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Hope you guys had a wonderful weekend. Thank you for all your comments to the last chapters, my thoughts are above (pg. 124).
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Chapter Thirty-Six
A-Okay
Arnav gazed at the waning sun, watching another day disappear into nothingness. It was funny how time worked. Every minute of every hour was monitored and calculated, yet, what did each minute even matter? Didn’t all the minutes just melt into one big, endless day?
It had been one week since he resumed his office, going about his meetings and projects as though nothing had happened. And seeing how easy it was to do it, perhaps nothing had indeed happened. Perhaps his child and Myra didn’t happen at all.
Arnav knew he was being silly. Of course they happened, because he felt their loss. He felt it every morning during his jog, during his commute to work, during his secretary’s ramblings… by the end of the day, it felt like maybe he wouldn’t be able to go through with another day. And perhaps he would always feel like that.
But he also felt different. He felt more correct. Seeing the happy faces of his cousins felt right. Chopping vegetables this morning as everyone requested breakfast once again felt right. Watching a match of cricket with Dev felt right. It was as if he was waking up from a deep slumber, realizing with relief that everything he had once enjoyed were all still there, waiting for him.
If truth be told, Arnav had needed this trip. It seemed almost god-sent when he received NK’s invitation on the family Whtasapp group. He just wanted to remember his old self, the self that didn’t need much validation from anyone.
“Aren’t you done brooding yet?” came Lavanya’s voice.
Arnav looked over his shoulder to see his sister join him on the second-floor balcony of the farmhouse. It was a rather quiet Sunday evening, most of his cousins were dispersed around the house, taking a moment or two for themselves. Lavanya, of course, was leaving in a few minutes for Akash –unsurprisingly– had to resume office the next day. The rest of them were due to leave tomorrow evening.
“Aren’t you packed yet?” Arnav asked, turning his eyes back to the purple sky.
“Yeah yeah,” she answered with a pout.
“So stay then,” Arnav murmured, easily understanding the source of her disappointment. His sister thrived on social gatherings, but her husband didn’t have much time for any of them. “I will drop you off tomorrow.”
Lavanya snorted. “I’ll pass… don’t want to be third-wheeling.”
Arnav simply sighed, the mention of his wife bringing on a new train of thoughts. It was only yesterday that she had mysteriously vanished with his cousins on what was apparently a hiking trip. He hadn’t even realized she was missing –being engrossed in the game of football Dev challenged him on– until Bhagi anxiously pointed it out. Panic had festered deep inside of him upon hearing that, and all Arnav really remembered was making a few trusted phone calls to trace their location and then sprinting out the backdoor to find them. He had only stopped when his eyes had found her downcast ones.
Arnav didn’t dare think what would have happened if he hadn’t located her. Their argument, more than a week ago now, was beginning to seem very silly. He had apologized to her, hadn’t he? Agreed it could have been better, but didn’t he make the first move and break the ice? So then why were they not talking freely, why did she feel the need to not tell him she was going for a walk in the woods?
Do you have any idea how childish that is? How immature? You are running a goddamn empire! So why don’t you buck up and stop being an utter pain in the a*s for everyone?!”
Perhaps it was his fault. He had been undeniably expecting an apology. Her words that day had been both menacing and uncalled for. His past aside, hadn’t he been trying to be a good friend to her? Didn’t she realize how concerned he was about her? Hadn’t they come a long way from being total strangers?
“So is this going to be a one-way conversation?” Lavanya said, breaking his reverie.
Arnav blinked.
“What do you want Lavu?” he replied, a little exasperated. “Can’t a man enjoy this beautiful sunset in peace?”
Lavanya glared at him. “Well, if the said man has been ignoring his sister, I don’t see how he can expect to be in peace?!”
“I haven’t been ignoring you…”
“Really? Then why haven’t you still told me about that stupid isolation stunt you pulled all of last week?”
Arnav pursed his lips. It was a conscious decision on his part to keep Lavanya out of the mess he had jumped into. She would probably lose it if she ever found out that he went to see Ira. Hadn’t she warned him repeatedly to leave the skeletons in the closet?
I know you don’t love Khushi and believe me I know what you had with Myra was real, but that doesn’t change anything. Why are you trying to dig up graves you cannot close?
