Smitar's OS:Knowing Khushi Part 9 Page 123 (Mar 4) - Page 15

Love it! What so Khushi have to talk about?? Hmmm..., I guess we'll find Out in the next installment!

again a nice one...but where this one is going ..become a suspense story...cant wait for next one

khushiu is truely a sanki:) bt y wud arnav stop her sagai? is he or his cousin getting engage to her?

Loved it... Completely loved it

Go Arnav Babua go and stop the sigai of ur would be life and wife and love and everything else

Smita,😊

Here is my interpretation to Part 3.

The update is based on food for thought. PABULUM.

Khushi remained seated. She seriously didn't think her legs would support her if she tried to stand up.

"I dare because I am getting engaged to your Jijaji, Shyam Manohar Jha!", she said quietly.

"Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game" ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

There was a moment of silence. Then came a furious 'What the!"

Khushi nodded. "Ji. I too swore when I found out. Not "what the!' because my English is poor, but 'Hey Devi Maiyya!'"

"People swear because if you shoot a bullet someone dies. If you drop a bomb many die. You hit a woman, love dies. But if you swear nothing actually happens" ~ Richard Curtis

Arnav sat down, very slowly.

"Get out." His voice was soft and deadly, his eyes like laser beams.

"But my patience isn't limitless... unlike my authority" ~ Dan Abnett, Xenos

"If I get out now, I will have to come back again.", Khushi said, her voice equally soft.

Arnav asked, gritting his teeth, "Do you want me to drag you out of this office and throw you out on the street?"

"Not the fastest horse can catch a word spoken in anger" ~ Chinese Proverb

"No. Shukriya for asking. But I can walk." Khushi looked directly into his eyes.

Arnav glared at her, his jaw clenched.

"Whatever you do or say, I am not getting married to a man who already has a wife." Her voice was sad, but the determination in it was clear.

"Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never... in nothing, great or small, large or petty... never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy" ~ Winston Churchill,

Never Give In!:The Best of Winston Churchill's Speeches

"A few days after we brought Babuji back home from the hospital, Shyam Manohar Jha approached Buaji. He said that he was a lawyer, that he was from Lucknow, that he needed a place to stay urgently, that he was an orphan'.", Khushi sighed.

Arnav sat, his face hewn in stone. "You are lying."

"The truth." Dumbledore sighed. "It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution" ~ J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Khushi did not bother to respond to him. She continued,

"Buaji is a widow, living on her husband's pension. And with Babuji being ill, we needed the money. So Buaji rented out a room to him." Khushi looked at Arnav's cold face with sorrow in her heart.

"Why must there always be a price to pay for every indulgence, and why must it so often be withdrawn from the bankrupt accounts of the innocent?" ~ Andrew Levkoff, A Mixture of Madness

"He knows how to pull the heart strings of women, especially older women. His smarmy ways, his oily smiles that never reach his eyes, his pretty speeches'Uughhh'. Soon Buaji and Amma began looking on him as a son they had never had. And he loved it'.. Luknowi chaat'.pooja with the family'..helping in the kitchen'talking to the guests as though he were a family member''" Khushi clenched her fists as though she were closing them around Shyam's neck.

"Charming villains have always had a decided social advantage over well-meaning people who chew with their mouths open" ~ Judith Martin

"You are lying." Arnav was quiet but emphatic.

"Why should I?"

"Because you want to hurt my sister, my family. Because you want something from me." Arnav's cold eyes rained ice on her.

"A torn jacket is soon mended, but hard words bruise the heart" ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Khushi nodded. "I do want something from you. Just help to stop the wedding between me & your Jijaji. I have no intention of harming your family. If I had wanted to make your sister cry, all I had to do was sit at home and get engaged first & then married."

Arnav fumed, shock & helplessness eating into his self-control.

"You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength"

~ Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Khushi pushed a glass of water closer to him.

