Happy Birthday, Avi! ❤️
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60. Quietly Yours
It wasn’t the outcome I had wished for. It was far from what I wanted to happen once I professed my love to Maan. Yet, I could not hold it against him for reacting the way he did. If it was possible at the moment, I would have laughed at myself for even thinking anything other than what happened could have taken place. I was torn into pieces. I could not help but replay in my head the time when he bared his heart to me so long ago. How I wished things hadn’t turned out to be the way they did back then.
Ironically, I did not wish to have not fallen in love with Maan. Even if it had been in my control to stop my heart from beating for him, I wouldn’t change how I feel. It just felt natural – like I was meant to love him. Whether it was a decade ago or today, my love was meant for him, my heart belonged to him. But perhaps I was not worthy enough for his love. This feeling alone kept me down for days. If the past few days had been a spiralling journey down a deep dark hole, what I felt now could probably only be described as being buried under heaps of that darkness with absolutely no light infiltrating through the gaps.
It was the single loneliest feeling I had ever felt in my nearly three decades of life and yet I did not wish to alter my situation. At least not now. I wanted to mope and mourn in solitude and that was what I had been doing since the past few days. Texting my assistant, Raya and Anaya that I would be out of town for work for a couple of days, I holed up in my apartment and didn’t get out of bed until absolutely necessary for a couple of days now.
It must have been the third or the fourth day of my solitary confinement - I'd lost track of days – when the doorbell came to life. It took quite a few minutes for my brain to process that I wasn’t dreaming and that there was actually someone at the door.
The doorbell buzzed again. Anguished as I was, I hoped whoever it was would just leave me alone to wallow. I was not expecting any visitors and I certainly wasn’t in any mood to entertain anyone at all, especially with my red-rimmed, swollen eyes, messy hair and disheveled state, wearing old, worn down trousers and a scrunched up shirt. The bell buzzed again and I huffed, pulling the quilt over my head in an attempt to ignore it. It was a useless attempt because whoever it was seemed intent on making me get out of the bed. The fourth time the bell rang, it felt like the intruder had forgotten to lift their finger back up, making me angrily throw the covers aside and scoot myself off the bed. While I was stomping towards the door, ready to give my unwanted visitor an earful, they had resorted to knocking and then ultimately banging on the door.
“This better be important or you’re dead meat!” I angrily called out while unlatching the door and yanking it wide open, too miffed to peek into the peephole or even to think what I would do if it was one of the people I had lied to about my absence from town.
As soon as the person at the door came into my vision, my brows furrowed. This wasn’t real, my mind told me, it’s a dream. And so I shut the door immediately. But the bell rang again along with knocks at the door. Sticking an eye on the peephole, I saw that he had not yet disappeared. My heart started pounding against my chest as I shook the stupor off. This was real. He really was at my door.
The knocking did not stop so I tentatively opened the door and leaned forward to peek outside. He stood there with an almost bemused expression, seeing me wide-eyed. Slowly, I opened the door wider as I straightened up. He was here. It wasn’t a dream. My eyebrows furrowed in disbelief which quickly turned into confusion. There stood the man who had robbed me of myself. He had stolen whatever control I had over my heart and mind, of my emotions and actions, of my feelings and senses. Such was the power Maan Singh Khurana had over me. He stood there, sombre as ever, perhaps waiting for me to say something. But words betrayed me and I just stood there, stupidly staring at him, baffled and star struck at the same time.
“Won’t you invite me in?” Hearing his smooth, velvety voice made my heart miss a beat. I was surprised that my body could react this way to him after being in such agony over this very man for the past couple of days. It felt like my body was deceiving me and this angered me.
I wasn’t going to let him know the power he still held over me so I crossed my arms, eyebrows knitted together, looking away from him.
“What are you doing here?” I may have sounded rude but there was more genuine curiosity behind that question than I was willing to let on.
“Let’s talk.” My eyes flew back to his face at his words. A part of my mind noticed that he looked exhausted, bags under his eyes, stubble denser than his usual, as if it had been unkempt for many days. Carefully ignoring that part of my mind, I re-centred my focus on the current situation.
“There is nothing to talk about.” It came out harsh. “Please leave.”
