Manan FF - Kaisi yeh Yaariyan season 3 - Chapter 123 & note - Page 51

They were done with the security check & were just waiting for the boarding to be announced, when Manik remembered he had to call Nandini. He had not told her anything about this sudden trip, in fact he had been so busy throughout the day that he had not had the time to call or meet her even once.

"Hey , what's my cotton doing?" He walked past Ranbir & Navya towards a corner, ignoring the teasing looks they gave him.

"Does it really matter to you?" He grinned, imagining her cute face, fuming with anger. This is exactly the kind of reaction he was expecting from Nandini.

"I am sorry dear, I was way too busy today."

"Really Manik?" So much had happened within the span of a day, that her head was about to explode. And the saddest part was, that Manik was nowhere near her when she needed him the most. Forget near, he wasn't even reachable. Every single time she had called him, either she had found the line busy or it had kept ringing. Not once had he called back. She had sent him some 20 odd messages in WhatsApp, none of which he had read.

"Yep really miss Murthy" Manik was completely oblivious to what was in store for him. He thought, like any other day, Nandini would fume for a while, crib , shout and then finally melt into his arms.. Virtual hands that is.

"Right, so busy that you couldn't come for my interview, forget coming, you couldn't even send a 'Best of luck' message?"

"Interview? Kab kahan? Why didn't you tell me yaar?" Manik was surprised. He honestly had no clue. 'Had she told him, she was going to appear for one?' He was wracking his brain trying to recall their conversation from the previous night.

"Yaa... I should have told you hai na, why don't you do something, why don't you check your whatsapp for a change, may be pata chal jay?" Her words were steeped in anger & dripping with sarcasm, but she was angry out of desperation.

"Shit!!!! Shit..shit.. I am really really sorry yaar...waise a big congratulations Miss Murthy, I always knew you will rock it. Congratulations on your new job. The treat is due on me." Yes, she had messaged him. The first one was timed at 9 something AM, where she had mentioned, she had called the NGO, Ranbir had asked her to check with and because they had an urgent requirement, they had scheduled her interview later in afternoon. She had also asked him to come along because she was nervous and like always, needed him to be by her side when she went for it. Her next message was sometime around 11, just before she was leaving home, and then one at 2, informing him, albeit in a dejected tone that she had bagged it but that she was missing him and if he could come around. There was a pile of more messages from her, mostly asking him where he was and why he wasn't responding to her calls or messages. Her last message however, was at 9.30 pm. It was short and still sounded sad and angry . 'Where the hell are you? All hell has broken loose at home. Call ASAP'. Shit he had missed them all and now he was feeling really sorry and infact was worried. "Baat kya hai Nandini, ghar pe kya hua?"

"Can't tell you here, can you please come on skype.. " Her patience was running thin after all the drama at home.

Keeping aside her resentment, she just wanted to see him.

"Nandini why can't you tell over the phone, Skype would be a little tough now." He didn't want to tell her at once that he was leaving for Delhi. She didn't know the context and she might get unnecessarily worried, he thought.

"Whatever..." she got further pissed off. "I don't know anything... I need to see you for heaven's sake"

"Try and understand Nandini, I can't. I am at the airport, I have a flight to catch in 10 minutes" He had to tell her, despite not wanting to, not at least now, in this manner.

"Airport? Flight? What are you talking about? Where are you going?" It came as a nasty surprise to her that he had told her none of this. What was Manik up to?

"Delhi. Have some urgent work there."

"Wow Manik, here Amms is coming in 4 days to get me married to Neel and you are going to Delhi for something urgent." She couldn't believe he was actually going to Delhi leaving her like that.

"Oh that, ya I already know. Thank God, I thought something worse has happened." This was old news to him thanks to that call from Neel Dixit.

But Nandini who was totally unaware of the fact that Manik knew or was going to Neel because of it only, lost it bigtime "How can you be so casual? And what do you mean by..'I already know', don't you think I deserve to know as well? This is my life that people are playing with. And you, the only person who should have been more worried than me, is behaving so casually as if kuch hua hi nahi."

"Nandini.." Manik tried to calm her down but the girl was on a rampage today and showed no signs of stopping.

"No no hold on, I am not yet done. So first I had this interview, where I go alone, and then when I return home, Amms calls and tells, not me but chacha to start the marriage preparations. Chachi told him about you and also that Neel wasn't his prima facie witness, but the real culprit. She also told him about your accident which wasn't an accident. But guess what, chacha ko to Amms ki sunni hai, so he created a big tamasha saying you have brainwashed both me and chachi. And in the middle of all this you are GOING TO DELHI!!! When you should have been with me."

Manik never spoke anything against her family , even when he had justified reasons to. But today he felt betrayed that they chose to believe Neel's lies over his truth.

"Why are you mentioning the Delhi thing again and again. I am not going on a vacation. I said I have an urgent work there." He could have easily told her that he was going to dig out details about Neel and that would have settled the scores, but he chose to be stubborn, he chose to test how deeply she trusted him and his intentions and all this was fueled from that hidden anger towards her grandma, which he was reluctant to vent out.

"Why shouldn't I ? I can't believe you are so casual aur idhar meri jaan nikal rahi hai. Tum kya wait kar rahe ho ki kab us kameene se meri shaadi hogi aur tum baith ke dekhte rahoge?" She was paranoid, and out of paranoia, she was uttering the kind of shit she herself didn't believe in. Part of this chronic fear came from the three years of hell she had suffered alone. It was so deep seated, that despite Manik's reassurances, she often fell back into it.

