Chapter 4:
The drive back to Ishaana's home from the party was much more quieter, Rohan had a few drinks himself and she knew she had gulped down far too many glasses of red wine. Neither should have been driving by any means, but Rohan wanted to be the reckless daredevil like always. He was still quietly driving but all Ishaana could think of was getting some answers, she knew Rohan wasn't the best person for getting them, but she just wanted to give it a try.
"Hey, did you know the Oberois had another brother?" She hoped she was subtle enough when asking. Rohan looked back at her curiously and then faced the road again, "yeah Omkara right? He doesn't associate much with the Oberoi business or anything, though I have heard he's an artist. He lays low from what I know. Some of his works have gone off for a few corers though, so he is still doing quite well for himself."
Rohan kept on reciting and Ishaana kept on listening, it did feel good to know that he was doing so well for himself, because she had always known how oppressed he felt living with his family's pressure.
But Ishaana wanted to know more, hoping Rohan would keep splurging.
"There has to be more though, he seemed quite isolated from where I saw him."
Rohan turned again, but this time he saw Ishaana looking straight ahead, "he hardly ever makes any appearances to these events, I suppose this was at their home so he had no choice but to. Though..."
Ishaana turned a little too fast at Rohan's prolonged but,' "though what?"
"He's been off the rails a few times Ishaana. He really only survived because of Shivaay, otherwise he has been way too close to overdosing a few times."
Ishaana's eyes bulged at hearing the word overdose, "what do you mean overdose?"
Rohan turned towards Ishaana, and she could definitely see some sympathy in his eyes, "he was heavily involved with drugs. About a year after he came back from college it went unnoticed, but Shivaay saw him spiral down in to a pit hole. I mean he had to be sent to rehab for quite a while, otherwise he was really a gone case."
Ishaana could physically feel her heart palpate, she had known him for three whole years in Columbia, and never had she known how heavily he was involved with drugs. She did see him snorting coke for sure, but in college who wasn't involved with stupid stunts like that? It was just upsetting that now she genuinely had no idea who she actually fell in love with.
Just as Rohan pulled in front of Ishaana's building he leaned in to kiss her. Ishaana may have returned the kiss but with it she unfortunately had to send a message that she wasn't up for more tonight. She didn't know how bad a message she sent off because all Rohan said was, "you seem tired, get some sleep." And that just made her feel more terrible, he didn't deserve this.
That night it was impossible to get any sleep, she kept tossing and turning which just brought more unrest to her body. She wasn't sure if she should see him again, because he simply walked away from her. Who the hell does that after seeing you for 5 years? She was an adult for God sakes! She then quickly brought out her phone and did a quick Google search on him, and it turned out Rohan was quite right. He was indeed an artist in India, and a huge one at that. One of his current exhibitions was on in the Chemould Gallery, which she realised was probably the first thing she wanted to see in the morning. Looking into his life wasn't right, and she knew it, but it was the only way she was going to get any closure for the pain that still disturbed her. Putting away her phone she closed her eyes hoping that sleep would eventually take over.
The next morning she knew her eyes woke her up way too late because her ears clearly didn't care damn for the alarm, but luckily it was the weekend. She slowly showered and got dressed, her faded jeans made way for the day.
She knew one thing today, and that was wanting to dig a little further into Om's life, but she also knew it really wasn't right either. It was the battle of the heart and the mind, but from whatever she had heard she knew that Om never had it easy. All she could remember was cursing endlessly about him when he left her, but even then she would have never actually hoped that he end up dead. Omkara was in too deep, and she had never known that. She could never help him even as a friend back in college, and that disturbed her more.
Parking her car and heading inside she bought her tickets to specifically his exhibition in the gallery. The way she approached it was that this experience could possibly be a peak into his mind, but in all honestly she wasn't sure what she was headed for. It was just an excuse to be close to him without actually seeing him. Hoping to see someone's mind through his or her art was a pretty big leap to make, but she was desperate, and he never gave any answers so what was the harm. His space in the gallery was unique, ceiling high windows and unimaginable luminosity engulfing the area. But she could see from a distance that several sculptures, or specifically dancing figures were positioned at the focal points of the natural light. Closing in on them she saw that the figures were carved from crisp marble, chiselled to perfection for what was at least months of labour. Their positioning was specific probably to incorporate their shadows as a moving element of the installation. She examined one specific sculpture; it was the one she was instinctively drawn to, the kathak dancer. Her posture and her movement was all near perfect, like it was studied so carefully just to be sculpted with such accuracy. All the figures she saw were based on classical dances from all parts of India. Each unique with its own story to tell. Their costuming and ornaments detailed with absolute precision from cultural history, each sculpture had fluidity and movement, which was so intricate that it emulated a far more graceful figure, one a human couldn't even achieve.
She slowly found an empty spot in the gallery and just sat down, because today all she just wanted to do was gaze. His carvings were genuinely immaculate, it was detailed and it had soul, and it seemed content. Hell he seemed content from his work, what more could she want then? Either it hurt that he was unhappy and near death, and yet it still hurt knowing he was doing well. Where did that put her though she thought?
