**Replies begin from page 64.31. On The Outside
Later that evening, I returned home with a tired mind. I was mentally tired not because I had spent my whole time thinking something but because I had spent my time trying to fight thinking it as long as I was around people who would need my attention. Now that I was alone in the serene silence of my apartment, I let my mind tread the path it had been trying to since the meeting at ARK.
I slouched on the couch and stared at the ceiling as my thoughts wandered to what I had seen today. I had always believed that change was constant as well as inevitable, that everything in this world changed, but I had never really stopped to give a thought to how much that change could affect anyone. It was only now, after I had experienced the shock of the enormity of a change that I thought about it.
Agreed, people changed with time, things changed, situations changed. I had changed with time too, I knew it. But how could a person lose the basic personality traits? How could they transform into the opposite of what they used to be? How was it humanly possible?
My mind took me back to the times I had seen him run away from Jess, the way he'd fled to his room after he had fallen on her, the way he had desperately tried to escape being in her proximity when we were on the trip and I had helped him. Replaying in my mind the way I saw Maan behave with her in the office, I could not help but be pulled into the shock of it again. There was such a vast difference in the Maan he was and the one he had become now.
But then I had seen him flirt with other girls, my brain reminded me, and I had accepted his change to a great degree as well. Then why was it that seeing him act just the same way with Jess left me stupefied? I knew the answer to it. I had accepted that he had changed superficially but he still carried most of his personality traits on the inside, that the basic likes and dislikes were still the same. Pasta was still there at least, I smiled slightly as I thought.
The reality which had laid itself in front of me was different though. Maan had changed. He had transformed to someone I did not know. I recalled my annoyance after the initial shock at his behaviour. If I, who had not witnessed the transformation, reacted like that, then how were Aunty and others coping up with it? How could they accept and be casual about such a change? Had they not seen the change taking place since it happened in front of their eyes? Was it too gradual for them to notice or was it so apparent to me because I had a fixed figure in my mind?
I needed answers. I needed to know if I was the only one unable to stomach the transformed Maan. But who should I go to? Aunty was certainly not the best option. I couldn't go and ask her about her son. G was not in the list either because she would make a mountain out of a molehill. Anaya? I shook my head. She could not keep her mouth shut at times and if I asked her this, she might blurt it out in front of someone and I did not want that.
My phone came to life, pulling me out of the maze of my thoughts. Since I was almost lying on the couch, I reached over my head to pick my phone from the coffee table. The name flashing on the screen gave the answer to me about who I should question.
"Ayush!" I greeted him as I put the phone to my ear.
"Hey Geet! Where are you these days? No calls, no messages!" He complained in a single breath.
"Just a little work load these days..." I answered slowly, wondering whether to ask him or not.
"Right. All work and no play makes Geet a boring woman!" He chuckled at his own joke. "Anaya is unhappy that you don't seem to miss us. You'll have to make it up to her." He informed me in his usual light manner which made me smile slightly.
"I will, of course! How about we meet one of these days?" I suggested.
"Brilliant idea!" His tone was heavily sarcastic. "I call you and you say we meet. I don't call you and we don't know each other! Good strategy!"
"Come on, Ayush!" I tried to pacify him. "I told you I've been busy. Tell me how to make up for not staying in touch."
"Come over and spend the evening with us tomorrow." He said nonchalantly.
I smiled a little. "That's not too hard."
"The whole evening. Until dinner." He warned me. "I would rather tell you to spend the whole day with us." I opened my mouth to protest but he didn't give me a chance. "But I wouldn't want your oh-so-important work to suffer, so come straight here after work and stay till dinner. Maybe even stay the night with us." He added as an afterthought.
"No, not the night but I'll be there at your doorstep as soon as I get off work." I said casually and heard him say a little "yay" in response. "Good that we'll meet tomorrow. I want to ask something from you." I added in a murmur.
"What's wrong?" He immediately detected the seriousness in my tone.
"I was just thinking," I began slowly, "how it is possible for someone to change to an unrecognisable degree. He doesn't seem to be the person I knew him to be..." My voice lowered until it disappeared completely.
"What are you talking about?" He asked after a pause. "And who is he?"
In reply, I narrated to him the entire episode of my meeting at ARK and how I felt after it. He fell silent for a few seconds.
"Don't worry your mind over it." He said softly.
"But I want to know." I protested.
"You're coming here tomorrow, aren't you?" He reminded me. "It's better that we talk this over in person."