I turned my face away in anger. He had no right to trample over my feelings like he did the other night, then leave me miserable and dealing with the acute pain of heartbreak and then just come strolling by to have a conversation and act like everything was fine. My eyes stung with angry tears but I resolutely kept them from spilling out.
“I’m not going anywhere.” His voice was as firm as his hand which instantly came up to hold the door in its place when I attempted to shut it. He did not push it open, but firmly held it in place, not letting me close it.
I clenched my teeth as I stared at him furiously. My hand was still holding the door, stopped midway by his hand on the other side. “If I wasn’t clear enough the first time, my mistake.” I said in a tightly controlled voice. “But just leave. Leave. Me. Alone.”
The threat and the anger in my voice had little to no effect on him and his stance as he slowly shook his head and spoke in a very calm voice. “Not until you listen to what I have to say.”
I glared at him as he stared back in such a composure that it only added to my ire. The staring contest continued, him cool and collected, I visibly irritated but neither of us willing to give up. At least not until his next words.
“I'm going to tell Anaya you lied about leaving town and that you’re still here.”
My mouth dropped open at his threat but I quickly pulled myself . “Oh, so now you’re keeping tabs on me?!”
I could not understand how Maan could just be so nonchalant right now. “You didn’t actually believe you would be able to pull that lie off on me, did you?” I grimaced. “You literally work for me.”
That pinched, for no good reason. “Yes, boss! Now if you’ll excuse me. I will see you at work.”
With that icy reply, I attempted to shut the door to Maan's face again but he put his foot between the door and the doorframe, while at the same time stopping it with his hands.
“Please, Geet!” His voice dropped a few notches, barely audible. It made me stop and look at his eyes. They were deep, dark and tired. “Just a few moments... please...”
The last whisper made something mellow down within me and I relented, dropping my hand from the door and turning to walk back, only stopping when I was in the centre of my living room. I wasn’t going to drop my angry facade, though. I just could not afford it.
I didn’t care to turn and see if he had followed but the door quietly closing and his very silent steps confirmed he had indeed come in.
Feeling jittery all of a sudden, I was unable to stay in one place so I started pacing the small space of my living room, being careful to keep a good distance between myself and where Maan stood at the corner, watching me silently. I was starting to get anxious. What did he want to talk about? I wondered. Had he come to rub salt in my wounds? To insult me? To mock me? Or to warn me to stay away from him?
Thinking about it left a sour taste in my mouth and I felt annoyed at Maan for having come over at all. What else could he possibly have to say to me? Without turning towards him, I took a deep breath and began speaking. Words rushed out of my mouth in a surprising speed.
“Look! I know what you want to say.”
“You do?” His startled voice made me give him a fleeting look. He was leaning against the wall, hands in his pockets, legs crossed at ankles leisurely as he watched me with one eyebrow arched upwards.
I turned away from his very distracting form and continued from one side to the other. “I know very clearly that you want nothing to do with me.” I paused momentarily shuddering as I remembered the night in the park. Sadness gripped my heart but I was determined not to let it show in my voice. “You don’t have to worry about anything. Whatever happened the other night is in the past and I can assure you I will not be interfering in your m-" I swallowed before forcing the word out, “married life.” I had stopped pacing but I stood facing away from him as I continued my tirade, struggling to keep the anger and annoyance in my voice so the hurt wouldn’t show. “I will not be in your life. I will quit my job and move out of the city. You won’t ever have to see me again and you can live a peaceful life with your family.”
I swallowed the budding lump in my throat. I had not dropped this bomb on anyone yet, not Anaya, not Raya, nobody. My grieving time of the past few days had led me to make this decision and however much it hurt, I knew I had to go away if I was to live a life even remotely as normal as it was earlier. I knew Raya wasn’t going to be easy on this decision but I had to do right by me this time. I needed to start afresh, even if I knew the distance I put between myself and Maan was never going to fade my love for him.
Maan sighed loudly. “And I thought I was the one who wanted to talk!”
I shot him a glare. He wasn’t leaning against the wall any more. He was standing erect with his arms across his chest, his face the expression of utter seriousness. For a second, I cowered in the face of his stature before composing myself and putting on a brave front again.
My voice came out stronger than I felt at the moment. “It is in the best interests of everyone.”
