Epilogue: Suresh vs. Fangurls
"Congratulations, Pragya, oops, Dr. Pragya Mehra", Suresh handed over a bouquet of assorted flowers.
"Thank you very much, Suresh. This is really beautiful", I admired the flowers.
"By the way, I read your dissertation. Your take on Leon Festinger's dissonance theory opens up an entirely new perspective. Prof. Sriram told me you wanted to publish this in Trends in cognitive sciences journal. All the best", Suresh expressed his appreciation of my Ph.D. work.
"Thank you, Suresh. It would be great if you could read my manuscript and give me your comments before I submit", I requested.
"Sure, Pragya. Send it to me by email", said Suresh.
"Chashmish", I realized Abhi was standing right next to me.
"Yes, Abhishek?", I turned to him.
"Have you seen Aarav's brown T-rex? He is throwing a big tantrum with Daadi for it. I am searching for it for the last 10 minutes but can't find it", Abhi complained about our three year old.
"Yeah Abhishek, I found Daadi looking for it and told her where it is. It was in the bathtub. Look he is already playing with it", I pointed to Aarav sitting with Daadi and playing with his favorite dinosaur toy.
"How do you keep track of everything? You are just awesome, Chashmish", Abhi almost squeezed me in a side hug kissing my cheek. I felt a bit uncomfortable since Suresh was right in front of us and was looking away..
"Abhishek, did you meet Suresh?", I tried to make it comfortable for Suresh.
"Oh, right! Hi Suresh, how are you doing?", Abhi let me go and extended his hand to Suresh for a handshake.
"Hello Abhi. It's a huge party", Suresh said as he looked around.
"Of course, when Chashmish turns Dr. Pragya Mehra, it's celebration time", Abhi beamed. Right then Aarav came running to Abhi with a complaint about his dinosaur toy not talking and Abhi picked him up in his arms listening to his grievance.
"Hehee, Chashmish...Pragya, I didn't know you are called Chashmish. But you are not even wearing glasses today. By the way, I almost didn't recognize you. You look something else today", Suresh stated.
"Just wore contact lenses", I said quickly not wanting to explain myself to Suresh about my look.
But I couldn't help thinking and almost laughing in my head about how Suresh would react if he learns of the nickname Abhi has for him, double battery.
The thing was Abhi had a notorious habit of nicknaming people. But then he would be so hilarious and endearing with his names that one would get used to them- not that he stopped using those names no matter who thought what. In my case, I adored him calling me Chashmish, and I rather felt strange when he took my actual name. Whenever he called me Pragya it meant anger or trouble. I wondered what prompted Abhi to name Suresh as double battery. It could have been due to Suresh presenting himself as this rigid and scholarly person. But I was sure Suresh would be offended with his nickname and I hoped he never gets to know.
Talking of Suresh, he was our neighbor from Pune, who had studied psychology and I used to take his help for my studies. He now worked at the same institute in Mumbai where I attained my doctoral degree with Prof. Sriram. He had done quite well as a researcher in psychology and he helped me a lot with my research. While we were in Pune, Bulbul tried to set us up thinking we were similar people. It was nothing but awkward for us, and we got nowhere with it. The reality I didn't know at that time was I had Abhi in my destiny. Who would have imagined I would find love with a person like Abhi when I had believed finding love itself was a remote possibility.
And the transformation in looks that Suresh had just noticed had been because of being Abhi's wife too. I still wore simple salwar kameezes or sarees to work along with my glasses. But living with Abhi as his wife demanded that I dress up glamorously especially when I attended parties and events with him. I was unenthusiastic to dress up initially given I never believed I could carry off such looks. However, Abhi's designer Andy had helped me out to discover myself and it often won me more than a complement from Abhi too. Since today was a party Abhi organizing for the completion of my doctorate degree, I had worn a green saree with a golden sleeveless blouse specially designed for me. No wonder Suresh couldn't recognize me for I wore contacts, straightened my hair and put quite a bit of make up too. And knowing Suresh, I was sure he had never seen my pictures with Abhi in award ceremonies to have an idea that I could look this way too.