I agreed with him and hung up after promising him I would be there the next day.
It was early evening when I reached Anaya and Ayush's house the next day. I was welcomed with Anaya's fake anger which melted as soon as I pulled her cheeks and called her cute. Yana and Shay, who were playing with some blocks at the time, saw me and their faces lit up. The shy little girl that Yana was, she showed her baby teeth as she smiled but made no move to come to me. Shay, on the other hand, got up and ran towards me, tripping over a block on the way and started crying loudly.
"Aww! My baby!" I quickly picked him up in my arms and patted his back. Anaya came in after locking the door and inquired just as Ayush poked his head from the kitchen. "My baby was coming to meet his maasi when the bad block came in his way!" I spoke in a baby tone, keeping my eyes on Shay as I informed his parents. In the same baby tone, I asked Shay where the bad block had hurt him. His crying lessened as he pointed towards his palms and then at his knees. I kissed his palms and rubbed his knees. "Choo! It's all gone!" I blew on my palm and smiled at him which made him chortle. "There, there!" I said as I kneeled on the floor and made him stand. "You're a big boy like papa, aren't you?" When he nodded enthusiastically, I continued. "And papa doesn't cry, does he?" He shook his head. "So our big boy Shay won't cry either." I encouraged him and he smiled before getting distracted with the distorted figure Yana had erected with her blocks.
"What was big boy doing in the kitchen, by the way?" I asked Ayush as I stood up to greet him. "Helping dear wifey cook dinner?" I joked as I wriggled my eyebrows.
"Humph!" Anaya snorted. "Helping in the kitchen and Ayush? Puh-leez Geet! All he can do in the kitchen is create a mess for me or eat the choc-" She broke off and immediately looked at Ayush with suspicious eyes, her body stiffening. "Don't you say you ate the chocolates I brought to decorate the cake."
Ayush grinned sheepishly in response, showing his chocolatey teeth, which made me chuckle and Anaya stomped her way into the kitchen, complaining about Ayush's habit of not leaving a single chocolate in the fridge.
Since Ayush was off from work for the day, Anaya had left the kids in his supervision as she did chores around the house. Ayush and I sat with the twins as they played. He quickly pulled his daughter into his lap and started helping her build something while I assisted Shay. Ayush and I conversed about inconsequential things concerning each other's life amidst the excited squeals of Yana and Shay as we built one thing after another from their blocks. Anaya was finishing up in the kitchen and the next task on her list was to take the twins to the nearby park.
It was a routine for the family to make an outing to the park every alternate evening after Ayush came back from work, I found out. The park was only a block away so we walked as the hyperactive twins led the way. Ayush had to call out to them again and again to stay with us while we walked in a normal pace as Anaya and I chatted.
The park was no fancy place with a pair of swings, a slide, a couple of see-saws and a monkey climb, but it provided a nice recreational place for children like Yana and Shay who seemed eager to try every ride at once. At first, Anaya ran after them alone while Ayush just stood at a distance and watched but when she called him out, he quickly made his way to her and took charge of Shay, who was getting a little hard for her to take care of with his energy. I sat on a bench and talked with Raya over the phone as I watched the hands-on parents enjoy with their children until they reached the swing and Anaya waved at me to call me.
"Can you take charge of my little girl until I get some chocolates from that shop?" She asked me when I reached where she was standing. "Courtesy Ayush, I will need to get more chocolates for today's dessert." She glared at Ayush while explaining, who made a puppy face as he gave a little push to the swing Shay was sitting on.
"Sure, Anaya." I came to stand behind Yana and slightly pushed her swing. "Go recover your loss." I chuckled and with another look at her husband, she trotted off towards the little shop I could see just at the corner.
"You shouldn't trouble her so much." I said to Ayush once Anaya was out of hearing range.
"What? I just ate a few chocolates! I didn't trouble her." He became defensive.
"And when are you going to control your weakness for chocolates? It's your children's turn to develop that weakness now." I laughed lightly.
"That is exactly why I won't stop eating chocolates." I looked at him in question. "See, if my kids eat a lot of chocolates, they'll get cavities, and they'll be in pain. So I'm saving them from this pain-"
"By eating all chocolates yourself. Right." I snorted as I cut him off and he shrugged. "You're crazy!" I laughed and he grinned as he winked. "Still the same kid from college!"
My own words reminded me a little of the questions I had to ask, pushing us both into a little silence before he spoke.
"You met him at the office of ARK?" He enquired casually and I nodded. "Did you know he was going to be there?"