She had been one hundred percent correct of course. He wasn’t ready to accept it just yet, however.
“That’s because there is nothing to tell,” he finally said. “As I told you and Di a billion times by now, I needed some time off for myself. I am human, aren’t I?”
Lavanya stared at him, not doubt sifting his eyes to see if there was truth in what he spoke. It took a few minutes, but she was eventually satisfied and relented.
“Fine… but please try to limit your breakdowns to once per decade. My poor heart can only handle so much.”
“Duly noted. Anything else I can do for you, Princess?”
Lavanya rolled her eyes. “Can you at least tell me what you have done to Khushi?”
“Nothing… why?”
“She keeps staring at you… you didn’t propose to her, did you?”
Arnav sighed. “Ha ha…very funny Lavu. Aren’t you getting late?”
“Fine,” she said with a smirk. “I will leave you two love birds alone.”
Then giving him a goodbye hug, she left.
Thank god.
Because Khushi had indeed been staring at him the whole day. Since her little adventure into the forest, she had become unbelievably quiet, watching him when she thought he wasn’t looking. Normally, Arnav wouldn’t have cared. But given how careless his family was with their thoughts, he was now getting a little concerned about what they may have let slip to her.
And if Lavanya noticed it too, then something was definitely amiss. So, abandoning his solitude, Arnav went downstairs, his eyes searching. She wasn’t with Sam watching a re-run of Friends, nor was she with the rest of the gang immersed in a game of carrom. After ten minutes, he finally found her seated on the porch swing in the backyard, lost deep in thought.
Arnav calmly took a seat beside her. “So…”
Khushi instantly straightened up, giving him her undivided attention.
His feet began to push the swing forward, the gentle rocking motion soothing him and hopefully her too. They weren’t in a board room meeting, for crying out loud, why was she looking so stiff?
“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly.
Khushi’s forehead folded. “Nothing is wrong.”
“You have been staring at me all day… something is definitely wrong.”
She nervously twisted her hands.
“How long is this going to go on for?” he continued. “What will it take for things to go back to the way they were? I said I’m sorry…”
She took her time to answer.
“I am not mad at you,” she murmured. “But I wanted to be at one point.”
“Oh?”
“For calling me childish and entitled and…”
Arnav didn’t fill in the gaps. He wished he could just magically reach inside of her and wipe out the memory of that whole day.
“But the problem is, I have been exactly all of that… childish is just the word for me.”
Arnav was startled. “What? Why are you saying that?”
“Because it’s true. I have been so busy criticizing the choices you have made, that I didn’t see that it takes two people for any relationship to work.”
He was now seriously getting worried. “Did Sam and Mitali say something?”
She shrugged.
So they did.
“Khushi,” he sighed, bringing the swing to a stop. “What is this really about?”
She looked away, staring at the fairy lights scattered around the yard. “I-I… I’m scared that I judged you too quickly.”
“That depends on what you judged me about.”
She stared at him, incredulous. “I screamed at you! Blamed you for pitying yourself when none of this is your fault.”
“I was pitying myself though,” he replied remembering those days he stayed locked up in his room. “Things happened. Not the way I wanted them to, but they did… and instead of graciously accepting them like you did, I threw tantrums.”
Khushi snorted. “I was hardly gracious. I blamed you too.”
“Maybe,” he agreed. “But you had the right too… It wasn’t your fault that I broke up with a girl, but it was definitely myfault that I married you to save my company. There’s a difference.”
“She broke up with you.”
She had done her research. Arnav knew he shouldn’t be surprised to see that. She had proven herself to be very observant after all, picking up on obscure things, joining the dots when his family thought she wasn’t looking… but he wassurprised.
Because he expected her to be furious when she learnt the full story. But here, she wasn’t even mildly indignant.
“It wasn’t Myra’s fault,” Arnav said quietly. “Or maybe it was… I can’t tell anymore. I certainly feel guilty though.”
“Why?”
He looked at his feet, unsure. He had never openly talked about his break-up, not even to Lavanya, who being the doting sister she was, figured it out anyway. And yet, he knew he couldn’t keep the secret anymore. Myra was long gone from his life, what was the point of keeping her memories so close?
