I told him that he was a sexist ass for saying that and if he truly respected me and my work, he would never ask such a thing of me. We almost broke up over that. But after a few weeks apart, we made up. He came back and apologized and I did too. We decided to try and compromise and work on our relationship. I gave up one of my projects and he took some time off from work too. We finally got married after two years of being engaged. Our wedding was a private affair in Puerto Rico, by the sea. Both of us loved water; that's why we bought this house soon after we got married. To be honest, the house isn't really my style; it's too...big and modern. But it's close to the ocean so I agreed."

"So if everything was so f**king perfect, where does this 'other woman' come in? How could everything deteriorate so much in two years?"

He hadn't planned on interrupting her story, but he couldn't help himself.

Khushi rubbed a hand over her eyes forced a laugh again.

"That's just it. There was no other woman. N.K. didn't cheat on me with another woman."

"What?"

"This extra-marital affair rumour was one that was created and spread carefully by his PR team so that no one could figure out the much more damaging truth. N.K. was cheating me financially. He was guilty of financial fraud, not infidelity. He was much, much too intelligent to have an affair right under my nose. He knew exactly how much our relationship meant to me and he did his best to exploit it."

He stared in disbelief. Everything about her screamed that she was telling the truth, but how was this possible?

"You're saying that...N.K. was stealing from you? Why would he do that? He's a billionaire-- his production house is a giant...why and how would he steal from his own wife?"

"That's the crux of it. N.K. isn't a billionaire. Not anymore. And I don't mean now, after I've won this outrageous divorce settlement. N.K. has been in serious financial difficulties for a while now. His problems began about five years ago, in fact. Just before he asked me to marry him."

His eyes widened and nostrils flared as comprehension dawned. The look of disillusionment on her face confirmed what he was thinking.

"He...he proposed to you because he needed your money. That's why he was so insistent on a quick wedding. He needed access to your funds..."

Khushi nodded in bitter resignation.

"I didn't know then, of course. Even when I first suspected that he was lying to me about my money, I couldn't imagine the extent to which he'd been deceiving me. Soon after he married me, he began siphoning small amounts of money from our joint account, and my personal accounts. On his recommendation, I had hired the same agency as him, to manage my finances and handle my taxes. It's embarrassing, how easily he was able to manipulate statements and swindle me for a good year and a half. I wouldn't have caught on for years, had it not been for my manager, Anjali Saxena. I'd hired Anjali soon after my second film. She had been recommended by Sharon Grey herself. She wasn't much older than me, but showed lots of promise. Hiring Anjali had been one of the best decisions of my life. She not only got me some of the most important deals and projects of my career, she was a miracle worker when it came to juggling my schedules, my personal commitments, media attention, coordinating my team and basically ensuring that my life ran as smoothly as possible. About eight months into my marriage, Anjali first urged me to keep a closer eye on my finances. She was deliberately vague, talking about the pitfalls of being too trusting and careless. I'd been baffled and had dismissed her remarks as random. After that, every once in a while, she would bring this up again. Finally, a little more than a year and a half into my marriage, she voiced her suspicions. She said that she didn't really have evidence or the financial skill to prove this, but she was almost sure that someone was misappropriating my considerable personal wealth. She didn't want to point any fingers, but she asked for authority to hire an investigator and get to the bottom of this. I didn't want to believe her--in my heart I knew where the needle of suspicion would point if she were able to prove what she suspected. We were at a stand-off for days-- she insisted that I let her do this, and I wanted to hold onto my facade of a perfect marriage. Eventually, I caved. She had my accounts and investments looked at by someone she knew, discreetly. She'd warned me not to tell anyone at all about what we were doing. I knew, of course, who she was really warning me about. A side of me also wanted to test my relationship. While we were happy for all intents and purposes, I couldn't lie to myself about N.K.'s growing aloofness and permanent anxiety. He would always brush off any questions with vague statements about 'work-related-stress.' We didn't fight...we had just been drifting apart. Anjali made me ask myself a whole lot of uncomfortable questions about my marriage and how much I really knew the man I was married to. I can't...I can't really explain to you what it was like. He would be sitting next to me on the couch--this couch--and watching TV but he would be miles away. When we were away from each other because of work...he would go days without a single word. We didn't even...you know...even when he was with me in bed, I got the impression that he wasn't really with me. Most people would just assume that I was overreacting to little things-- but I wasn't."