"No. I was very surprised. I didn't know he had any company other than Khurana Constructions, and to be frank, I hadn't been paying much attention to the paperwork which was handled by our MD." I confessed honestly. "But I think it wasn't mentioned in the papers, because Vyan knows Maan and he would have mentioned it to me if he had any inkling of ARK being Maan's company."
"Do you know the full form of ARK?" His question took me by surprise.
"No. I checked it in the documents but it was not stated anywhere." I frowned.
"That's because Maan wants the company to have its own identity rather than being known as another firm with Khurana ownership." He explained with his eyes on Shay, who was laughing as his father pushed the swing. "Ameerah Ranbir Khurana. ARK."
I opened my mouth to say something at this new piece of information but then closed it, not knowing what to say. "Why did that not occur to me?"
"Because you're a dumb-head!" Ayush laughed before turning back to the topic. "Maan loves his niece a lot and so he has always been working towards securing her future, even though Ranbir had faith in Khurana Constructions and its ability to do enough for his daughter."
Before I could respond in any way, we heard Anaya's voice from the side as she announced that we should leave. I laughed when she was about to put the packet of chocolates in Ayush's hand but pulled away at the last minute, leaving him pouting.
By the time we reached back home, the sun had already set and Anaya bustled about setting the dinner table. I helped her while Ayush looked after the kids.
Dinner was a loud and talkative affair as Anaya tried to feed her mumbling kids as well as herself as she kept a string of conversation with me and Ayush.
"Alright, children!" She wiped both the kids' mouths and got up, helping them get off the chairs too. "Time for bed. Give Papa and Maasi a good night kissie and we're going to sleep."
Yana and Shay obliged their mother and quickly came to peck my and Ayush's cheeks one by one. The gesture made me smile and I gave them both a kiss in return before they ran in the room.
"You two brother and sister talk. I'll be back." She smiled at me and looked at Ayush. I felt a silent communication pass between them before she went to the room and closed the door.
"Geet." Ayush called after a few seconds of silence passed with the only sound being the game show which was playing on the television. "Don't you want your answers?"
I kept my eyes trained on my plate. "I do, Ayush. I want to know everything I have missed in his life." He lifted his eyes to me. "I mean, everything that led him to where he is now. I suppose I should not be asking why he changed, but I do want to know when and how it happened. Didn't anyone notice such a big change in him?"
He stayed silent for a few dragging seconds.
"It wasn't easy for any of us, you know." He sighed. "None of us could really believe the way Maan had changed." I looked up at him to see a forlorn expression. "I have known him since high school. I have seen him change through those stages of a boy to a man, I have seen his boyishness transform into maturity after his father's sudden death. But it wasn't as big a change as the one which has you upset." He looked at me then. "You want to know how I, Anaya, his mother and everyone else can take the change with such ease, don't you?"
I nodded slowly. "I cannot understand this. I can't even understand how he changed so much, for crying out loud! Was it because I..." I trailed off.
"Left him." He completed for me and then let out a humourless chuckle. "Shouldn't it be obvious to you, of all people, Geet?" He looked at me with accusation which made me dip my eyes in guilt. A little silence stretched between us. I snuck a glance at Ayush to see him clenching and unclenching his teeth. When he suddenly turned his head towards me, I could see a suppressed anger in his eyes. "I have to ask this from you." I lowered my eyes again. "I want to know why you left Maan. How could you break his heart? Why?"
I swallowed but did not say anything, which made Ayush's questioning a bit more forceful. "How could you, Geet? How could you be so heartless to give such hurt to an amazing person like Maan? What explanation do you have for it?"
"I... I..."
"No, Geet. I do not believe there could be a logical reason for you to refuse his love."
"I was a coward, Ayush. I was... I didn't have the courage to hold his hand... I believed I did not feel for him the way he did for me..."
Ayush looked at me with incredulity. "Did not feel the same way? Are you crazy?" His voice went a notch higher but he controlled himself and looked away. "I don't believe this!"
His words did it and the tears I had been holding back since the beginning of this conversation began to slip down my cheeks. "I know!" I cried out and covered my face with my hands. "I know I... I have wronged him, and you have no idea how hard the decision was for me, how... how... what I felt... what I went through to make that decision. You don't know, Ayush..."
He was quiet after that while I let the tears flow. I had not talked to anyone about it, not even with Raya, who I had always dodged whenever she approached this topic. I knew I would not be able to hold the tears back if I had talked to anyone, and so it had happened now. Not a word passed between us until I composed myself and wiped my tears. "You will never know, Ayush, how heavy my heart feels whenever I recall that time."
