5th Part:
"Laluji. He gave me a l-lift. He is such a sweet, dear, dear m-man." She replied.
Bihaan shook his head and laughed scathingly. "Oh yes! How can I forget your sweetest Lalu?"
After that he became quiet, he seemed to be thinking rubbing his back neck distractedly. He came to a decision quick enough and sauntered towards Thapki purposefully. He grabbed Thapki's hand and started to drag her with him.
"Wh-where are you taking me? L-leave my hand...I am not going anywhere with you ever...you fiend...leave my h-hand." Thapki said clinging to the beam of the hut.
"Come with me" Bihaan said still pulling her hand.
"No--you can't make me."
"COME"
"N-NO" Thapki said stamping her foot on to the ground, clinging to the pole more securely.
"I am telling you for the last time, come with me...or else---"
"NO-NO-NO a thousand times NO, you can't make me l-leave...where are you taking me at this time anyways?"
"To your pyaara Laluji's place, where else? He brought you here; he can take you back to town tomorrow. I don't want you in front of my eyes even for 1 second anymore."
"Leave my hand, you evil b-brute, I am not going to leave you ever...why don't you get it in your thick h-head?"
At that, Bihaan left her hand and began to walk away.
"Bihaan... where...where are you going?"
"To break Lalu's legs for meddling in to my business" Bihaan said without stopping.
Thapki began to run after Bihaan.
"You can't do that, B-Bihaan...I will not let you"
"Just watch me"
By the time Thapki caught up with Bihaan they were already in the jungle. Thapki took hold of his hand, "Bihaan," she panted, " Bihaan don't""
"BIHAAN...BIHAAN...BIHAAN... I am sick and tired of this name...I AM NOT BIHAAN, I AM RAJA." Bihaan jerked his hand away from Thapki's and shouted. Thapki was shocked at Bihaan's sudden burst of anger. She knew he would be upset seeing her back, but he was acting quite composedly but now it seemed he had completely lost his cool.
"Bihaan, aise mat b-bolo."
"UGGGHHH again, that name...why don't you get it?? Bihaan is dead, he is gone, he died with that fall...I am Raja, and I am not your Bihaan." He said cruelly.
"Yes...yes...you are Raja now but y-y-you are also my Bihaan, both of you are the one and same person and we l-love each other very much."
"No I am only Raja -The RAJA DAKU and I don't love you. Maybe your Bihaan did, but I don't...and I won't pretend to care or love you just to placate you any longer"
"I am not a-a-asking you to PRETEND to love me. I want you to REALLY l-l-love me...maybe you don't now but you will eventually..." Thapki said wiping her tears, she didn't realise when she started crying.
"I will never love you" Raja said assertively with vehemence.
Could Bihaan hear the sound of Thapki's heart breaking right now? At his vehement sure reply that he would never love her Thapki was lost for words. She didn't know what to answer to that. She stopped following him and stared at his back. Bihaan was slowing down too. He stopped walking when he realised Thapki was not following him but didn't turned to her. He was cursing himself and calling himself a thousand names in his mind. He didn't want to be cruel to this girl but she was full of vexation and she made him fast loose his patience.
After a while she asked,
"Is this because I st-st-st-stammer? You--"
"It is not because you stammer Thapki----", Bihaan began to rub his hands over his eyes and said tiredly feeling like a monster who had just kicked a puppy.
"Then why can't you love m-me? Is it because of my h-height? I am too s-s-short---" What could Thapki really do now, if Bihaan didn't find her attractive as a girl anymore after losing his memory...she was very well acquainted to her every flaw...and she very well knew she was no Aishwarya Rai.
"NO--"
"Then it must be my nose..." Thapki muttered touching her nose self consciously, suddenly she started to doubt herself, she was not good enough, not pretty enough, not smart enough...something must be repellent about her...
Bihaan groaned and walked back to her. He took her shoulders in both his hands and gave a gentle shake. She was still touching her nose looking so heartbreakingly sad; Bihaan's heart went out to her. At that second, he just wanted to kiss her trembling lips and wipe off all her self-doubts.
"It's not your height, not your nose...you are...PERFECT"
Thapki raised her sad eyes to his face, tears still running through her face.
"Then why can't you love m-m-me? Am I not p-p-perfect enough for you?" Thapki implored to him.
"You are too perfect for someone so flawed and broken like me; you are like the moon, so beautiful and high above us, I can only admire and covet it from afar...but never touch it."