“You’re not a good judge of what’s best for everyone.” For the first time since he had come here, I felt his calmness turn into something akin to vexation. He had almost snapped at me and it triggered my own ego.
“Maybe not.” I slapped back at him coldly. “But I’m not going to wait around for anyone else to tell me what’s good for me, at least.”
His eyes turned to slits, shooting daggers at me. “Maybe don’t make the choices which affect others.”
I huffed out an exasperated breath. “Did you come to taunt me on how my decisions affect other people?”
He shut his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened them, the cynical Maan was replaced with a calmer, sensible man.
“No.” His voice was quieter. “I’m sorry.”
“What do you want me to do?” I was still not as collected as he had successfully managed to be.
“It's just that...I want you to think of what implications your decisions have on the lives of those around you...” he hesitated before saying the last part, “and if you still must make such choices then you should talk to people beforehand.”
I processed what he said. It took a few long seconds while he waited patiently. I opened my mouth to answer him but nothing came out.
“I don’t understand.” I finally said. “Who should I consult with when deciding things about my own life? And why?”
“Me, perhaps?” He said it like it was the most obvious answer to my question.
“Why would I do that?” I was confused as to where he was leading with this.
“Because, Geet -" he took a step closer, making me warily eye him, fighting the urge to take a step back. “Whatever decisions you make in your life have, still do and will always affect me and my life.”
“You’ve lost me.” I told him, utterly baffled.
He shook his head while taking another tiny but visible step towards me. “I can’t afford it anymore.”
“What?”
“I said,” his voice turned impassioned, and it caught me off guard, “I can not afford to lose you again.”
My brows furrowed. He had stopped making sense and his very slow steps towards me were starting to make me self-conscious. “Listen, Maan -"
“No, you listen to me now!” His voice low, his steps determined, his gait like that of a panther on his hunt. I inadvertently took a step back. “I am done.” Another step towards me. “I am done thinking of you.” His gaze set on me, his eyes deep and enchanting, did not allow me to look away. “I am done letting you play with my heart and feelings.”
“You... you’re making no sense.” I stammered but he was too focused to be swayed.
“I am done trying to be strong and,” with another step, he stopped only a couple steps away from me, almost towering me, “I am done running away from you.”
“Wh- what?”
“Geet,” Maan almost whispered, his eyes the depth of the deepest seas, holding countless mysteries in them. “I am not strong enough to live through the pain of your separation again...” His eyes dipped, hiding away the secrets which were buried in them. “I can’t...” he was shaking his head slowly, struggling to find words as his hand reached out to grab mine in a surprisingly tender grip. “I just can’t let you go away from me this time.”
“What are you talking about?” My head was starting to spin while my hand lay limply in his warm hands.
He lifted his gaze, looked deep into my eyes and said every word slowly, enough to let me know he meant what he was saying. “I won’t let you leave. I want you here... with me.”
I was shaking my head. “But... but... I don’t understand... you’re about to belong to someone else and you want nothing to do with how I feel about you.” It hurt to repeat this truth. I pulled my hand away and stepped back. “Why would you want me here then?”
He wasn’t one to be deterred either, for he closed the distance I’d put between us in one step. “What if I said I’ve been running away from my own heart all these years? What if I said I believed you to be out of my bounds... unreachable... unattainable?”
“No.” I gave a short, humourless chuckle even though I felt on the verge of tears. “I can’t believe it.”
“It’s nothing but the truth.” He said it with such authority that my hands started shaking. Hearing him say that he had been pining for me and denying himself for all this while was too much for me to handle. Memories from the night in the park came crashing down on me. I remembered his words which had slashed through me and I couldn’t figure out which version of Maan I was to believe, the one standing in front of me, trying to make me believe the unbelievable or the one in the park who had not held back in letting me know how little I mattered to him. Tears began to cloud my vision as my breath came in short gasps.
“It doesn’t make any sense... I... I... broke your heart...” My eyes could no longer hold the accumulating tears and they started to spill over on to my cheeks in a stream. “You said I didn’t matter!” I cried out. Of all the things he had said to me, this one had felt like a dagger slicing through my heart. It was the most painful memory to me.
