ShivIka FF: PROMISES- The Final Promise: I Love You (Pg 39) - Page 23

"Anika didi? Anika didi! There's someone at the door."

Anika's heart started racing. "Tell him to go away, Sahil." She called, trying to keep her voice steady.

"It's not a 'him', Didi, it's a 'her'. And I tried but it just made her angry and she started yelling at the door. I didn't want to wake everyone in the neighbourhood so er, I let her in. She's sitting in the living room. Didi I erm, I think she's very drunk."

Anika climbed slowly out of bed and headed towards her door, pulling the bolt open. Sahil looked up at her nervously and then pointed towards the living room. "She's through there."

Anika nodded, told Sahil to go back to bed and walked towards the living room, peering around the corner to see who on earth had arrived drunk at her house at 2 in the morning.

"Tia?"

The woman spun round, still wearing the stunning gown from earlier, its shade somewhere between seafoam and turquoise to contrast the behemoth of a purple ring on her finger.

"You!" Tia pointed an accusatory finger at Anika's face and marched unsteadily towards her. "I have tried so hard to ignore everything but today... today was the last straw!" she stomped her foot angrily and almost toppled over.

"Tia, what are you talking about?"

"I'm not stupid, you know. I know everyone thinks I am, but I'm not. I totally realised Shivaay had a crush on you but he's a 30 year old man so I thought where's a crush going to lead? And also Anika, no offence but I am totally hotter than you. I don't mean that in like, a horrible way- I'm not negative vibing you or anything- but you have to work every day and live your life. I on the other hand just exist to be rich and look good. Looking hotter than you is literally my job."

Anika didn't know whether to laugh or not. Tia was being objectively funny, right? But she didn't look as though she was trying to be. "Tia do you want to sit down."

"Only if you sit too, you're too tall, Anika. I don't want you looming over me." With that she slumped into a chair, Anika perching on the one beside her.

"Would you like some water?"

Tia shook her head. "I had to drink a lot of alcohol to get myself to come over here, let's not dilute the effect by giving me water or coffee or something. Anika, you see, it takes quite a large dose of Dutch courage to come and tell another woman that your fiance is probably quite desperately in love with her." And with that, Tia Kapoor started wailing.

After she had calmed down a little and blown her nose indelicately on a tissue Anika handed her, Tia continued. "I've known about Shivaay since I was a little girl, you know? We all have. By 'we' I'm talking about the 'Rich Set', Anika darling. The Oberois are kind of at the top of our social hierarchy and our social scene is kind of all about climbing that pyramid- it's very easy to build up a lot of bad karma doing that which is why I regularly do reiki for all the rich people I know." She nodded and clutched Anika's hands, "They need all the good will they can get. Rich people have problems too, you know."

Again, despite Tia's admission earlier having made her world spin, Anika was resisting an almost insuppressible urge to burst out laughing.

"So anyways, when Mummy told me that I was to be married to Shivaay Singh Oberoi, I was actually pretty disappointed. I knew his reputation was mean and rude and ruthless and I thought to myself, what kind of husband is a man like that going to be? I thought he'd be cold and mean and that he'd laugh at all the homeopathic, spiritual stuff I do. I know a lot of people think it's silly nonsense, but it makes me feel better, and surely that's the point? But then I met him properly and we talked and... he was nice. He paid attention to what I said and he listened and he asked me questions and he answered mine. Shivaay is a good person Anika, and as time went on, I became more and more amenable to the idea of marrying him. I knew that he would treat me well and that although business is important to him, family is more important. As his wife, I would be family and I found myself quite eager to be in that small, exclusive group of people Shivaay Singh Oberoi would do anything for."

Anika didn't say anything. In that moment, she related more to this hippy dippy rich girl so much it was almost painful.

"So then when they finally hired a wedding planner I was over the moon. Except... that wedding planner turned out to be you. And that's when everything started to go wrong."

"Tia I-"

The other woman shook her head, cutting her off. "No, Anika. Please, let me talk. You might change what you have to say to me once I'm done. I noticed the way Shivaay behaved around you and I knew what it was. It's actually quite irritating that he didn't because he's 30, for heaven's sake. The man should know what it feels like to have feelings for someone." Tia rolled her heavily kholed and slightly smudged eyes (unlike Anika, Tia had clearly pre-emptively invested in waterproof mascara). "I shouldn't say that." Tia frowned and blew out a puff of air. "Positive vibes. Positive vibes."

Anika didn't care what the ultimate aim of this conversation was, she liked Tia Kapoor. The woman was nutty as a Snickers bar, but she had an inherent sweetness of character that made Anika wonder at how she survived the bitter reality of this world.

"Are you bored of listening to me talk, I'm bored of listening to me talk. But Anika, I know, okay? I know Shivaay loves you. Tonight, after we got engaged, he couldn't even force himself to smile. Every time he looked at me when he thought I couldn't see him, or every time he looked at his ring he just looked empty. And he kept LOOKING for someone. And I was thinking to myself, who is he looking for? Who is he looking for? And I thought maybe it was Omkara because he disappeared for a bit too, but then Pinky Aunty said something and I realised that you were missing too. So I asked Shivaay. I asked 'Hey, where did Omkara go?' and Shivaay looked at me like I was crazy and just went 'Oh he'll be over with Rudra somewhere' so clearly he hadn't even noticed Omkara was gone. So it had to be you."

Anika couldn't speak, could barely breathe.

"And do you know what I felt, Anika?"

Anika shook her head.

"Relief."

A new wave of tears.

"I would marry Shivaay, of course I would. Mummy and Papa want me to and I know that on paper, Shivaay and I would be great together. But I don't want to marry him just because someone else says I should. My parents got married because they had to and sure, they tolerate each other just fine- but I don't want to just tolerate my husband, or even worse, just be tolerated. I want it to be a partnership. I don't just want to send positive vibes, Anika. I want someone to send them back to me as well."

Anika patted Tia softly on the shoulder. "I understand, Tia."

"There's someone who... who I maybe think already feels the same way about me. I met him around when you were first hired and, well it became much more than the flirtatious little fling it started off as. When I told him I had to break it off with him, that I had to marry Shivaay, he was so upset. He did something slightly silly and... and I need to apologise to you Anika. He's told me I should have done it much earlier, offered to apologise to you himself, only, that would have gotten me into huge trouble so he didn't. I promise you he's been sending you a lot of positive vibes though, to try to make up for what he did."

A flicker of understanding in the back of her mind. "Who are you talking about, Tia?"

"Yes. Who are you talking about, Tia?"

Both women whipped their heads around to face the doorway, where Shivaay Singh Oberoi was standing with a peculiar look on his face. It was as though he couldn't figure out where he was on the scale of emotions at that moment. To be honest, Anika wouldn't bet against her own face wearing the exact same expression.

"Baby, you actually came." Tia rose to her feet, swayed and then slumped back into her seat again.

Shivaay crossed the room in several long strides and sat down in the seat opposite Tia, to Anika's left. And so they sat, in this awkward triangle, waiting for Tia Kapoor to unexpectedly finish saving the day.

14th Promise- "This Changes Everything"

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So Shivaay and Anika's story is rounding to a close- I foresee maybe 3-5 more chapters, but somehow I'm just not quite ready to let them go yet. So I was thinking of making this Part One and then continuing by making Part Two the IshKara story, while still occasionally checking in with what's going on with Anika and Shivaay. I kind of seriously want to delve into Omkara's mind and story, and with that in mind, even though I was going to introduce Ishana in the last chapter, I decided not to in favour of holding her back for Part Two.