"Soon, he approached Buaji with a marriage proposal. Buaji & Amma were delighted. A responsible lawyer, a boy who was like a son, who would stay with them'a perfect match for their Sanka Devi who does one foolishness after the other''" Khushi sighed. "If Babuji were well, I don't think he would have accepted the proposal without finding out why Shyamji travels so much, is absent from home on many days & nights of the week'..Anyway, Babuji is ill. He can't even lift his hand''..Buaji & Amma are all for this wedding. They don't know what kind of a scoundrel he is'.." Khushi sighed, tired. She placed her hands on his table, crossed them, and leaned her chin on them like a child.

"I was praying at the big, white temple on the Main Road, asking Devi Maiyya why I didn't want to marry Shyamji. Then I saw him with a beautiful lady. She was smiling at him. He filled her maang, and she tried to touch his feet. He stopped her, and said. "Your place is not at my feet, Rani Sahiba, but in my heart!"

Khushi didn't notice Arnav paling.

"One man on two boats, will fall into the water sooner or later" ~ Adrian Adam Lee

"The lady limped away to a car. I ran to Happyji who had brought me to the temple in his auto, and asked him to follow the car. It was difficult, but we finally traced her to Shantivan. I didn't tell Happyji anything. He knows Shyamji, you see'I didn't want Shyamji knowing that I had found out that he had a wife." Her voice was low, reflecting her fatigue at the long battle she had been fighting against her family & Shyamji.

"I'm tired of pretending, tired of acting like everything's okay" ~ Terra Elan McVoy, The Summer of Firsts and Lasts

"I found out that it was your house, that the lady was your sister'..I got your office's address from the watchman'I tried to see you'But how could I tell the receptionist or your secretary why I wanted to see you?" Khushi looked at Arnav.

"It's not me who can't keep a secret. It's the people I tell that can't" ~ Abraham Lincoln

Arnav looked at Khushi for a moment, silent. Then he got up, picked up the photo of his sister & her husband that he kept on a glass ledge behind her, and showed it to Khushi.

"Yes. This is the scoundrel. And this is the lady I saw in the temple." There was no triumph in her voice, only deep sorrow. "I told Babuji, but couldn't tell Buaji & Amma. Or Jiji. Because if they knew, they would throw him out'..and he would retaliate.

"Retaliate?"

Khushi nodded.

"Once I realised that he was a crook, I started paying closer attention to him. Odd people call him up'at odd times'.and the way he talks to them'as though threatening them''I don't know if he is a criminal as well as a scoundrel, but I cannot take the risk."

"Never trust to general impressions, my boy, but concentrate yourself upon details."

~ Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

She looked into his eyes. "I am sorry. I know I have hurt you. I am sorry. There was'there was no other way'.."

"How do I know that you have told me the truth?", Arnav was equally sombre.

"Truth never damages a cause that is just"

~Mahatma Gandhi

"You don't. But maybe you can find out." Khushi got up from her seat, putting the strap of her cloth bag around her neck. "Hum chalte hein."

"Your phone number.", Arnav demanded.

She gave it.

"If you are lying, I will destroy your life." The threat was very real.

"To let the brain work without sufficient material is like racing an engine. It racks itself to pieces"

~ Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Devil's Foot

"My life is already in tatters. There is nothing more you can do to destroy it.", Khushi replied, her sad eyes on his. "Namaste."

She walked away, out of his office, down the steps, towards the exit. Near the door, she turned to look at him.

"I walk out the door with a heavy feeling in my heart as another secret falls on top of it"

~ Jessica Sorensen, The Coincidence of Callie and Kayden

Even at this distance, he could see the glint of tears in her eyes and the movement of her lips as she murmured, "I am sorry."

"Apology is a lovely perfume; it can transform the clumsiest moment into a gracious gift" ~ Margaret Lee Runbeck

Even after hearing Arnav Singh Raizada question her audacity and the propriety of asking him to break her engagement, Khushi remained seated. She felt nerveless after hearing the range of his decibels. In contrast to his worked up shout, she in a cool quiet tone, answered to him that she definitely dares to speak to him because, the person she was getting engaged to, was his brother-in-law!