He dipped his head. “I know, I’m sorry.” Raising his eyes to look at me, he continued speaking in a voice I had never heard from him. It sounded ashamed yet determined to make things right. “I wasn’t thinking straight. But it was one of the biggest lies I have ever told.” He tried to take a step towards me but I jerked backwards, angrily trying to wipe my eyes from the sleeves of my sweatshirt. It did little good, for more tears replaced them just as quickly. “You matter, Geet. I can not explain in words how much you matter to me.”
It was a lot to take in. I couldn’t wrap my head around his words. He couldn’t possibly express his love for me now. It was too late. It wasn’t just about the two of us now. There was another woman in the picture.
“No... no...” I kept shaking my head while sniffling. “I can’t do this.” Another bout of tears overcame me and my voice kept breaking as I spoke. “I can’t do this to another woman. We don’t belong together... Go away!”
With that, my tear-stricken face fell into my hands as my knees gave up and I sank to the floor, sobbing my heart out.
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Maan's POV
My heart shattered into a million pieces seeing her in so much pain. I fell on my knees too, unable to watch her suffer like this. I knew she had been through so much and I needed to give her time to process through everything but I just simply could not stand by and watch her go through it alone. I wasn’t going to be a spectator in her life anymore. I scooted to her side and wrapped my arms around her, pulling her body into my chest. Sobs rocked through her body while I just held on to her, trying to provide her some support and comfort, wanting her to know I was there for her.
She did not flinch away at my touch and deep down, it gave me some satisfaction. I lay my cheek on her head, holding her close as I could and shut my eyes. It felt like I belonged here, like this was what my arms were made to hold. It felt like home. I had spent the last four days feeling lost. Realising that one of my deepest wishes, which I could dare not share with anyone, had finally come true and Geet loved me, crying over pushing her away from me, agonising over losing her over and over again, it all had drained me. Something snapped in me and it took some hard questions from myself to finally muster up the courage and come up to her place. I was determined not to let it go wrong. Not this time!
I kept rubbing her back softly, trying to soothe her until her sobs began turning to whimpers and then gradually transformed into soft sniffles. She did not attempt to move even after she had quieted down and I wondered if she fell asleep. I was just revelling in holding her close before the inevitable questions would follow. I knew there were many things Geet and I had to talk through before I could make any claims on her.
After what seemed like a long time, she moved. I felt her wiping her eyes and pulling her head back. I didn’t want to move but still loosened my grip. She took the opportunity to shift away from me just enough to put some space between us. Her face, beautiful as it was, seemed exhausted and worn down. Her hazel eyes full of confusion, full of questions. My hands were still lightly holding her by the top of her arms.
“I believe we really do need to talk.” I chuckled lightly but she was still serious.
“Yes.” It was all she said.
I looked around and pulled myself up against the wall of her open kitchen island, which had been very close to where we both were sitting. I rested my back against it while still sitting on the floor with crossed legs. Geet kept gazing at me so I patted the place beside me. She then crawled over to sit beside me, her legs pulled up against her chest and her arms wrapped around them. She put her chin on top of her knees, her eyes set straight ahead. Her posture screamed of her state of mind right now: she wanted to protect herself from any further hurt. It made me sad to think she was protecting herself from me.
I sighed and let my head rest against the kitchen island. I needed to come clean with her. “Geet...” my voice sounded hoarse but I didn’t care anymore. “I have spent the last four days in agony.” In my peripheral vision, I saw her turning her head slightly towards me. “I know these past few days haven’t been easy on you... and I’m sorry to have been the cause for it.”
I turned my head towards her, hers was resting on top of her knees, turned to look at me.
“I really am.”
She lowered her eyes wordlessly.
“I didn’t take it too well when you left me almost a decade ago...” Geet closed her eyes. I didn’t like it because her eyes were windows to her soul and I could tell by her eyes how she felt. “I had been so involved in loving you for three years... ever since I first saw you and I had imagined us being together so many times that the reality threw me off an edge I didn’t know I was standing on.” She winced but did not open her eyes. “It felt like the world had ended... that my life had ended... I was suicidal.” She gasped as I shuddered and drew in a shaky breath. “My mom pulled me out of that darkness. She knew how much I was hurting because she was the only one who knew the depth of my love.” I remembered those gloomy days. “She is my saviour and I can not explain the extent to which she has gone to pull me back to life.”
