PART 2
It had been almost 12 O' clock when Jalal returned from the cemetery. It was feeling like the dark flat is going to grab him.
While making the coffee for own, he got the message in WhatsApp...
"Don't stress much and sleep well. If necessary take a tranquilizer. You need rest."
He smiled in his mind. Jodha notices everything... nothing of this world can go out of her attention. She is so much caring and soothing. Her presence itself drizzles peace... she is a gem of womanhood!
Had he been got the chance to live with her forever, his whole life would have been different. He could live in the warmth of heaven instead of the furnace of hell!
He entered into the bedroom- better to say the room of the patient... Again the vacancy of the room made him empty from inside. She was quarrelsome, she was hell irritating, maniac, rude, moody, mean-minded... every bad thing of the eternal world- but still she was there, capturing a large space of this house and his life... Her absence has emptied the whole house! Everything of the room was right at their place... the glass and boxes of medicines, the towel and the big bowl, the machine of measuring BP, the bedpan under the bed... and even the gloomy strangulating air with the strong odour of medicines everything is still at their place... only the person who used to lie on the bed like a skeleton is no more!
He sat on the bed, and became quite surprised to see the old album, the photo album of their wedding and honeymoon near the pillow... Who took those out from the shelf? Ruqaiya? She was unable to walk on her own nowadays... must have ordered the maid...
He opened the first page of the album... The first one is the couple photo just after their marriage- the same one who's enlarged form is decorated on the wall. Maybe as it always stays in front of eyes so Jalal has not observed it so keenly before, but this time he gazed at that for some time. Ruqaiya is smiling happily, with real happiness in the photo. She knew that she looks pretty when she smiles but in spite of that she always kept an irritated expression along with a frown intact in her face... Jalal can hardly remember her smiling!
Jalal also can hardly remember this look of Ruqaiya. The picture that comes in his mind very first is the slender ghostly body lying on the bed day and night! Maybe not an eternal beauty, like Jodha, but she was no doubt a very pretty and glamorous woman. She is looking beautiful in the bridal outfit in this picture... had Jalal even looked properly at his bride at the day of his marriage? Probably not... Even this couple photo is an evidence of Jalal's unhappiness with this marriage! The marriage was completely a forceful decision thrown on him by his family; after all his possible protest going down in vein he had to step in the shoes of bride-groom to set off a new journey of compromise with another girl... Jodha had left his side and the country by then, but he was not able to imagine his entity without her... still he had agreed to marry the girl of his family's choice at last- partially due to the grievance and partially for peace the long battle against family and society! He was lost in the thoughts of Jodha all the time, was thinking about the dreams that both of them had crafted together, hardly smiling even while interacting with the guests, was totally cold while talking with his new bride...
Had Ruqaiya suspected him from that day?
Not at all! She was absolutely maniac... cynical! Perhaps Jalal had been too much cold in the day of marriage, but he did try to be cordial with her after that. He had tried his best to be a good husband, to love her, to forget the scar of Jodha's love by loving her the most... Hadn't he? But she was too unfit to get her due of love in her life... He can completely remember the incident of honeymoon...
FLASHBACK:
They had visited Kulu and Manali in their honeymoon. The beautiful Himalayan ranges floating on the kingdom of clouds, with the crown of sunlight glittering on their head, the carpet of flowers on the valley, the curves of mountainous path had partially wiped out the gloomy vapour from Jalal's mind. The beautiful Sunsets within two valleys of the mountains, and a beautiful lady- maybe not his love of life but the one who is all his- while gazing towards the sky he slowly used to become romantic, poetic... reciting poetries... Had she been Jodha with him she would have started to sing a romantic song placing her head on his shoulder, relished the beauty of the nature together but... Since Ruqaiya was not Jodha... she used to get bored off, shopping and bargaining with vendors was a better amusement for her! However, even with the differences of tastes lots and lots of couples live together happily... but when the string of doubt comes inside then...
They were roaming at a paragliding site; the gliders were jumping from the cliff, but were not falling down; they were floating on the air-like the birds of the valley...
Jalal got excited with the smell of adventure of gliding. "Let's try that once." He proposed to Ruqaiya with chuckle. Perhaps it was the 2nd day of their tour. Usually the husbands expect their wives to either to be get scared, or become double enthusiastic, or maybe suddenly to become penny-pincher... but Ruqaiya's response was hell different.
"Why? So that you get enough scope to get rid of me?" Maybe she was joking, but her voice was so taunting and the smirk was so cruel that Jalal could not enjoy that. All he could do that time was to chuckle like a stupid to make the situation lighter. Meanwhile she blurted out the rest of her words. "I am not letting you to get rid of me so soon! Don't dare to!"