"Mumma, come we have to cut the cake", Aarav pulled my pallu and I saw that my family was waiting for me to cut the cake. Abhi had ordered a cake with Dr. Pragya Mehra written on it. I cut the cake with Aarav and fed the first bite to Abhi. Later the dinner started and I fed Aarav with great difficulty as he seemed to have filled his stomach with snacks and cake. After that some guests started leaving, Abhishek and I went around sending them off. I then noticed that Suresh was standing alone, all by himself, admiring our antique cocktail table. Prof. Sriram and my other colleagues seemed to have left already. Since Suresh was my guest I felt the need to talk to him. As soon as he saw me, he started talking about my research work again.
"It's like talking to a different person, Pragya. I told you, you really look so different. Is it really you?", Suresh commented in the middle of a serious conversation about my research.
"Do I look so awful, Suresh?", I joked.
"No No, you look very pretty, very nice, really good you know", Suresh said nervously.
"May I take my pretty wife with me for a dance?", I felt Abhi's arm sliding on my almost bare back and encircling my waist.
"Actually, I was going to take your leave, Pragya. Sorry, Dr. Pragya Mehra. Congratulations again", Suresh said, shaking hands with Abhi and me.
"You don't want to dance, Suresh?", Abhi asked despite having an idea Suresh wouldn't dance.
"No, no, you guys carry on. Bye Pragya", said Suresh and left.
"Abhishek, I was trying to keep him entertained. You know he wouldn't dance and all, he was just standing there alone, may be feeling out of place", I said as Abhi walked me to the make shift dance floor in our living room.
Abhi did not reply to me but put his arms around my waist, starting to sway to the music.
"Abhishek I said something", I placed my hands on Abhi's chest. He still didn't reply to me but pulled me closer.
"I am talking to you and you...", I hitched as his fingers dug into my waist.
"Abhishek, what are you doing? We are in the middle of a party", I reminded him.
"Then come with me", Abhi whispered in my ear.
"To where?", I asked as I could not understand what he meant.
"To our room", he said looking intensely into my eyes while his fingers danced on my back. "I need you, right now", he huffed pulling me even closer.
I flustered at the realization of what he wanted but also remembered that we still had a party finishing; "I need to put Aarav to sleep", I reminded him.
"Daadi took him already to put him to sleep", Abhi replied. I was surprised since Abhi always argued that Aarav would wake up in the middle of the nights and interrupt Daadi's sleep and hence he hardly allowed him to sleep with her. Aarav often slept with us in our room although I tried to develop a habit for him to sleep in his specially designed room, sometimes.
"What about the party?", I put my next concern up.
"Just come with me", Abhi held my hand and pulled me along with him to walk upstairs to our room.
As soon as we reached the room, he took off his jacket and closed the door behind us. I was annoyed at his behaviour to abandon the party like this and I wanted to call him on that.
"Abhishek, what is wrong with you? We have a party going on downstairs", I complained but he had no answer.
He walked towards me and I walked backwards until I hit our closet door.
"You dress up like this and expect me to be right?", Abhi's hand moved up my hand gripping my bare arm, as his mouth nipped at my cheek.
"Dress up?", I said with a fastened breath, yet wondering what he was talking about, for he had seen me in much more revealing clothes, well, he had seen it all.
He suddenly turned me around having my back face him. "Like this", he moved his lips down my neck, along my back that my blouse hardly covered. I shivered when his teeth tug at the strings that held my blouse together at the top.
He undid the tie of the strings and came to whisper in my ear, "tell me all this is for me". He released the lonely hook of my blouse and nibbled at my ear lobe.
"Ohh God", I squirmed as his hand made its way through the loosened blouse to my breasts and fondled them. I arched my neck leaning to him as I already was melting into him. It had been almost a decade of togetherness with him and yet his proximity slayed me every time.
"Tell me, Chashmish", he still was deliciously moving his lips and whispering in my ear and I had forgotten what he wanted me to say. I turned around and held his face to crash my lips on his and he was kissing me back immediately, with utmost intensity. There was nothing like being kissed by my husband and I felt myself drowning in his kiss, like always.
Without stopping kissing, Abhi was peeling off my clothes haphazardly. I only had realized that when his fingers probed my entrance, making me lose my balance. Sandwiched between the cold door of the closet and his hot body, I clung to him to steady myself.