Omkara on the other hand woke up with a blazing headache, his head pounded so furiously that he wanted his eyes to give up. He wasn't sure if there was another presence in the room, but he was sure that someone had placed something on his bedside table. Turning on his side he saw a blurry figure, which he eventually processed that it belonged to Anika Bhabi. Om rubbed away his eyes, and once again he felt his head pound causing him to groan simultaneously.
"There is a glass of water with two tablets of disprin that is if you want any relief for your headache." Her tone was unusually cold, probably because she couldn't tolerate that he had drunk himself to hell last night. But he was still thankful enough that she cared.
"Bhabi, please don't be mad." Om was hoping that was enough to tone her coldness.
"Om no one is ever mad at you," And Om heard her amazing sarcasm lift off.
"We are usually just oscillating between worrying about you or hysterically crying ourselves to death because we found out you did something. You really need to start acting responsibly Om. Enough is enough!"
And Om realised he had probably done the absolute opposite of calm.
"Om just get up and shower, everyone is waiting for you at the dinning table."
Om looked plain confused, then he checked his bedside clock, it was 12 pm in the afternoon, how could they still be waiting for breakfast?
And without even asking the question Anika answered, "we're going to have lunch soon. So please clean yourself up and get there on time."
Om got it through his head that he had to act up, everyone on that table was probably going to interrogate him, and that too based on the questions they would have discussed during breakfast that morning. Family interventions' was Shivaay's new addition into their family specifically after his wedding to Anika. It was technically supposed to bring their family closer.' No matter how much the family became tightknit Om thought, his dear father was still the outlier that refused to assimilate.
Om walked into their dining room, all set up and ready to serve lunch, with every seat full except for his. It was most definitely an awkward scenario, but Omkara knew what facing the music was like by now. He purposely screeched his chair, and Rudra couldn't help but chuckle, to which he smirked back equally.
Omkara made a decision though about today, he didn't want to play the tamed and righteous version of himself that everyone was already used to, today he genuinely wanted his own space free of others commentary.
He wasn't sure how far he was going to get but as soon as he started pouring the sabzi onto his plate his dear' father started regurgitating his divine and unneeded knowledge, to which he blatantly rolled his eyes.
"You really don't want to improve do you Om? Is this really the sort of life you want to lead? First it was drugs and now what? Alcohol?"
Om just ignored him and tore off a piece of his roti and started to eat, he clearly didn't' give a damn anymore of what was to come from his fathers mouth.
"How could you be so stupid and irresponsible? Some girl comes strutting back into your life, and the next thing you know you're a bloody piece of crushed meat."
Truthfully Om never understood his father's analogies, but like before he gave him another stern look, and then turned it back towards his own food.
Everybody on the table was just plain uncomfortable, neither did they know how to turn the situation and neither was anyone strong enough to take on Tej when he was so fired up. Shivaay still willingly attempted, "Bade papa, please he was just a little disturbed."
Tej widened his eyes even more, which Om thought couldn't actually be possible, "Shivaay please stop making excuses for this piece of sh*t. Look at where you are today and look at where he is? Even the sky and the earth manage to look closer than both of you."
Janhvi could not think that she could be any more disgusted at her husband, yet he surprised her once again. But looking at Om shocked her even more, he seemed so unaffected by Tej's words. Om usually reacted quite horrifically to any of these fights, which always resulted in Shivaay and Shakti mediating between the two of them. Yet today Om was untouched, and ever so casually eating away from his plate.
Tej looked over again at Om, and his continues eating only got him more frustrated. Om's nonchalant behaviour was irking him much more than the responses he always had prepared.
"HOW DARE YOU! How dare you behave as if all this is a joke to you." Tej's roaring voice had everyone startled, but he made it worse by standing up aggressively. This was not good by any standards.
Om then took his last spoonful of sabzi, wiped away his lips with a table napkin and then flicked it off onto the plate so it to be taken away by their house help. He then finally turned his head towards his father, very calmly with not even a wrinkle on his forehead.
Tej just impatiently waited for him to speak.
"You know something papa..." And once again the table turned in shock because Om uttered the word papa,' which was just foreign for Tej as he was just Mr Oberoi for him now.
"Today I feel like you've earned me calling you papa, and do you know why?"
Om just smiled and leaned back onto his chair, "Because today I can proudly say I am your son, that I am exactly like you. You know that girl yesterday, the one who everyone says I was drinking over? Guess what? What you've been doing to Ma over the years, I did to her. So today you and me, we are on an equal level field, because today we really are father and son." And with that just Om got up with a growing disgust on his face. His chair left much farther away from the table.
Om wanted to head out of the house today, he needed to breath again. While everyone left on the table just came to a stand still. Dadi was mortified that Om even said any of those things, while Janhvi just cried with her head buried in her hands, Rudra was worried for both his mother and his sister, and the rest were just stunned that Om probably won today. Because today he really had Tej speechless and more or less on his knees. Tej on the other hand just popped back down in shock with his head banging against the back of the chair. Today was the real day he realised how much had he truly failed, what an example had he set for his own children.
A very special thankyou to all those wonderful readers that are leaving such amazing reviews behind. I am sorry about editing, sometimes I just get lazy and other times I really just forget. So apologies for that. But please leave all your wonderful reviews, and thankyou to the readers that shared this story, it means so much to me that I have more readers.
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