"Getting rid of you?" He tried to cut jokes from her seriousness. "You are my new bride madam, how can I let you free so soon!"
"You are a very bad actor." She commented. "Hence I can easily read your plans... You want to get rid of me by hook or crook. Who can say, maybe you attempt to kill me!"
"What..." he had laughed out loudly. "Do I look like a murderer?"
"I heard you had a girlfriend?" the question stung like a sharp arrow... She was staring at his eyes, as if she is peeping into his heart to read all the secrets. He could not lie; he could not deny Jodha's entity in front of an almost stranger girl...
"Yes... But that's the past!" he hurried to tell. "No need to open those old stories now..."
"It is needed. You never told me about this before. What was the reason of hiding? That means you two have relationship even now, and this marriage is an eye-wash??" she started interrogating like a police constable. He was slowly getting irritated, but did not express it. "She has gone abroad; I even don't know where she is! I am married to you now, and so I am completely committed to you... You can trust me blindly!" he proceeded.
"And you think I will believe you so easily?" She smirked cruelly. "I know the boys like you very well! But don't think that I am a soft toy that is used for cuddling and then is thrown out at dustbin! I know how to get my right!"
FLASHBACK ENDS
That was just the start... The spark of a silly doubt slowly spread like a forest-fire in Ruqaiya's mind, which has continued to burn Jalal each and every moment of his life... She was demanding, over-possessive, complex-minded, rude... but everything Jalal could have endured; if she had not continued to taunt, shout and hurt him day and night with her imagination of his ongoing extra-marital relationship and hence to prove him characterless! They hardly had any happy moment together! They hardly had any normal conversation completely without taunts, shout and fight! The vacant place of love in Jalal's heart left vacant for the whole life, only with the name and memories of Jodha... Jalal got no scope to fill that space ever...
6 years! Jalal smiled unmindfully... How he managed to live with her for long 6 years? They had no common interests, no mental match...still they lived- just in inertia of common practice! Jalal had wanted a baby after 2 years of marriage to mend their differences; but Ruqaiya, being figure-conscious, was not ready to conceive so soon... Who knew then that she will not going to get much time to live her life after that! When the bitterness of their relationship had come to the limit, and Jalal seriously thinking to file divorce, the report of biopsy changed the whole story in a moment! In spite of all the problems, all the bitterness and differences, Ruqaiya became fully dependent on him- both physically and mentally... She was possessive about him, now she became obsessive... days went on, her obsession continued to increase along with her sufferings... Poor her!
When he was drowning in the sea of debt, the strong rock of frustration is strangulating his breath, his first love, his one and only love of life came back most unexpectedly, and like a blessing... Jodha...his first love... they had met in a very tender age- Jalal just stepping into the college and Jodha is pursuing for medical after school then... She was a friend of Jalal's cousin, a very good girl, and her thought-process and tastes were as same as him- so it took no time to exchange the hearts... Jodha was matured, calm, educated, cultural- a perfect match for Jalal... she had everything to be proven the most eligible for Jalal, but not the basic criteria of loving him... that's she was coming from different religious background... both of the family stood firmly to break the steady relationship of 4-5 years- compelling Jodha to go abroad for further studies and Jalal to enter into the marriage hall in outfit of groom. She had gone forever, but came back again when he needed her the most... In the dress of Ruqaiya's doctor she came as a healer of Jalal... They started meeting almost daily; though their interactions were not anything special other than of a doctor and the husband of a patient- not what Ruqaiya used to think, but both of them had felt that maybe dust has piled on their love for both, but that has not been rusted... they still want each-other, can wait thousand years more for each other...still now...
Poor Ruqaiya! While struggling with the pain of the disease alone on her bed, she had no weapon to fight against her husband's disobedient heart other than her voice which too was slowly losing its normal self! How much helpless was she! How much frustrated she had been! But why she died! She was desperate to live last night just not to let Jalal live peacefully... then why! Is it really a suicide? Or maybe the nurse has done any mistake and now saving herself? Or...
Jalal closed the album with a bang... He did never love Ruqaiya, but she was his wife! He never wanted her to die! He tried his best...he gave up everything to continue this unequal battle with death... He...
His personal confession got a pause, as his eyes stuck on a small sheet of paper peeping out from a page of album. Out of curiosity he pulled that.
Whose hand-writing is this? Ruqaiya's? As far Jalal knows, she had a wonderful handwriting worth to be jealous for... these fonts are looking like the handwriting of a 5 years old kid just learnt to write... it's obvious. She hardly could manage to hold a pen properly nowadays... The small note has been written very carefully, with a lot of concentration each and every alphabet is tried to be written perfectly as best as possible... his heartbeat increased with his sudden discovery, holding his breath he read out...