I took a deep breath. “When I finally started coming back to normal life, I discovered that the only way I could live was to taint every memory I cherished of you with anger and hatred. Hatred was timber for me. So I changed. I convinced myself I hated you for leading me on... for knowingly letting me believe you felt just the same as I did... I hated you for all the good memories we made together because they haunted me... and most of all, I loathed you for having such a power over me... I found out that hating you was the only way out for me...”
Geet was wincing with every sentence I said but I needed to let it out even if it felt embarrassing at the moment.
“I guess I deserved all the hatred.” She said in a small voice.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” I said softly.
She ignored what I said. “How come your family does not hate me?”
“If you’re talking about my mother then you must be aware that she’s a lot more sensible than I am. She always gives the other person a benefit of doubt. You were way above being just any person for her so she could not hold it against you that you went your own way.”
“She’s such a pure soul.” Geet's voice held the respect and fondness I knew she had in her heart for my mother.
“She is.” I smiled slightly.
We fell silent for a few moments, the only sound being the ticking of the wall clock.
“Where do we stand right now?” Her whisper was barely audible but enough for me to speak again. There were still some explanations I needed to give for her to be able to make sense of the situation we were in right now.
“I learnt to live with my hatred and moved on with life, until you showed up again.” I recalled seeing her after seven years and the memories flooding back. “I acted cool and made myself believe your return did not affect me. I showed you that I had changed entirely and even flirted with you so you would not get too close to me.”
“I remember that.” She added with a very small chuckle. Hearing that soft sound gave me an unbelievable sense of happiness. “You were known as a Don Juan.”
I snorted. “I did date a lot of girls so the title might be justified.”
I saw Geet's eyebrows raise. “Were any of them good?”
I contemplated teasing her a little but decided it wasn’t the right time. Instead, I reached for her hand, which was still wrapped around her knees. Gently but firmly wrapping my hand around hers, I looked into her widened eyes and said with utmost sincerity, “None could hold a candle in front of you.”
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Geet's POV
I was robbed of speech. It felt like my heart had started to come alive again. How could one small sentence seem so powerful, yet so romantic at the same time? I looked down at my hand in his. He was obstinately holding on to it and if I was to be very honest to myself, I liked how it felt. I did not attempt to pull it away but I wasn’t entirely placated yet.
“The other night...” I trailed off, hinting him to start speaking again.
“Ahh, yes!” He pulled my hand and held it in both of his, which rested in his lap. “You’d been so distant since a few days and it was driving me crazy. I’d already been so restless by the whole proposal scenario that seeing you shut me out seemed like the last straw.”
I grimaced at the reminiscence but otherwise stayed quiet as he continued to speak.
“I hate to admit but it bruised my ego when I tried to get you to open up and you shunned me so I just kept away. So when you called me there, I didn’t know what to expect but I was not ready for what you sprung on me. I’m not proud of how I reacted. It was an unintended reaction but I got carried away and... well, I hurt you in the process.”
He looked down at our hands. “When the initial anger wore off, I couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of things. To have you fall in love with me was a dream I had buried in the deepest corner of my heart. Seeing it come true at a time when I had finally compromised to share my life with someone other than you felt like the universe was mocking me.” Hurt settled in his voice. “It felt like it was laughing at me that I couldn’t have the person that I loved... that I still loved... and I was the one pushing that person away...”
The pain in his voice cut through me. I crossed my legs and shifted so I was facing him now. He still had my one hand in a firm grip so I reached out with my other hand and put it on top of his. He looked up and I noticed his eyes held tears swimming in them. How I wished I could comfort him.
“It’s taken a lot of courage for me to come here today... to fight against the person I had built myself to be in these ten years... to accept the truth I had been denying for a decade...”
I waited patiently, my heart pounding loud, stomach full of knots.
“Geet...” his voice was merely above a whisper, his eyes a pool of emotions. “I love you...” I sucked in a breath. Hearing him say it felt surreal. It was electrifying, it was scaring, it was stupefying and it was overwhelming. I went through so many emotions that my eyes filled up. “I really love you, Geet!”
A lone tear trickled down my cheek. Maan brought his hand up, tenderly wiping it away and cupping my cheek in his warm palm. “I always have and I always will.”
Edited by mayyo - 1 years ago
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