"Baby, you didn't answer me", Abhishek breathed into my mouth as I tried to wrap my leg around him, trying to get closer to him, unable to bear the bait of pleasure he was leading me with.
I tried to think for a moment what question he had asked me to answer but then he inserted his damned fingers deep in me and I lost balance with my pointed heels betraying me.
But he was there to hold me and he moved me quickly to the sofa by our side. Laying me on my back he licked his glistening fingers to say "sooo wet for me but you don't want to say it".
"Oh God, Abhishek, please come here", I tried pulled him to me, as I felt like exploding seeing what he did. But he moved away and stood up to take off his tee shirt and undid his belt, having me drool at his glorious form. As he got himself naked, I couldn't help pulling him on the top of me and kiss him.
He started to kiss me down my body. He kissed along my mangalsutra, the precious jewel I never removed or let him remove while he loved to free me off of any accessory I wore. He was paying special attention to the known vulnerable spots to get me worked up to the point of desperation. He started to tease me with his tongue where I was throbbing the most but he would stop when I would be just so ready to let it go.
"Abhishek please, for God's sake..", I tried to get up while he tried to push me back to lie on my back. In our little tussle, we rolled down to the floor. But he quickly came on top of me and kissed my lips maintaining the passion. He teased my breasts with his teeth and trailed kisses along my thigh holding my still heeled leg up his shoulder but not proceeding further.
"Abhishek.. please.. don't do this to me..please", I pleaded.
"What do you want me to do?", he asked moving his hand on my inner thighs.
"You know what I want", I felt like I wanted to cry in need.
"I don't really know, say it", he said biting his lips.
"I want you", I whispered.
"I didn't hear you", he said breathing heavily.
"Oh My God Abhishek, I just want you, please make me yours", I begged.
"You are mine?", he asked brushing my cheek with his fingers.
"Of course, is there a doubt?", I said kissing his fingers.
"Mine always?", he now came on top of me again and held my face.
"Forever", I said kissing his lips feeling I would die in my craving for him.
"I love you", he said finally penetrating me in one slick move.
I felt as if I saw stars for a moment and it didn't take much long at all for him to take us to our love heaven that belonged to just the two of us and where we forgot ourselves in each other.
After we relaxed silently in the bliss of each other arms, I felt cold air hitting me when he slid off of me to lie on my side. I realized we were on the floor and I also thought about the party that we left in between. I got up quickly, asking him to dress up but he told me that the party would be done by now. I dressed myself in a salwar kameez and went out to see that the party had ended indeed and the family members had settled to their rooms. I checked on Daadi's room and heard her telling Aarav a story and hoped he would go to sleep soon.
I came back to our room to see Abhi now lying on the bed checking his phone.
"Come, sleep, Chashmish", Abhi said lazily as I was walking around picking our clothes that were all over the place.
"You were so mean, Abhishek. What WAS that?", I asked him about the unusual lovemaking that happened a few minutes ago.
"Did Dr. Pragya Mehra not enjoy it?", Abhi chuckled making me blush but I poked my tongue at him.
"I don't want to call you Dr. Pragya Mehra, that double battery was calling you that na? But how dare he question you on me calling you Chashmish?", Abhi oddly reminded me about Suresh. While I thought about why he was talking of Suresh now, he continued to say "the way he was looking at you head to toe, I wanted to just take his eye balls out and then he would not be able to see even using a dozen batteries".
"Abhishek, what are you talking about? About Suresh... why would you say such stuff?", I had to admit I was shocked at his words.
"Come here", Abhi pulled me to the bed and I got inside the blanket settling my head on his chest. I knew this was going to be one of our serious conversations that happen after a session of love making.
"I don't like how he looks at you, how he talks with you", Abhi complained like a child.
"Oh this is why you were... wait! What are you trying to say? What made you say all this", I raised my head to look at Abhi.
"Didn't you notice how he was commenting on your looks, on this, that, having a long conversation about some theory to impress you?", Abhi muttered.
"You are totally taking it wrong. He just always talks about research. You know he is one of those nerdy people who know nothing other than books and theories. I am also a little like that na, so he talks with me such stuff. And he has never seen me dressed like this, so he was shocked, I think. But whatever he thinks, why are you worked up about him?", I asked Abhi making him face me.