"Dare, and the world always yields: or, if it beat you sometimes, dare again, and it will succumb"

~ William Makepeace Thackeray, The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon Esquire Written by Himself and Catherine a Story

This statement of hers was greeted by stunned silence followed by his trademark epithet "What the!" Khushi told him, "Ji. I too swore when I found out. Not "what the!' because my English is poor, but 'Hey Devi Maiyya!'"

"Swearing relieves the feelings - that is what swearing does. I explained this to my aunt on one occasion, but it didn't answer with her. She said I had no business to have such feelings"

~ Jerome K. Jerome, Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow

Arnav sitting back on his chair, made himself spit out a "Get out" in a deceptively calm but low toned deadly voice, with eyes spitting, angry balls of fire.

Khushi though quivering inside, was calm and collected outward. She told him in a cool voice, that if she heeds his command then she'll have to take pains to come again. Arnav gritting his teeth and bit out, whether she wants the privilege of being dragged out of his office and thrown into the street by him.

"Keep your words soft and tender because tomorrow you may have to eat them"

But Khushi unfazed by his anger, meeting his eyes unflinchingly, told him that he need not exert so much as she was definitely capable of walking out herself.

"Those who are made can be unmade"

~ Hilary Mantel, Bring Up the Bodies

Her retort just fueled his anger. She said,"Whatever you do or say, I am not getting married to a man who already has a wife." She made it quite clear that she was determined not to go through it.

"If plan A doesn't work, the alphabet has 25 more letters - 204 if you're in Japan"

~ Claire Cook, Seven Year Switch

She was not going to be a part of a bigamy offence.

"One wife, you're happy, two and you're tired, three and they'll hate each other, four and they'll hate you" ~ Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind

Continuing her narration of her story, she told him how they came in contact with Shyam Manohar Jha. After they had brought her father home, Shyam had approached her aunt and had said he was a lawyer from Lucknow, an orphan and needed a place to stay urgently. Arnav though was attentive to what she had to say, accused her of lying.

"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored" ~ Aldous Huxley, Complete Essays 2, 1926-29

Without paying any attention to what he was accusing her off, Khushi continued saying that, her Buaji who was a widow and depended on her husband's pension, with her brother ill needed money. So a room was rented out to Shyam. He being adept in Pharisaic ways and endowed with slithery smile soon made himself indispensable and had the elder ladies of the house eating out of his hands. They started to treat him like a son they never had.

"There's nothing more dangerous than a man with charm" ~ Christina Aguilera, Christina Aguilera - Back to Basics

Arnav Singh Raizada just couldn't believe what he was hearing about his Jijaji! Again he accused her of lying! When she asked why would she be doing so, he told resting his cold eyes upon her, like shards of icicles piercing her, that she wanted to hurt his sister, his family and was out to extract something out of him the rich business tycoon.

"Do you believe a man can truly love a woman and constantly betray her?Never mind physically but betray her in his mind,in the very "poetry of his soul".Well,it's not easy but men do it all the time"

~ Mario Puzo, Fools Die

Khushi nodded she did want something out of Arnav and that was to stop the wedding between her and his brother-in-law. Further she told him that she had no intention of harming his family. If ever her intention was to bring misery into his sister's life, all she had to do was to go put up with this rigmarole and wed his Jijaji quietly. Hearing Khushi's reasonable argument Arnav felt helpless and was seething with anger. He felt his self control being eroded.

"To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart" ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

Seeing his state Khushi pushed the glass of water towards him and continued. Shyam soon inveigled her Amma and Buaji into accepting his proposal to marry Khushi. The Ladies found him to be a perfect match for her, their Sanka Devi, who was known for tomfoolery. She said if only her father was well enough to express, he would have not agreed without verifying Shyam's travels and absence for days together. He has her Amma and Buaji mesmerized by his glib tongue and slimy ways! They are not aware of his serpentine ways.

With a tired sigh reposing her cheek on her hands placed on his desk she continued. One day while she was praying at the Devi Maiyya temple on the Main Road to give her a clue as to why she was hesitant to marry Shyam she saw him placing a pinch of sindoor on a beautiful Lady with a slight limp. When the lady tried to touch his feet, he stopped her saying, "Your place is not at my feet, Rani Sahiba, but in my heart!"