"You will be happy now; Will not you, Jalal? I hope at least now I will be able to make you happy... for once...
From, Your ungrateful wife, Ruqaiya..."
He kept on gazing at the fonts for a long time... the moments were passing one after another, but for him the time had stopped... After a long time, when the clock stuck 1 am, he got back his sense... he crushed the paper and thrown that to the paper-basket with a strange rage... Jodha was right; he needs to sleep... he needs to get out of all these... where is the tranquilizers! He pulled himself up from the bed, drawn his body towards the cupboard at the corner of the room, opened the lock of the drawer where he keeps the less-used medicines and... The foil of sleeping-pills was not there!
Suddenly a cold current flowed through Jalal's spine! The foil is beside Ruqaiya's bed, empty... she had consumed all the pills in one go... and slept forever!
FLASHBACK
"Try to clean the room before the nurse comes..." He ordered the maid before going to the office. As a regular practice, despite his anger and disgust of the last night, he did peep into her room for once... She was as usual on the bed in same posture, only was staring steadily out of the window, to the sky.
"I am going. I will be late today." He informed as calmly as he could without looking at her.
"You are going too early..." she murmured in her ailing, chocked voice which was surprisingly wet today! Without continuing the sentence, she then told "Will not you come inside?"
"No. I am already getting late." He stated harshly and about to go, but she again called back. "Will not you feed me medicine? The one you give me before going out?"
"Nurse will take care of that..."
"But I..." she gasped before she could utter. "I want you to feed me! I..." her voice became too low to hear. "You are still angry on me? I am sorry Jalal!"
This is a known gesture of Ruqaiya. She is an attention-seeker, so takes no time to seek apology when Jalal starts ignoring her, but takes no lesson from the whole thing and repeats the same again and again...Disgusting! Jalal stepped inside the room with angry steps and came towards the bed with a glass and a capsule in hand. "Gulp it and let me free!"
"I am a burden on you. Isn't it?" She murmured instead of taking the capsule from his hand.
Yes you are!! Jalal's heart cried out loudly. If only he could say the truth in front of her!
"What are you telling..."He touched her hand. Two drop of warm tears fell on his hand. She was crying silently...
"Why are you crying Ruqaiya?" He wiped out the droplets of tears rolling down from her cheeks. "Don't cry... It may cause your chronic breathing problem..."
"You care for me...so much..." she exclaimed with teary voice while gripping his hand. Suddenly a strange ache clutched his heart... her hand... her grip... all has become so feeble! He kept the glass beside and then cupped her face. "You will be alright very soon Ruqaiya! I swear!"
"You really want me to recover?" Again her screechy voice pierced his ears. He looked at her eyes; her dull, hazy eyes were staring at his eyes- as if they are reading his each and every thought!
"Again you..." he tried to protest, but she touched his lips...
"I love you Jalal! Maybe you don't believe it, but I love you!!!"
He kept silence while casually caressing her cheeks. What is the definition of your love Ruqaiya? To strangulate the person whom you love?
"Take the medicine fast and then try to sleep till the nurse come. She will come after 1 hour. Listen to her like a good girl okay? I don't want to hear any complain from her like you have not taken lunch or denied to take injections etc..." He ordered her as if she is a little baby, perhaps to fill-up the vacancy of love... "I am telling Meena, she will take you to the balcony at afternoon... You have to practice walking slowly..." he stood up from the bed. "Now I gotta go! Bye..."
"If I want a thing from you will you give me?" she asked suddenly. He looked back.
"Hug me for once. Please!" she had a heart-wrenching plea in her voice... But why such a strange wish suddenly?
He smiled in reciprocation, and sat closer to her, pulling her towards chest. She shifted her weak hands round to his neck and placed her head on his chest. He embraced her with all his warmth, took her weightless body inside him... The sudden ache of pity jerked his soul suddenly... She is nothing but a bag of bones covered by a thin cover of skin now... where is the healthy, content body with which he used to play nights after nights? He is worried of the medical reports, the bill of hospitals, the expense of medicines... But has he ever tried to feel even that how much pain she is enduring?
He was hurrying to leave; but she was not ready to break the hug so soon... as if she was to absorb all the trace of love and care from his warm body...
For last time...
FLASHBACK ENDS...
With a strangled scream from his heart, Jalal broke down on the floor; covered his face with palm and started gasping... his body was shivering with a strange pain!
Edited by Shinning_Stuti - 9 years ago
