PART 2
As the kind man looked up into her face, an expression of
pain and horror on his own, Khushi leaned forward to help him to his feet. He resisted her attempts, almost recoiling from her hands. Seeing this, little Khushi, slightly confused, reached just her hand forward to the kind man. This time, contact was achieved, as she patted his white, strained cheeks with her dirty fingers. Khushi swallowed her tears as she tried,
instinctively, to comfort the stricken person before her who stared so weirdly at her face.
"Whats wrong, Uncle?"
asked Simran, shaking Arnav's arm, frightened by both
the strange look on her Uncle's face, and by his harsh breathing that seemed to
shudder through his frozen body. Arnav
focused on the ground, trying to control his thudding heartbeats, when little
Khushi 's voice intruded into the nightmare that had gripped him once again, a
nightmare that had no beginning and no end.
Khushi was now getting a little teary eyed again, a change brought by the odd look on Simran's Uncle's face. She was, honestly, a little upset by the kind Uncle's strange reaction to her name, and now said
"Can you help me call my momma? She works at the store
across the park, and she left me to play here until her break-time. I'm not
supposed to talk to any strangers, and I'm supposed to play with the other
children and not be naughty and cause anyone any trouble. But my foot hurts, Uncle,
and I want my momma..."
The little trembling voice broke through to Arnav when even Simran's urgent
shaking had not registered. Somehow, he controlled himself. Focusing on the small foot, Arnav told Simran
to hold Khushi's hand in her own, to comfort her while he fixed the sprain.
Simran, puzzled by the expression she was seeing on her normally granite faced
Uncle, did as she was told. His voice was gravelly and thick with some suppressed emotion
as he told Khushi
"Thora dard hoga" and, with a
swift movement, twisted the small foot first left and right.
The action was done too quickly to hurt, and Khushi, sitting up and examining
her now healed foot with great awe, threw her arms around the kind Uncle. The stiff
man patted her back awkwardly, and silently handed her his cell phone.
Khushi made a careful call, her small pink tongue sticking out as she frowned with
the effort of getting her momma's numbers entered just right. She was pleased
with her success, and in a few moments, Arnav was speaking to a hysterical
woman, Khushi's absent mother. The woman on the phone begged him to wait at the playground with
little Khushi for just ten minutes, while she rushed over to pick up her
daughter.
*********************************************************************************************
Amrita Singh, a junior salesgirl at the Greater Kailash branch of AR Design
Group's Bridal Boutique almost had a heart attack when she recognized who
little Khushi's
"kind Uncle-ji' was. Stammering
her thanks to the great Mr. Arnav Singh Raizada for looking after her little
daughter, Amrita stared at the enigmatic man who was her company's powerful
owner. To her surprise, he paid no attention to her, and was looking at a now
cheerful, fidgety Khushi with almost despairing eyes. Puzzled by his odd
expression, Amrita tried to apologize for the inconvenience that Mr Raizada has
suffered. Her words were again ignored.
"Why do you allow...her...to
play in a public park when its not safe?"asked Arnav, and was told,
with some hesitation, that Amrita's duties at the AR Boutique did not allow her
to chaperon her daughter at all times. The park was safe enough in the afternoon since there were so many children there. This was the only free time Khushi
had to play, and just run around and enjoy herself. Amrita's husband, Pradeep Singh
had died some time ago, so, as a single mother, she could not afford full time
childcare. Mr. Arnav Raizada just listened, silently.
A car screeched to a stop a few feet from them.
There was something peculiar going on here, Amrita thought, as she watched her
company's president turn to face two beautiful women, who had just pulled up
in an SUV.
She had seen pictures of both
ladies in the Delhi Society pages, so she knew that the older lady with the
limp was Anjali, Mr Raizada's sister, while the younger, softer-looking woman
was Payal Raizada, who was Aakash sir's spouse. Both women looked around, and spotting
them, hurried to Mr Raizada's side as if he was in some kind of trouble. There manner was agitated, as if Mr Raizada was in danger, and
not just standing by a playground, talking to his very junior employee and staring at her
young daughter.
Khushi, all this while, had been making busy making new
plans with Simran about tomorrow's games. Simran's earlier worry for her friend
prompted her to ask if Khushi could in fact play at all, given the state
of her injury. Khushi, by now, had been spotted as well, and was being examined with painful intensity by the two silent, well dressed ladies. She was a friendly child, and these Aunties did look very concerned, given the way they were staring first at her, and then at Uncle-ji. Khushi was worried about their concern for her, there was no need to look so upset. So, to make everyone happy, she was in the middle
of assuring everybody about her excellent, almost miraculous good health when Payal
Raizada, who had been staring at her for past two minutes suddenly,
audibly, gasped when she heard Khushi's voice.
They were all behaving so oddly. Why would Anjali Raizada look so desperately, with such tearful eyes, at her brother? Why would Payal Raizada shake her head as if in denial, and turn away abruptly from the sight of little Khushi's smiling face? Amrita Singh was normally not a very
sensitive person, but even she felt a sense of strain, of suppressed panic and tension as if
there was an actual fog of something dark and suffocating in the air. Sensing that the two women behind Mr Raizada were
somewhat agitated by her daughter's presence, Amrita firmly took her daughter's
hand and turned to return to the Boutique.
Khushi was being led away by her mother when she turned, one final time. She
had wanted to wave a goodbye to Simran when she noticed the kind Uncle-ji had
put his hands up to his eyes, and that his entire body was shaking as if he was very ill.
Concerned for the man who had been so good to her, and who she could sense was, for some reason, not okay, she asked loudly, and with genuine worry "Tum
Thik Ho?"
And that was when Arnav Singh Raizada finally let go.
Originally posted by: arisaiI have no words for this psychic ability anymore. It's not just borderline weird anymore- it's full blown creepy. 😆
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