Mere Raqeeb - AdiYa - Part 3 - Page 2

He sat there, feeling suffocated in his over-priced suit, as the presentation kept rolling one after another. Everyone trying to convince him where his money should be invested. For the life of him, he couldn't pay attention. It didn't seem like anything was worth it anymore. He couldn't remember when was last time he felt content. He wasn't greedy for money or anything. He had enough to last him more than his own lifetime. The feeling of something always missing wore him down. Sitting there in the bland conference room felt like he was wasting his time, even though this time he was investing in a nonprofit organization.

The ominous emptiness in him gave space to the past that he tried to shut down in other times. One decision changed the dynamics of his whole life. Before that, she was forbidden and then all of a sudden she was there standing in front of him, broken and shattered. He had left her thousand miles and 10 years behind, but what did he feel like he owed her his loyalty. Why couldn't he just pick up his own pieces and move on?

It was raining yet again, but he couldn't find solace in the frostiness of the night. No longer the breeze could calm his anxiety. Now the coldness and stillness of the night reminded that he had no home to go to. No friends to turn to. The idea of death always looming in the back. Yeah, the pills made him happy. Made depression easy to deal with, but no one would understand at least no one who was around him. They'd always say what do you need more? While they saw his life in rich, bright color, he himself saw everything in cold grey... like a bystander he watched his life fade away in the background.

The ringing of the phone pierced through his tormented thoughts.

"Yes, Naina?" Only his secretary could get through to him at this time.

"There is an issue with kitchen. There is leakage somewhere in the pipeline and they have closed the whole kitchen for the night."

"I'll be there."

Vasl was his baby, the hotel that he created from nothing when he left home and had nothing, but the ambition to create something where people felt like they were home because he didn't have a home. Vasl literally meant the meeting or a union. He wanted to create a place where people met the comfort of their dreams.

He walked through the lobby, and even at this time when the curtains of darkness were drawn down, the hotel was still humming with the arrival and departure of people. Each person with their own circumstances, staying at the hotel with completely different reason. The wedding season brought on many families, like the one he craved for himself. A home to return to, A wife to love, and children that he could fret over, yet love them endlessly. A home that his money couldn't buy.

He could hear the frantic words. Naina was the female version of him. As insomniac as he was, and as lost and broken as he was. But he never asked because he didn't know how would he fix her when he didn't know how to fix himself.

"Naina" He cautiously warned her as the girl was spiraling down in an anxiety whirlpool.

"We so many guests, Aditya. Some are barely arriving and then we have the catering for the wedding events that are happening in the reception halls. I don't know how we are going to do this. This is a disaster."

"Naina," He turned towards her and she was clearly about to lose it. "I got this okay. Don't sweat it."

As he entered the conference room in the basement, an equally anxious kitchen staff met him. He reassured them as he started to form the plan to remedy the situation.

"We can use the reception hall kitchens as the gas line is completely separate for that. I will get the fixing crew for the kitchen right now and by the morning hopefully, we'll be back on our routine. Also, if someone orders something that is not possible to be prepared in the other kitchens, they have the full right to order something from around the block and it'll be on our charge."

Everyone sighed in relief and dispersed to get on the work. He knew how to fix everything, but himself. The broken pieces still lay in the same place for years now.

"Can we contact anyone who has an event tomorrow at this side of the hotel? I'd like to reach them as soon as possible just in case the kitchens have to be closed tomorrow."

Naina agitatedly looked through her Ipad to search the reception hall schedule.

"The front desk reported a wedding planner is here as they have the earliest event tomorrow morning and she is here to do the final check."

"I'll go talk to her." He stuffed his hand in his pocket. "You go eat something. You have been worried way too much. I got this, okay?"

She nodded, but still, she was hesitant in her steps.

Not that he was glad there was a problem in the kitchen, but he was grateful that there was something to distract him. Empty mind gave way to the thoughts that reminded him how Death was standing right around the corner holding the damn pills' bottle. The emptiness inside him always started filling with unknown grief. Like he was carrying the whole world on his shoulders and failing at it every second.

He pushed the door open and looked for the lady who was there past the regular hours. The Wedding hall looked exquisite. The entire place was covered in beautiful white decorations. He had never seen this hall decorated as serene yet so majestic. He looked at the women who stood on the stool trying to free the drape from the chandelier.

There was something enthralling about her. Something that told him in the back of his mind that she was familiar yet a stranger. The closer he got to her, the more his heart picked up speed. He swallowed. He knew her... way too well for him to not recognize her.

"Mrs. Hooda." He choked on those two words.

The way she jerked back towards him as a telltale sign that even after ten years she still recognized his voice. The moment she turned around, his breath got stuck in his throat. The ten years had been kind to her. She was as breath-taking as he had left her standing in that corridor, yet her eyes were as empty as they were years ago. For a second, he couldn't believe fate started its game of who gets hurt more again, but damn she was standing there right in front of him in flesh.