"But I am y-yours to have..." Thapki said with conviction, matter of factly.She slid her hands up his chest to cradle his face and moved closer to him.
But Bihaan pushed her from him and shouted, "NO THIS IS WHERE YOU ARE WRONG, you are not mine but Bihaan's. You look at me, and see your precious Bihaan instead of me, as if I, Raja doesn't exist." He said in disgust.
"No, Bihaan it's not t-true...You are Raja, and you a-are Bihaan, I can't s-separate any of you...and its only m-matter of time before you remember all back----"
"WRONG AGAIN...what if I never remember any of my past back? Do I have to live under your GREAT Bihaan's shadow forever trying to be like him?"
"No-Bihaan-No ...just l-listen---"
"NO YOU LISTEN, your Bihaan was a weak, pathetic person, he let other people treat him like shit, who threw him away like a trash...BUT NOW I am Raja, RAJA DAKU without any conscience and fear, now I am strong and know how to defend myself. I am happy and proud of what I am, where I am. I find peace in this forest and I will not let a fru-fru girl like you to stampede into my life and steal away my peace. You need to leave."
"Bihaan was not weak...he---"
"I don't care what he was, how he was...I don't want to know him and I definitely don't want his wife as a charity...I want someone of my own, who will love me as I am now, not what I was--"
"okay---"
Bihaan looked at her, a bit surprised she agreed so readily. He was expecting a bit more fight from her. He couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed...okay may be more than a bit.
"okay---good, let's go then, Lalu can take you to town tomorrow morning and you can catch the bus to the city."
"I am not g-going anywhere"
"YOU JUST SAID YOU AGREE..."
"I said okay...which m-meant I can see and understand your p-p-point NOT that I agreed to leave y-you."
"WHAT IN GOD'S NAME YOU WANT FROM ME, WOMAN?"
"I want you to love me."
"I can never love someone, who is so in love with someone else so obviously."
"I am not in love with s-someone else, silly" Thapki said with a small giggle, "I am in love with you. But if it makes you feel b-better I will call you Raja for time being."
"UGHHH---I swear I will kill you with my own hands."
"I will take that bet g-gladly; you will never harm or let anyone else h-harm even one strand of my hair."
Thapki began to walk back in direction of the hut.
"So you are willing to live with a person who doesn't love you or will ever love you? You are willing to live with that?"
Thapki stopped and looked at the shimmering water of the small pond to her left. The sun was almost gone, the soft red glow from it was still lingering in the sky and that warm red glow was being reflected in the water of the pond making everything look ethereal.
"Yes, maybe not n-now but you will love m-me eventually. I can live with that hope." Thapki said with a quiet confidence still looking at the shimmering water.
"Haven't you heard a single sentence I have been saying, I will not love you...EVER...I will not love someone who--"
"But I already love you...R-R-Raja" Thapki said falteringly. This was the first time Thapki willingly called Bihaan, Raja, and the name faltered in her lips, not because of her stammering.
Bihaan gave a dry laugh and said, "yeah right..."
"If you don't b-believe, I will simply have to w-work harder to make you believe in it. Yes to me, Raja and B-Bihaan is one and s-s-same person, but if you w-want I can love you separately"
"Still I will never love you...I am a cruel, brutal and heartless daku, I don't know how to love and I definitely don't have time for it...", he said stubbornly.
"pfft...yes you do"
"No I don't...I don't care about you, I don't love you and never will" Bihaan promised.
"Are you saying if s-s-something bad happens to me now, like if I die, it won't matter to y-you?"
"That is exactly what I am saying...if you die now, that would mean you will get off my back like a betaal which you are being, and I will dance in sheer joy because I will finally get my peaceful life back"
"You want me g-g-gone that much?? Then m-m-maybe I should throw myself in this l-lake and let the alligators feed on me. I would rather choose that fate than to be separated from you a-again..." Thapki said outrageously looking hurt.
Bihaan rolled his eyes. "Stop being so dramatic. This is not a lake, it is hardly a pond, it is so small...and there are no alligators here, snakes maybe who are more scared of you than you are of them..."
"Okay... then m-maybe I can die drowning in t-this 'not even a pond' and you can dance in joy w-while you watch me drown in front of your e-eyes." Thapki said being more and more hurt at his indifference and his comparison of her to betaal.