He had never experienced the sort of helpless fury that her words elicited. Even his own desperate situation didn't anger him like her story did. He had never been personally let down by anyone he'd been close to, like she had. He almost wished he'd been harsher to him earlier at the door, hit harder somehow. He didn't know Khushi very well, but he knew that she hadn't deserved any of this...

Swallowing the anguish that had been spilling out with her words, she took a moment to compose herself and then returned to her earlier monotone.

"Anyway, Anjali's investigators came through. Within a month or so, they handed me a report with every single penny of mine that had gone missing underlined, complete with time stamps, real transaction details and even proof of a couple of forged signatures. It took me two days to go through all of it. I took it to N.K. after that. I kept telling myself that I had concrete proof and unless he had a solid story to explain all of this, I would walk out this marriage without a second thought, that I would be strong. As it turned out, I didn't need any of that. N.K. wrought far more devastation than I'd expected. When I confronted him, he didn't bother denying anything. He said it was a relief and he was glad that I finally knew. He was done with this marriage and he wanted out. Apparently, I wasn't really worth the money, after all."

Looking into her worn-out face and red-rimmed eyes, he willed himself to stay where he was.

"I still don't understand. A) why did N.K. need so much money all of a sudden? And B) why did he tell you the truth? He must have known you would sue him for every penny."

"To answer your first question, over the years, N.K. had made a series of poor investments and lost a fortune on the stock market. And then, two or three of his shows failed consecutively. All of a sudden, he stood at the brink of ruin. That's when he wanted to marry me and pull himself out of his financial doldrums with my money. When that didn't happen as quickly as he wanted, he took a large loan from some rather questionable people. No respectable source would have lent him that kind of money-- he just didn't have that kind of credibility. So he borrowed money from these people, positive that his luck would turn soon and he would bounce back. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. His shows continued to fail, and then the people who had lent him the money sent loan sharks of the worst kind after him. Fearing for his life, he paid them a token amount from our joint account to get them off his back and said that he would pay the rest back in installments. He knew he would bankrupt himself if he had to pay them back with his personal assets. And so, he started liquefying his assets and investments all over the world. Along with the money he stole from me, he began putting it away in a foreign bank account under a false name. The idea was to collect as much money as he could in that account, and then disappear. He would begin anew in a different country with that money. A new life, a new name...and his wife had no part in that. But Anjali's overall competence and fierce loyalty to me put a spoke in his plans."

"What about the second question? Why tell you the truth?"

Khushi smiled sadly. Her eyes looked suspiciously bright for a second, but it may have been a trick of the light.

"He knew me. He knew that I didn't care about the money. He was counting on me to walk away with minimum fuss, enabling him to get away with what he'd done. The worst part? He was right. I would have let him walk away with as much dignity as I could muster. What was the money to me when the world as I'd known it no longer existed? I had just wanted to get as far away from it as possible. Again, it was Anjali who wouldn't let me run away. She told me that N.K. needed to face the consequences of what he'd done and I couldn't possibly let him get away with it. She told me that the surest way to deal with the pieces of my life and move on, was to get even. It wasn't about the money, it was about the principle. It took a while, but Anjali has always known what to say to press the right buttons. She told me that I didn't need to keep the money, she understood my need to distance myself from it. She stood by me like a rock through the exhausting and humiliating courtroom battles where every dirty secret, every ugly truth was held up for all to see. The media, of course, was wildly off the mark thanks to the closed-door hearings-- that's what N.K. and his team wanted. I really didn't care. I just wanted it all to end. And it finally did-- the day you arrived. For the first time in more than a year, I had nothing fight for. No more hearings, no more interrogation, no more endless meetings with lawyers, no more of the constant anxiety about N.K. getting away with this, no more of dealing with him and his family ever again. Nothing. I was finally free...and I had no idea what to do with myself."

"So you locked yourself away in this house alone."

"Something like that. I needed some time-- to figure out where I go from here, I guess. I wasn't trying to punish myself, if that's what you're getting at. Nor did I come here to pine for N.K. and heal my broken heart. Like I told you, I just don't care anymore. I came here to take a break, and to do some soul-searching. Nothing more, nothing less."

"Why is N.K.'s family blaming you? Surely they must know what he's been doing?"