Good Lord, That was his wife standing there. Zoya Hooda.

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This story is close to my heart so please do read it and also please vote and comment. I'd love to hear your feed back.

She heard the raspy voice that kept her awake night after night. She didn't want to turn and stare in those onyx eyes. The ones that saved her and destroyed her in one day. Her hands trembled and drapes fell from them. She gradually turned around, holding the step-ladder for support. As if she let go, she'd crumble and the pain of ten years would pool in his feel. She fluttered opened her eyes and he was standing there in all his glory.

He wasn't the same man that left her in that door at the crack of dawn yet she was familiar with each and every vein of his. The night still stayed alive in a corner of her heart. The night he picked her pieces from the dirt and put her together so beautifully, yet at the dawn of that night, he left her heart in the dust and never looked back.

The man in front of her had aged so beautifully though. The color of hair that matched the darkness of raven were so alluringly ruffled back. It seemed his habit of running his hands through his hair was still as alive as it was a decade ago. His face was framed with the same raven black facial hair. He'd never liked the idea of of long hair so she wondered what caused him to grow his hair and his beard. But what caught her breath in her throat the way his eyes were devoid of any emotions that resembled life.

He wasn't his best friend that cheered her when fate broke her down. He wasn't the one that chased Arjun around the house for ludicrous reasons. He wasn't the man that threw parties for every little reason he could find. Oh dear God. She sucked in the air. He had abandoned who he was. Why are you in so much pain?

She got off the ladder and stared in to the obsidian of his eyes. Why did you leave? She wanted to run to him and hold him by the collar of his shirt and question him. Why did you give up on me? With each step her heart pushed her more to just wrap her arms around him and yell at him. I didn't meant it when I said leave me. She could still taste those bitter words. The ones that cost her nights of regrets and ten years.

But why did he believe her? She was broken. She was abandoned. She was left alone. She was bitter. So why did he leave instead of holding her together.

She didn't realize she was right in front of him as she stared into those vacant eyes. Void of happiness. Sorrow and hopelessness lurking in them instead. She forgot her own decade of agony as she stared at him.

"What are you doing here?" She breathed.

"This is mine. Vasl." His words were soft yet strange. Guarded. "You want coffee?"

They had to decode ten years between them but neither one had the courage to go back to the torn and burned chapters of their life. But she nodded.

She followed him and the world around her vanished. She was lost as if in a daze. She vaguely remembered that they were in elevator and then a hallway leading to an office. When she finally found her way back the reality. She was standing in a massive room. She looked around and it was an office. She assumed it was his. He was pulling a small table and two chairs next to the floor-to-ceiling window.

"Come. Sit." He whispered.

Her legs were barely supporting her. She still felt the tremble in them. She took the seat and stared out the glass as he started making coffee in the machine that was in his office. She had the vast view of Mumbai's hustling life. Was everyone like her? Still lurking in city that could never find peace for soul. She missed home. Meeting him brought the bitterness of memories. Memories she ran from. Memories that haunted her in the darkness of the night.

She heard the click of the cup against the table and chair screech. The ten years between them were standing like a glass wall, but both of them refused to crack it. Too many cuts were still fresh and they were both vulnerable and afraid to get hurt anymore. Did they ever even heal?

"What brought you here?" His voice was hoarse and tired. What happened to you?

"Noor is getting married." She looked away as she said those words. She couldn't face the fact that her sister broke his brother's heart. Part of her felt she was the reason.

"Is uh is Arjun here then?" His words shocked her. She turned to look at him and he was just staring at her with some kind of hope.

"What do you mean?" She asked as her heard filled with confusing thoughts.

"Noor and Arjun are getting married right?"

"Adi, have you talked to Arjun?"

"No." The guilt rose in his voice and his eyes. "I haven't been home in ten years."

"Noor and Arjun broke up." She closed her eyes as she said those words. Feeling the guilt as well for the reason they both had broken hearts. "Abu never accepted it and Noor wasn't willing to put Abu through what I had put him through." She felt her throat closing up as she felt the burden of her sister's broken relationship.

She glanced down to her cup and her eyes fell on his hand. Suddenly, her heart slammed against the cage of her ribs. He still had the wedding ring. She slowly looked up and he was also staring at her hand. The wedding ring on her hand. The piece of him that she had connected with herself. The only piece that held any sign of their marriage.

They were tied together, yet they were strangers.

"Why didn't you become a pilot?" She wanted to change the subject but everything between them was dipped with pain. Each topic had it's own bleeding wounds.

"We don't always get what we want, huh?"

He stared at her, a bit with accusations. She didn't know whether he was talking about his dream or their relationship.