He did not respond, but I knew his anger had subsided when he patted comfortingly on my shoulder.
"The day you left," Ayush began in a neutral tone after a prolonged silence, "Maan was... he was... he was out for the day..." I could figure out that Ayush was either withholding the details or altering them, before he took a deep breath and looked straight in my eyes. "Look Geet, there are some things which I feel I have no right to tell you until Maan decides to do so himself. It would be fair if he told you everything himself."
I sighed. "That's alright, Ayush. I understand if you don't want to tell anything."
"No," he said, "I will give you the answers you need for now." I nodded.
"When you left, he was very ill for a whole week. He had a high fever which didn't reduce for a while even with all the remedies Aunty tried over him. We were all worried for him since the medicines weren't very effective and he wouldn't talk much with anyone."
"His fever started to lessen after another week and we could see life returning into him as he sometimes took note of the people around him." I let out a silent breath of relief. "But he was still nowhere close to being himself. He would remain quiet, locked up in his room, generally indifferent to everything and everyone around him. His aloofness pinched us all and we tried in our own ways to keep him occupied. But it hardly worked. He would answer if anyone talked to him directly but otherwise, he kept away. I was bottling my emotions up in front of him when all I wanted to do was either slap him awake or cry whenever I saw him. The same was the situation with everyone else, especially his mother. It was on one of his grey days when Aunty broke down in front of him. I was there too." His voice came out in a low mumble. "She cried and shook him up. When he saw Aunty's tears, he reacted. He reached out to wipe them and hug her. It was the first thing he had done without anyone else prompting. At that moment, Aunty made him promise not to ruin his life for anything." I bit back the tears which were threatening to spring out of my eyes when Ayush suddenly looked at me, having collected himself from the emotional moment he was recalling.
"Aunty told him life is too short to live in remorse over what's gone. We must live for the present, not for the past, which cannot be changed and not for tomorrow, which we don't know a single thing about. Live for today and live fully. Enjoy, laugh, party hard, be a good human being, so that when you put your head on the pillow at the end of the day, you feel a sense of fulfilment instead of incompleteness. If you have really wanted something and failed to get it, be sure that life has much better in store for you. Maybe not what you desire but what you deserve. Until you get what you deserve, don't miss out on the little pleasures life bestows on you."
Every word uttered out of Ayush's mouth was like heavy lead being dropped onto my shoulders. It made me feel like a wrongdoer. It made want to go back in time and erase all the pain which was unquestionably caused by me. I quickly composed myself and asked in a small voice if that was what changed Maan.
"No. That did not change him. That just began to bring his real self back to us. He was alive and that was what we all were happy with."
"Then when..." I frowned in confusion.
"It was gradual." He answered the question I hadn't formulated completely. "I slowly noticed a more open, a more outgoing outlook developing in him. He would party and enjoy, take the flirting girls around him did in good humour and even flirted back, unlike the way he would run away from them since I knew him."
I could feel a small scowl forming on my forehead as he continued. "I did not notice it at first but it slowly started to become prominent. It worried me a little. I was happy with his optimistic approach towards life but whenever I compared his new self with the old one, it would make me worry over his mental condition. He did not want to talk about you or anything that led him to the condition he was just getting out of. I did not want him to suppress anything behind that extravagant facade. I talked with Aunty about it and she had the same worries as me. But she pointed to me what I couldn't see. She told me that it was only his view towards other people which had changed, not his attitude towards those he felt close to. He was still the same Maan for all of us. He would still enjoy being with us, laugh with us, care for his friends and family. The only difference was that he was more open, more expressive than he had been before."
I was starting to get their viewpoint. In awe of the new Maan, I had failed to notice how he was with his mother, his brother and Bhabi, with his niece and his friends, but now that I recalled the cruise holiday, I was in agreement with the opinion that he had retained some of his old traits after all. One question still bothered me, though.
"How could he behave like that with Jess? He used to be so annoyed with her..."
Ayush shrugged. "Like I have said, his behaviour changed for the world, for people he did not have any ties with, for outsiders and Jess is as much an outsider for him as any other girl he goes around with." He explained in a matter-of-factly manner just as Anaya exited the room, informing that the twins had slept.
It was true. His behaviour had changed with outsiders. And I was an outsider for him now.
Edited by mayyo - 9 years ago
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