And more importantly, didn’t Khushi deserve to know the truth?
“I was being lousy in our relationship,” he confessed. “She kept telling me that she wanted to settle down, but I wasn’t interested in becoming my father’s successor. I wanted to be a chef… open my own restaurant and finally be free of everyone telling me what to do.”
Khushi didn’t appear even the slightest bit surprised to hear that. She was clearly well informed.
“So Myra ended it?” she asked matter-of-factly.
“Yes and no… we had a big fight the day after Dev’s birthday party last year and I told her that I will give her a good life, but she has to be patient. She wasn’t too happy, of course. We were together for six years after all… how much more patient could I ask her to be? So, one thing led to another and I ended up saying things I am not really proud of.”
“Like what?”
Arnav took a deep breath. “Things like she was desperate… that she wanted my money… that she wasn’t up to my father’s status… basically everything that would break any self-respecting person’s ego.”
Khushi pondered over that for a few moments, before speaking again. “So… you basically pushed her to break up with you?”
Arnav sighed, leaning back on the swing to gaze up at the stars. “Again, yes and no… Myra and I were complicated.”
Khushi snorted. “Who isn’t?”
He couldn’t help but smile. It was so easy to talk to her. “You see, I didn’t want to break up with her… but did I know that she would after hearing everything I said? Yes, I did… I was just so angry that I took it all out on her without really thinking about the repercussions of it.”
Khushi shifted in her seat so that she was facing him. “Was it because you expected her to understand?”
How had she known?
“Yes,” Arnav answered. “I expected her to understand… understand that my life had turned upside down, that the only good thing going for me was her and that maybe I was having a bad day and that I didn’t really mean anything I was saying.”
“What happened then?”
“Nothing… she packed her bags and left. A week later my father had a stroke and I was appointed as the acting CEO on his behalf. It was bizarre to be very honest… one second I was fighting with my girlfriend about finding a job and in the next, I was handed this empire to run without a clue about what I am supposed to be doing.”
Arnav gazed at the stars, memories of those days flooding his mind. It was chaos. It’s actually a miracle in many ways that he was sitting here today, seven months later, reminiscing. He had been sure back then that the company would be dissolved by now.
“Did you ever call her back and apologize?” Khushi asked suddenly.
How had she known yet again?
“I did,” he admitted, keeping his eyes on the clear night sky. “It was a month before we got married actually…”
“And?” Khushi pressed. “What did she say?”
You destroyed your career, you destroyed your restaurant and now you are destroying your father’s company… what do you even have left? With your track record, forget me, you aren’t worthy of any girl Arnav Singh Raizada. You were, are and will always be a disappointment.
Myra’s words echoed pitch-perfectly in his ears. Perhaps he was never going to forget them. In light of her abortion, however, her venomous tone felt like nothing. His body didn’t tremble with rage like it used to a few months ago.
“She said what she needed to,” Arnav replied with an ironic smile. “To make sure we really were over.”
At last, there was surprise in Khushi’s tone. “She didn’t forgive you?”
He rolled his head, still resting against the back of the swing, so that he could see her. “Would you ever forgive me?”
She bit her lip. “It’s different with me… we don’t have history.”
“So you think because Myra and I have history, it should be easy for her to forgive me?”
“Isn’t that how it always works?” she answered rhetorically. “If Vihaan yelled at me–”
“Can Vihaan yell at you?” Arnav interrupted, unable to imagine her brother having the capacity to raise his voice even by one beat.
Khushi chuckled. “He can yell, just not at me… but that’s my point. If he ever does, then I’ll know that something very bad happened… So I wouldn’t have such a hard time forgiving him.”
“Ah… but for that you trust Vihaan, no?”
“Myra didn’t trust you?”
“No.”
His voice seemed to reverberate across the silent lawn. Khushi’s face, thoughtful until now, appeared perplexed.
“That was our fundamental problem,” Arnav said, turning back to stare at the sky. “She didn’t trust me… so you tell me, how will any apology be ever good enough?”
Khushi didn’t reply.