The sudden change in subject didn't faze her at all.

"Of course, they know. Well, some version of it. N.K.'s family never really liked me. They felt that N.K. could have done much better than an Indian nameless nobody who had suddenly come out of the blue and made some money. Not that they're the Tsar's descendants or anything. But they pride themselves on their Russian heritage. They had done their best to dissuade him from the engagement. Now, of course, I wish they'd succeeded. Chances are he's told his family that I wouldn't help him with the money and that he was desperate so he did what he had to. They would accept that, no questions asked. The really sad thing is that had he come and told me the truth right in the beginning and asked me for help--I would have given him the money without a thought. Of course, he was too proud to. N.K. did have a streak of sexism that ran deep."

"If you don't mind me asking...where was your family amid all this? Why weren't they by your side instead of Anjali?"

"I have no family who would be interested in standing by me."

Her cold, dispassionate tone touched a nerve that the entire sordid tale of her broken marriage hadn't been able to.

"I lost my parents when I was an infant and had no relatives to speak of. I grew up in foster care. I switched families a few times. The best that I can say about my adolescence is I wasn't abused in any way. But after I left for college on a small scholarship, I haven't looked back."

An uneasy silence filled the void left by her corrosive confessions. Fumbling for the right words, she began again.

"See, the reason I'm not as mad at N.K. or as hell-bent on 'getting even' as everyone thinks I should be, is that I chose this. I fell in love with him. I pursued him. I was a willing participant all the way-- more willing than he. I pushed for our relationship, for our marriage. I'm not some kind of hapless victim here...I went in with both eyes open and it didn't work out. I'm not going to pity myself anymore because it didn't."

"No one's saying you should."

"No! That's just it, they are! Everyone thinks that I should curl up into a ball and spend my days crying over my broken marriage. The ones who know the truth are filled with righteous indignation on my behalf. But that's unnecessary. No one made me do any of this. I chose it all. And everyone should face the consequences of their choices. For all I know, had this spot of trouble not hit, N.K. and I may have built a solid relationship with time."

He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and steepling his fingers.

"You're right. Everyone should face the consequences of their actions and choices. You chose this relationship. But what you didn't choose was dishonesty. You didn't choose the deceit. You didn't choose betrayal. You took a leap in good faith. That it didn't work out isn't your problem. The problem is a guy who exploited your love and trust. People work on faith, Khushi. That's how society works. When you go to sleep at night, you believe that your family isn't going to murder you while you sleep. When you send your kids to school in the morning, you have faith that the teachers aren't going to hurt your kids. When you buy an ice-cream after lunch, you trust that the ice-cream man hasn't poisoned your cone. Is it that none of these horrendous alternatives are possible? Yes, they are. But they aren't common occurrences. It's because despite everything that's wrong with our world, we inherently trust that other people won't hurt us without obvious reason to do so. And that's what keeps the world running. So to come back to you, yes, you chose everything. But those choices were made in good faith. You didn't force him into a relationship, any more than he forced you. He too chose to marry you. And he chose to not honour his vows. He chose to hurt you. So from where I'm standing, no matter what kind of a person he had been or is at the moment, he deserves everything that's coming his way now."

Khushi shrugged. She didn't look entirely convinced, but the exhaustion of reliving the last decade seemed to have loosened its hold on her.

"I'm tired. The sun's almost up and I will crash if I don't get some sleep."

He looked outside with a start. Sure enough, the eastern sky had lightened and was a smoky pale blue. Now that he was paying attention, the clamouring of the distant gulls and various other birds closer to the house filled the air. He looked at his watch.

It was almost four thirty in the morning.

They'd stayed up all night, talking about this.

As Khushi pointedly stretched out on the couch and snuggled into the comforter with her back to him, he couldn't help one last question.

"Khushi, I know you said you don't care about N.K. now. But do you care for him at all? Or do you just not care about what happens to him after this?"

She didn't answer for so long, he was sure she'd fallen asleep.

"I care about the life we had together, once upon a time, even if it was all a lie. But I don't care for N.K. anymore."

As the softly spoken words floated over to him, a corner of his mouth twisted into a smile.

He didn't know why he'd asked that last question.

He didn't know why she'd answered.

It was inexplicable.

He too stretched his legs out in front of him and leaned his head back.

Dawn was still a couple of hours away.

-

Chapter 5