"I told you, I just don't like him. I just can't stand him around you", Abhi grumbled.
"Abhishek, why would you care at all? First of all I don't believe he has any emotions like that for me. He is just a different kind of person. And secondly, even if he has something, do you think I will ever entertain anything like that? Thirdly, why would you be worked up? Is he a threat to you in anyway?", I reasoned.
"Well I can't talk psychology to you for hours. I have forgotten everything I read in college", Abhi still argued.
"So what? Is that important? Okay tell me this, you are making a big deal out of this, but what about you dancing with so many hot and beautiful girls? What about that Tannu who never leaves a chance to perform with you? What about ad shoots with those skinny long legged girls who don't even wear 10 inches of clothes...", I retorted.
"Hey you know that's just my job", Abhi tried to defend.
"Job? What job? Does it end when you come home? You get random phone calls from your fan girls. They surround you, hug you, kiss you in airports, malls, holiday, wherever we go, that too in front of me. They even write love letters to you and hate messages for me on social websites. They want to marry you. They have your posters all over their rooms..Do you even know what and all they imagine doing with you..eww.. I just feel like strangling them all sometimes. Do you even think about how I feel?", I took all the bitterness I had in me for his fan girls out at once.
"Chashmish, hold on... they are just fans. They love me. You can't talk like that about them", Abhi was defensive of his fans.
"Yes, but think about this. Here we have a poor professor double battery of a Suresh and you get worked up just because he looked at me. And you expect me to deal with 1000s of omnipresent fan girls and even some fan boys. Next time you want to complain about Suresh, think about how I deal with all these women, especially those heroines and models of yours who cling to you like glue", I further took out all my frustration about seeing him with other women.
"Oh my Chashmish, I would worry for them next time you are around them", Abhi joked making me feel angry. I looked away scrunching my nose.
"Sorry", Abhi said turning my face towards him.
"On a serious note, tell me how do you deal with them, Chashmish?", Abhi asked innocently.
"Well I think that no matter whoever you are working with, you will come back to me for the night, and you will sleep in my arms. I meant that leap of faith I took when you asked me to marry you. I just have learnt to go by that", I said caressing his cheek.
"Aww, Chashmish, I love you", he said hugging me.
"And you don't have to worry about that double battery friend of yours. He is going to US for a research project next month. He may just get settled there. And I would be a crazy lunatic if I let go this hot mess for anything in the world", I said running my hand along his torso.
"Oh GRREATTT!! I will sponsor his tickets", Abhi said holding me tighter and I continued to say "but I am mad at you for another thing. What if I conceive our second baby today?".
"Second one? Ahaa, great na, we were thinking of it anyway after you finished your doctorate", he said happily.
"But I didn't want to make our baby on the floor. We made Aarav in the bathtub, remember?", I complained.
"I don't know how you concluded we made him in the bathroom", Abhi argued as he always did on this matter.
"Well I have told you, you were away for two days before that and you fought with me and didn't do anything for two days after that. So it must have been that bathroom one", I explained again.
"Alright, we can do it again now, so that it doesn't have to be from that floor one. I am leaving to London tomorrow na, so we better do it again, in any way you like", he said nuzzling my neck.
"That means I can use you now as I wish?", I ran my finger on his lips.
"Of course, by all means", Abhi bit my finger.
As I leaned to kiss him we heard a knock on the door.
"Hmm, here comes your prince", said Abhi getting out of the bed to open the door.
"Sorry beta, I told him a dozen stories. He heard them all and then insisted he wants to sleep with his mumma and daddy. He doesn't listen to me at all", Daadi said with a sleepy yet stubborn Aarav in her arms, as I sat on the bed.
"It's okay Daadi. He will sleep with us", Abhi picked Aarav in his arms, kissed Daadi on her forehead, wishing her good night.
I also wished Daadi good night as she left closing the door behind her.
Abhi settled Aarav in the bed between us and my little son turned towards me to hug me tight. Abhi placed his arm protectively on both of us pulling the blanket on us all. Soon my two boys were fast asleep with Aarav looking just like a clone of his father.
I kissed Aarav's forehead first and then Abhi's, as I joined them in their dreamland.
Life was good
Anupamaa
