A/N: Hey there! :D Here's the next update! :D :D
Happy Reading! :D
Ps. This chapter is dedicated to Ash as a small post-birthday present. :D
3rd November, 1996:
I returned back home a week later to see that a lot had changed. A lot would be an understatement. Let's just say that the base of my eight months in this new city trembled violently.
I entered home to see that Ishaani was sitting upon the sofa, flipping through an Enid Blyton book idly. I cleared my throat and just like I'd expected, it caught her attention. Being apart for ten days, I could not describe how ecstatic I was to see Ishaani after what felt like an era. And neither could I hide away the huge smile that crossed my face unconsciously.
But what I hadn't banked upon was Ishaani's reaction.
She walked towards me as though in a slumber, her mind focused upon something behind my back. Her face remained remarkably expressionless and her eyes looked the same to me. I did not understand what exactly she was up to or what was running through her mind, but I had the strangest of feelings that it wasn't looking good for me.
She simply stood in front of me and tilted her head to one side, looking at me questioningly for a considerate amount of time. When her little 'interrogation' came to an end, she simply muttered, "You're back." Those two words stabbed at my heart painfully, a little lump rising in my throat. It effectively replaced the grin upon my face with a frown now. However, I managed to mask my shock remarkably at her cold reception, speaking in a falsely cheerful voice.
"I was just gone for ten days."
Ishaani looked at me blankly and nodded her head curtly, making her way back into towards the sofa. Her frock trailed behind her strut as I followed her, this unceremonious attitude from my only friend highly scalding. I had barely reached where Ishaani stood when Mota Babuji descended from the grand staircase, his eyes instantly catching mine.
He, unlike Ishaani, gave me a radiant smile as he quickened his pace and reached where I stood within a matter of seconds. He instantly took me into his arms and ruffled my hair playfully while I let out a cheerful laugh in spite of myself. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Ishaani watching us with a saddened expression upon her face and I instantly sobered down.
Mota Babuji looked at me happily as he now sat me down, inquiring about my vacations. I narrated everything, telling him that they were brilliant and that I'd had a gala time amidst my loved ones. And I swear I saw Ishaani let go of a tear out of the corner of her eye even though she pretended to get back to reading her book. I shuffled my feet uncomfortably out of distraction and Mota Babuji noticed the crease of worry upon my face instantly. He followed my line of vision that landed upon a now aloof-Ishaani, sighing heavily as he whispered.
"I don't know what the matter with her is. She looked happy enough on Diwali. She's been a little moody since the next day."
I nodded my head in understanding even though I had no clue of what I was supposed to understand. I felt Ishaani let out a sniff before she abruptly walked out of the room, her eyes only upon her sandals. She only stopped briefly to hug Mota Babuji and bid him goodbye and I noticed instantly that she called him 'Papa'. I shared a smile with Mota Babuji as she ascended to her room, he looking a mixture of happy and flustered.
But I still could not put off this new behavious from Ishaani's end and it considerably bugged me. Perhaps Mota Babuji had sensed my irritation for the next moment, he spoke in a significant voice.
"I'm sure you'll figure it out."
I nodded at him solemnly as I felt him hand me over the responsibility of a battle I was now to fare with Ishaani. Not only fare, but emerge victorious as well. I could not fathom what had happened in those ten days that had made Ishaani's attitude towards me so indifferent, but I tried to keep my cool about it. Ishaani and I had fought our way out from a lot of tough spots in our friendship. And after my ragging incident from four months ago, I knew that we had built the foundation of love between us that would never dim away no matter what.
All I needed to do was trust her friendship and her affection for me. I'd made the mistake to remain oblivious to it once and I wouldn't do it again. Whatever it was, we would fight it out together and I would make her get better again, ridding her of all her pains and causes of sadness. This was a mission felt ready to embark upon by the time I reached outside her room in the next few minutes.
I wondered whether I was ready for this assault but I decided that it was not the time to think about it. I knocked at her door and wait for a response, but none came. I could sense footsteps on the other side of the door and a bated restlessness, but instinct told me to remain silent. I felt her standing on the other side of the door, listening to the numerous times I called out her name, hesitating and caught between despair and hope. I did not know whether to enter her room or simply leave her alone but in the end, I decided on the latter.
I had barely walked away from the room when I heard the lock click. The door opened uselessly but Ishaani didn't leave it. Taking it as a sign that she had granted me permission, I entered the room and saw Ishaani standing by the window. She was staring at the garden, lost in a reverie. Sighing, I closed the door and stood by the doorpost uncomfortably, waiting for Ishaani to speak first.
She didn't initiate any conversation. She only kept staring away at the garden overlooking the rear of the mansion. The room's silence could easily be described as the one of a calm before the storm approached. And I could sense the storm approaching swiftly, ready to wash the two of us away the moment it befell us. I felt considerably conflicted on whether or not should I initiate the first round on conversation until the silence became too much to bear. I cleared my throat and asked her softly.