The fact that Manik was going somewhere, somewhere away from her, and that he wasn't shouting at the mere mention of Neel, caused her nerves to fray. What if, Manik was leaving her alone again...what if the marriage really did happen.

But on the other hand, her words pricked him deep. It sounded as though she was blaming him for not loving her enough when all he ever did was to love her and love her more, going far beyond his physical and mental levels. Did he even have a life of his own? He hadn't as much as taken a tenth of the rest his doctor had prescribed. And yet she had the heart to blame him? "Wow Nandini, I must say haan, I wasn't expecting this from you. One day I don't call you, just 24 hours and this is what I get to hear, so much for trust huh? All that I do, or ever did, doesn't count right? And instead of telling me, Why don't you tell your chacha and Amms to see some sense. Why does it have to be me everytime, why everytime freaking time I have to prove myself and my love." He could no more hold it inside, he felt so hurt.

"Why don't you understand Manik..." She hadn't meant this.. 24 hours, f**king she had waited 24* 365* 3 hours & if needed she could wait till eternity for him. It was the fear of losing him that was driving her nuts .

In the meanwhile, boarding had begun & when Manik didn't turn up even after two rounds of announcement, Ranbir and Navya, both went out, looking for him.

They were having an argument, one look at Manik and Navya understood. Even though they weren't friends and probably Manik didn't even like her, she admired him more each time she found him going another extra mile for Nandini. Could any guy love a girl, the way Manik loved Nandini? And if Nandini didn't realize that, she was making a big mistake.

"Listen Nandini, I have told you more than once that I won't let Neel touch you. Forget Neel, agar uski jagah koi Harvard graduate bhi hota to I wouldn't have let him, unless you yourself had told me to let you go. But you got to have trust on me, if there's no trust, there's no point having a relationship." this time Manik didn't care that Navya and Ranbir were listening to him. He was sweating, even in the chilled air of the airport. The physical exhaustion from all the running around, the worries looming large in his mind, the uncertainty surrounding the girl, it was already too much to handle but he would have taken all of it smilingly, only if Nandini hadn't been so drastic in concluding that he was just sitting happily waiting for her to be taken away. "Good bye..." Those were his parting words before he disconnected the call and switched off the phone.

Ranbir was about to say something when Navya pulled his hand. She knew better than to disturb Manik when he had had a fight with Nandini.

All three of them left silently.

Nandini called back, but found his cell switched off. Already on the brink of tears, she slumped on her bed and holding her pillow close to her she started crying bitterly. She hadn't meant any of what she had said. She had not doubted his love or his commitment, how could she, after all that they had seen and been through together. She was petrified, because it felt like life was playing the same old joke on her one more time. That horrible night, three years ago when she had been happily waiting for him and he never turned up... No matter how hard she tried, she just couldn't flush it out of her system. Time and again it rose in her veins like a dormant volcano, unsettling her and turning the world around her upside down.

Sometimes what we speak is the exact opposite of what we mean, sometimes 'go away' means 'come and hug me please', sometimes 'I am fine' is a silent cry of 'I am lost, take me home', sometimes 'I hate you' stands for 'I have never loved and I will never love anyone more than you' and today Nandini had done the same today. Had Manik been close to her, he would have read it in her eyes. May be that's why she was insisting him to come on skype. If only she could run to him and hug him for dear life.

She quickly typed the message, as tears continued streaming down her cheeks. 'I trust you more than anything or anyone, Manik.. Tell me u know..Tell me you love me...Yes U do, may be everyday, but please say just one more time that you love me..'

'And... have a safe flight...come back soon... I am sorry and I love you dammit.. I wish I could tell you how much.'

Song link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Dnv-nIlwWo

Throughout those two hours on the flight, Manik remained silent. Wearing glares in the dead of the night, he was looking out of the window at the receding skyline of Mumbai as the plane slowly waded into the fluffy clouds. Ranbir didn't know what would work, lame jokes or a matured heart to heart talk . He wanted to cheer Manik up but backed off thinking he needed some space and lone time before the madness of the next day caught up . Navya, on the other hand wanted to speak to Nandini & check if she was ok. She knew, no matter how much these two fought, their love was deep enough to pull them right back to each other.

But both of them silently promised the same thing to themselves .They wouldn't let Manik's efforts go in vain. They would do whatever they could and beyond, to stand by both Manik and Nandini and even if this plan were to fall through, they would find some other way to set things right.

Manik, was not able to take those words out of his mind. Every time her face flashed infront of his eyes, he saw her crying and blaming him. He wasn't sure, what he wanted to do, go and hug her or run away from life. Whatever he was doing, he was doing it for her, for them. How could she not see that, how could she think he was being casual. The girl who could read everyone's emotions, even Alya's, why could she not understand his desperation then. He wanted to switch his mind off, only if it had a power button like his cell.

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

3 hours later when they walked out of the airport in Delhi, the first rays of sunlight were slowly spreading across the dark crimson sky. Manik switched on his phone, with a faint hope that he might have a message from her.

He read through the two message and swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat.

'Landed safely. Take care of yourself and best of luck for your first day in ofc.' He replied.

And then as if he had forgotten something, he sent her another message 'I won't tell you 'I love you', until my actions prove it to you. That's when I will call you next.'

All the way to the hotel Manik was restless while the other two were drowsy. Should he or should he not, he thought and then finally out of desperation he typed a third message 'But may be if you could listen to your own heart, you would know just how much...' and sent it to her.