"All human beings have three lives: public, private, and secret" ~ Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Gabriel Garca Marquez: a Life

Khushi engrossed in her narration, didn't notice Arnav going pale. She continued saying that the lady went away in a car and she followed it on Happyji's auto that she had come in. Shadowing it, they found it went to Shantivan and not wanting to disclose the reason for following the lady to Happyji as he was in friendly terms with Shyam she returned home. While narrating her story it was obvious that she was at the tether end of her constant fight with her family and Shyam.

"I am strong, but I am tired, Stephen, tired of always having to be the strong one, of always having to do the right thing" ~ Brenda Joyce, An Impossible Attraction

Finding out it was his house and the lady his sister she procured the office address from the watchman and had tried to meet him. But all her attempts were in vain as she was unable to give his receptionist or his secretary, her reason's to see him

"While all deception requires secrecy, all secrecy is not meant to deceive" ~ Sissela Bok

She knew she couldn't divulge the reason as it would lead to controversy and also one never knew how people who received it would use the information!

"Be careful who you tell your secrets to because when situations change... sometimes, so do people" ~ Gwen Ro

Observing her keenly he showed his sister and her husband's snap shot. She recognized the people"Yes. This is the scoundrel. And this is the lady I saw in the temple. I told Babuji, but couldn't tell Buaji & Amma. Or Jiji. Because if they knew, they would throw him out'..and he would retaliate." When she used the word retaliate he was surprised. Then she recounted as to what she had done to know about him. Realizing for what he was, a crook, she started observing him quietly. She found that he had shady characters calling him at odd time, he would threaten some of the callers, his rough talk made her conclude may be he had criminal connections. Maybe he was a criminal too in addition to being a scoundrel. That was why she couldn't risk the safety of her family by directly accusing him. It was a risk she was not ready to take. That was why she had come to him.

"What is important is not what you hear said, it's what you observe" ~ Michael Connelly, Trunk Music

Looking into Arnav's eyes she apologized for being the bearer of this news as she knew it had hurt him. She told him that all the other methods had carried a risk for the family and she couldn't compromise on their safety.

Hearing her story Arnav asked her how will he know whether what she had told was the truth to be believed, she said he needn't take her word but could get the facts verified. Slinging her bag around her neck, she got up to go.

"You should not honor men more than truth"

~ Plato

At Arnav's demand she readily gave him her contact number. He clearly stated to her that if he found all that she had told him was a pack of lies, then he wouldn't hesitate to destroy her.

"You don't destroy what you want to acquire in the future" ~ Suzanne Collins, Mockingjay

Khushi replied saying that her life was already in tatters and he had nothing more to destroy. With a woebegone look she took her leave with a "Namaste." As she reached the main door she turned towards him. He could make out from a distance she with a tear filled eyes murmur "I am sorry."

"An apology is the superglue of life. It can repair just about anything"

That sorry was for bringing her problems to him to fix. It was for putting him in a spot wherein he had to take action to safeguard his sister. It was for causing him pain by being the bearer of unsavory information. She who was used to taking all the hurt, couldn't bear to see another person being hurt!

In this update we see Khushi without being intimidated by Arnav's anger and outbursts calmly presents her thoughts to him. His journey to the truth begins with anger to denial mode and now he is amenable to verification. In his anger he had accused her of being a destroyer of his sister, of his family and a seeker of his wealth. But in the end of the update he just threatens to destroy her if her allegations were found to be baseless. Her narration has changed his take on his Jijaji. From being able to vouch for him unconditionally he is now changing. He is now questioning his perceptions and is ready to verify the facts. Her narrative has made him think hard about his Jijaji and reassess his perceptions about him! Khushi has provided him with a heap, a heap of food for thought!

That's it. PABULUM...

That's it from me. Hope you enjoy it!

What a shocking chapter!

i just read part 2 and part 3

Wowww..love tis story...another side to ipknnd n i juz cant waitt to read more...

Hope u will cont plsss...

Ossum dear
supern
w8fr the next update
give soon