"How were your vacations?"
Silence.
She didn't bother to reply back and I stood resolutely by the doorpost, as though guarding the secrecy of our conversation. When I knew that she would no longer answer my question after keeping mum for fifteen whole minutes, I tried asking another one.
"Since when did you start calling him Papa?"
The silence still prevailed.
I felt the defensive mode leave me, getting replaced with a bubbling unease upon my friend's silence. I tried to ask another question, hoping that she would reply atleast this time.
"What's wrong, Ishaani?"
The question finally caught her attention. Or rather, it broke her trance. She turned her face away from the window and finally looked at me. There was an undecipherable look on her face as she sleepwalked towards me in the same hypnosis, until we stood inches away from each other. She looked at me straight in the eye and spoke silently.
"Mum is pregnant."
I did not know what to make of the entire scenario. It was awkward enough that she was telling me something as private as this, but the sadness on her face was at odds with what I knew was always her secret desire - to have a sibling of her own. She had never told me this directly, but I noticed it in all her drawings; she always had a younger sibling. Yet somehow, her reaction to the whole thing did not feel right. It was as though I was fighting this war in the wrong direction, or rather, I was trying to read through a haphazardly-pieced puzzle.
I realized though that my aim about striking a conversation with Ishaani had been fulfilled. She finally went and sat by the edge of the bed, looking at me for the first time with what I instantly recognized were fear-laden eyes. I walked right up to where she sat, kneeling down so that our gaze met. She retracted her gaze away instinctively.
"Isn't that supposed to be a good thing?" I asked, seeing her eyes tearing up.
She looked away, refusing to meet eyes again. Her only response was her shaking her head, the first two tears making their way down from her sparkling coal eyes. And like always, my heart felt tortured with the sight of her tears. I pulled her hand in my own, taking it as a good sign that she didn't throw it away. After a few minutes, she spoke in a low voice:
"The baby be Papa's real blood. Real. His true family. He won't love me once the baby is born. Nobody will," she added rather vehemently, bursting into a fit of tears.
I was seized by the crazy urge to pull her into my arms but my mother's words rung eerily in my mind, and I threw aside that emotion. I felt restless for I could neither stop myself from being tortured with her pain, not could I provide her with any consolation. The only thing I could let her do was cry, since I found myself tongue-tied and incapable of speaking anything.
Ishaani didn't stop crying for two hours straight, by which time I'd almost forgotten the purpose of what had even pushed her off the edge in the first place. And that's where I made my first error. I asked her gently why she conceived of such a thought in the first place. And with that I had awakened a demon within her. She sprung up from the bed so suddenly that I lost my balance and fell on my back crudely. She paced around the room in what I very soon realized was an insane fit of rage before she threw the first vase from the stand in front of her.
It broke with a resounding crash by the time I could spring upon my feet, alarmed at what she was up to. I ran up to her, leaving all my inhibitions of our proximity and social status behind and caught hold of her shoulders roughly. She pushed me away this time and sought to break another glass vase beside us. Unfortunately, she did so quite successfully.
She pulled the glass vase away from its position mercilessly just as I stepped in to break its fall. And as fate could have it, the vase first made brutal contact with my hand, shattering into pieces instantly. It ruptured the skin of my hand where several shards now sat evilly, blood poruing out almost instantly. Post the first contact, the remaining pieces of the vase still continued its relentless fall to the ground until they finally smashed into smithereens.
Ishaani remained oblivious to all of this, storming off to the other end of the room by the time I could so much as take a painful gasp. She fell to her knees, suddenly hugging herself as she pulled her knees up to her chest, and began to cry unabashedly. I quickly held my hand behind his back, trying not to notice the blood drops that were already falling upon the clear, white tiles of the room. Instead, I walked up to her and sat beside her again, mentally thanking my stars that it was my left hand that was injured.
I put my uninjured arm upon her shoulder and it sagged underneath the weight of my gently-put palm. I shook my head as I felt the storm overhead upon us, my heart swirling in a mist of apprehension and misgiving. In that moment, I was certain that either one of us were about to break - or if my trepidation was fruitful, both of us would be left broken by the end of this conversation. And I was correct.
I asked Ishaani to share all of her pain with me, giving her the assurance that whatever was wrong, we would sort it out together. I had a very ominous feeling in the depths of my heart, and when Ishaani finally met eyes with me, I knew that my world had been destroyed. Even before she could say the words, I felt myself falling away from a cliff that was somewhere distantly connected to my dreams.
"You are not my friend."
Constructive criticism will be more than welcome and sorry for any typos! :D :D
Next chapter:
Interlude 1
Bade Achche Lagte Hain Naya Season
Bigg Boss 19
Real Estate