"Gladly" saying that Bihaan turned away, still planning to have a heart to heart talk with the hero of the day Laluji. Lalu needed to be taught what it was to meddle in Daku business mainly be overly friendly with a daku's female. Lalu's bones were calling out to him. He needed to break some of them then he might calm down.
A loud splash stopped him, he turned just in time to see Thapki sinking into the water and she was not even struggling to remain afloat. That stupid stupid stupid girl.
With heart on his mouth he began to run and dived straight into the water. He dipped under the water and started to look for her frantically, coming up for a breath and going under again and again. It was difficult to see anything under the murky water and Bihaan started to panic big time. Why couldn't he find her? Did she already drown and lying on the pond bed right now? The pond was quite deep which he hadn't realised before. He began to go deeper into the water, looking for any scrape of pink, the colour of the dress she was wearing. But he couldn't find her; he was like a mad man now, screaming her name every time he came up for oxygen.
Time tickled by and Bihaan kept trying to find Thapki under water, he was becoming tired and it was dark already, soon animals would start to come out to drink from this pond but Bihaan didn't stop. Again and again he dipped under the water...his brain had stopped functioning..he only knew he needed her back in his life, needed her annoying existence in his life, he would surely die without her.
Next time he came up for breath, he heard something... like a tinkling laughter? He must be losing his mind; he started to go down again when he saw her. She was sitting in the bank all wet and showing off her 32 teeth.
The first feeling Bihaan had was of absolute relief, she was alive and well; and then incredulous fury took its place. He wiped his face off water and slowly started to wade towards where Thapki was sitting still grinning smugly.
Thapki must have realised she was in trouble looking at his expression, the moment Bihaan started to come closer, she gave a squeal and began to run.
Run, pretty girl, run for your life. Bihaan was simply too livid.He didn't know what he would do to her once he get a hold of her.
He climbed up on the bank and began to run after her his wet soggy clothes leaving a trail of water. However, he didn't have to chase her far, giving a big yelp, Thapki tripped over a root and sprawled on to the forest floor soon enough all by herself.
Bihaan reached over her and took hold of her hair when she started to scramble away from him in fright seeing his scowl.
"Was that your idea of a joke?"
"Oouuu--Bihaan, leave my h-hair...ouuu...oh sorry... not Bihaan...Raja..hi hi hi" Thapki laughed and Bihaan tightened his hold on her hair.
"I can squish your throat in one hand. Do you know that?"
"I know, you have always been b-big and s-s-strong to my small and petite. And I fit perfectly into y-you, especially when we hug."
"You...You...You still finding it amusing...I will kill you and--"Bihaan said menacingly , through gritted teeth.
Instead of being intimidated Thapki arched her eyebrow at him giving him a 'oh really?' expression. Bihaan slackened his hold on her hair and straightened. Whom was he really kidding, his recent dip in the water contradicted and nullified all the threats he was making towards her. And she knew it very well.
"You are a vindictive woman Thapki." BIhaan said wiping his face of water. He back brushed his wet hair from his forehead and eyes with his hand which made him look sexier than ever.
"I know...but all is fair in love and w-war. You d-deserved the dunking after leaving me a-alone in the town." She huffed haughtily. "Now take me in your arms, I am h-hurt and I can't walk to the hut, carry me." Thapki commanded like a queen sitting on the forest ground and held out her arms.
"Who do you think I am?? Your personal koolie slash slave or something?"
"Something" Thapki said still holding out her arms to him.
"You can stay in here whole night for all I care." Saying that, Bihaan walked away.
Exactly two minutes later he came back and picked her up into his arms without saying anything. Thapki gave a happy sigh and snuggled closer to Bihaan wounding her arms around him.
She started to say, "I knew------"
"One word, only one word from you and I will throw you back into the pond."
Thapki smiled at him and before he could protest or realise what's happening she smacked a loud kiss into his lips.
"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR?" Bihaan shouted.
"That was for Raja, and not for Bihaan I promise... for saving me from my supposed drowning after saying he doesn't care whether I live or die." Thapki said happily.
"Don't be so smug, I would have done it for anyone else, it was a matter of conscience". Bihaan said not looking at her; they had almost reached their hut.
"Wow , a d-daku with a conscience...I love him so much" Thapki said and kissed his cheek again and Bihaan rolled his eyes. He had given up asking her to keep away from him. He was not sure he could stay away from her either.
"Well, Well, Well, isn't this a lovely sight to behold" A female voice sneered dripping in venom.
Bihaan and Thapki both froze at the voice.
Cricket
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