Perhaps like him, she too needed time to digest that. Time to accept that the number of years you stay with someone is not a measure of how strong your relationship is. No, the true measure of any relationship is how unflinching your faith in the other is, both in good times and bad. Especially in the bad.
Khushi took a deep breath. “I am sorry,” she murmured.
“For what? Any of this is hardly your fault.”
“No… I’m sorry for calling you childish and immature and everything else. You were dealing with your demons and I should have been more patient.”
“And I’m sorry too,” Arnav answered with a sigh. “I shouldn’t have brought up your father, I had no right. I was just too angry to see reason… I guess it’s a reoccurring pattern with me.”
She smiled. “It is… but more importantly apology accepted and forgiven.”
“Likewise.”
Mirroring his position, Khushi then leaned back on the swing and stared up into the galaxies. It was a gorgeous night, no doubt. The moon –almost full– was dazzling iridescently in the velvety sky. Next to it, the stars appeared like small diamonds.
“I used to do this as a kid,” she said, quite unexpectedly.
“Looking at the stars?”
“Yup. My mom even got me a telescope once… I was obsessed with constellations.”
“Your nerdiness never ceases to amaze me Dr. Gupta.”
“If you must, knowing constellations is actually very helpful… they can guide you about directions if you ever get lost.”
Arnav snorted. “So you weren’t really lost yesterday evening then?”
She gritted her teeth. “You can’t expect me to remember all the constellations… plus, Mitu was pretty confident you would find us.”
That was a surprise. He had no clue Mitali held such a high opinion about him. “She was?”
“You have no idea how much your family loves you, do you?”
“I try to stay grounded, you know? I don’t really let the fame get to me, especially with the ladies… meditation helps too.”
Khushi chuckled. “Show-off.”
Arnav grinned sheepishly, the two of them drifting off into silence once more. That was one of the other things he liked about her – the comfort to stay quiet without the threat of awkwardness looming above them.
Khushi eventually spoke again. “Do you ever regret it? Marrying me?”
Arnav mulled that over. Did he really regret the marriage? Sure he regretted the situations that led to it, he regretted agreeing to it the way he did, and he definitely regretted how he behaved with her after it. But did he actually regret it?
“Not really,” he confessed.
“Why not?”
“Because you are perfect for my family. And I know enough to realize that not everyone is like that.”
“And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“Are you okay being married to someone you don’t love?”
Arnav stopped short. He knew she wasn’t asking an unreasonable question, after all, didn’t everything lead up to that? Now that Myra was truly out of the picture, where did they stand? Was their arrangement truly sustainable for the rest of their lives?
He wasn’t sure.
And luckily before he could come up with a reply, they were interrupted by a new voice.
“Oh, there you are!”
The two of them sat up on the swing, to see Sam hurriedly making her way towards them, a knowing grin on her face.
“Sorry to disturb,” she said, stopping a foot from them. “But I need Bhabhi.”
“What’s wrong?” Khushi asked.
“Well, Dev being the idiot he is, was bragging about winning at carroms. Mitu got offended –she lost by one coin– and it’s now a girls versus boys thing. So you are needed very urgently.”
Khushi laughed. “Just so you know, I suck at carroms.”
“You are still much better than NK, so let’s go.”
Khushi relented. “Just give me a minute, okay?”
Sam nodded and disappeared into the house once again.
“Will you join?” Khushi asked, turning to him.
Arnav shook his head. “I’ll stay out here for a few more minutes… you go ahead.”
She stood up. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Was he?
The answer everyone wanted to hear was obvious, but he knew with the way she was looking at him with concerned eyes, that she wanted the truth, not what was convenient. And so, for the first time in many months, he answered with complete honesty:
“Yes, I’m a-okay.”
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Arnav and Khushi have covered a lot of ground this chapter… Khushi heard in the last chapter how Myra didn’t fit in with his family, but in this chapter, she heard why Myra didn’t fit in Arnav’s life. That’s progress!
As for Arnav… well the opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. And I think he is slowly getting there 😉 He has a much, much clearer picture about the Myra episode than he did in October 2019 when Ryan came to his office.
Please like & comment!
Archi
P.S. - a big thank you for patiently following this story and my sometimes erratic updates! ❤️❤️❤️ Will try my best to post again on Friday!
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