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Continu story part 3
PART 3: 'Some choices and some decisions...'
Scorching heat of the sun shone brightly above the persons' heads. They, oblivious to the heat of the atmosphere, drowned back into the heat of the fire that was ignited years back into their lives...
Eight years ago...
Asher froze still, despite the ashes burning before his eyes, and gasped. The low gasp that escaped his lips broke away the thunderous silence and the police broke away their gaze to look at the youngsters standing there.
"You are the brother of Khizer Hussain, right?" one of the policemen eyed Asher and wondered.
Asher, closing his eyes in hurt and delusion, nodded his head.
Khushi barely moved, staring wide-eyed at the ashes going down; of her best friend, her life's biggest achievement and her own shadow dying down.
She ran forward, forgetting all the security systems, as the fire-brigade rescued Asad of the inflamed place.
His dark and hollow eyes were showcasing nothingness as several memories hunched his heart. The last moment which he spent with the love of his life will haunt him for the rest of his misery and he knew that.
"Asad," Khushi frantically threw her arms, holding his collar, and yelled, "Zoya is going to come with other rescuers, right? She is going to come back, right?"
Asher glanced back at Zoya. The police-man questioned him, "Did you have any idea that your friend, Ms.Zoya Farooqi, was supposed to visit your brother, Mr.Khizer Hussain's bungalow?"
His eyes far-off, Asher shook his head. If he would have had any idea then Zoya wouldn't have been dead today. He surrendered himself to guilt or it held him somewhere; he was unsure.
Khushi ran after a morose Asad and held his wrist into her grip, digging down her nails to scratch his veins, and yelled out, "Tell me, Asad, where is Zoya? She was supposed to come out with you, she always did! Whenever we used to get into trouble after bunking classes, you were the one who got her out of it!"
Asad looked into Khushi's eyes, her deep hazel eyes, which always whispered meaningful tales. But at this deadly moment, her eyes were not her. They were afraid; frightened; angry and guilty.
"Zoya is dead..." Asher's whisper tried to strike its way into Khushi's mind.
Ignoring it completely, Khushi angrily pushed Asad and shouted, "Where is Zoya, Asad? Where is my Zoya?"
Asad shook his head and tilting his head rightwards, whispered softly, as if sharing a secret, "Our Zoya is burnt, Khushi."
Asher slapped her hard as she stood still, rooted, and shrieked, his eyes fiery red with anguish, "Zoya is dead! She is dead, Khushi!"
"Asad..." the whisper of Asher Hussain, which had once caressed their lively days, sealed the moment with its presence.
Asad's eyes, moist, blinked and he stated in a plain tone, "It is wonderful to meet you, Mr.Asher Hussain. Shall we proceed with the meeting?"
"Khirad!" she exclaimed, limping forward to hug her best friend and her sister.
Anjali's affectionate embrace filled warmth within her and she softly smiled.
"Asalam-walekum, Anjali Aapi. Rimsha Aapi discusses you a lot."
She laughed and fondly held her best friend's hand, chirpily saying, "That is her specialty. She discusses a lot."
The three women laughed and finally entered the mansion taking slow, moody strides. As they entered, their chatter reached its ultimatum.
"Khirad, you and Rimsha sit here while I arrange for some snacks and bring Naani to meet you guys," Anjali explained and moved back, smile still lingering on her lips.
Khirad comfortably settled herself on the sofa set and muttered to her sister, "She is absolutely amazing, Aapi, just like you described."
"She is; I told you. And her husband and Naani are also too good. You must meet Anurag Bhai jaan," Rimsha told her sister.
Khirad nodded and checked messages on her phone. No messages from Asher.
"Naani!" Rimsha shrieked and ran forward to hug the elder lady.
Naani, indeed, was a very pleasant lady. In her early eighties, she had the heart of a child; a sensitive innocent child. But on a front, she had the authority surrounding her and this was showcased when Anjali arbitrated.
"Naani, Khirad is a writer. You read the novel Musloom?" Anjali spoke while Khirad smiled, talking to Rimsha.
"Yes, what a beautiful book Musloom is. Wonderful!" Naani praised.
Anjali placed a warm hand on Khirad's shoulder and said, "Then, meet the author of it, Naani. Khirad Ehsan is the writer of Musloom and Zahir."
Naani's smile widened and she burst in excitement, "What a beautiful book you wrote, Khirad Bitiya. I can't begin to tell you the emotions that I felt after finishing Musloom. It was heart-touching, Bitiya."
Khirad curved her lips into a smile and, tilting her neck, responded, "Thank you, Naani, it is your interest in reading that makes you feel such strong emotions. Otherwise, we writers write what comes in our heart with Allah's will. He is the sole reason of why such strong feelings crave within us. Musloom happened..." her smile pondered somewhere but fixing it, she gulped and continued, "...because it was Allah's will that I write it. Nothing great about it."
"Anjali?" her husband called out to her.
Their conversation got intervened mid-way as Anurag Singhania descended the stairs, submerged in his tablet, and called out to his wife another time, "Anjali?"
"I am here, Anurag," she addressed him.
"Then, where is my-" his deep blue eyes landed upon Khirad and halted there for a moment.
Khirad's smile evaporated. She had seen him somewhere before but recognition failed her.
😉
"So, Mrs.Khushi Hussain," Arnav stroke his chance after a weary silence, as the waiter served their light lunch, "You need time to make the decision?"
She looked up, her bulgy eyes fixated, and then, adjusting her veil, she answered, "But I have already made my decision, Mr.Raizada."
"And that is?" he pestered, taking in the hygiene potion.
"That I am afraid I can't accept this generous offer," she very cautiously replied.
Arnav's spoon stropped mid-air for a second as he raised his eye-brows and queried, "Ahaan?"
"I am afraid that I can't accept this generous offer of yours, Mr.Raizada."
Her statement raised a sense of mockery in him and him out rightly shot, "This is no generous offer, Khushi."
"It might not be, Mr.Raizada, but I am content with the amount of deals that are on slide currently. I can't take one more and plus, my team is booked with-" she started her explanation.
He sharply cut in, gulping the prod, "But I wish to work with you, Khushi; the best; not with your team."
"You mean individual collaboration? I am sorry but I am not open for that," she, surprised, mustered up.
"Look, Khushi, this is pure business. Our company needs establishment, here in Pakistan, and your work needs expansion in South side of India. Then, why not seal a deal?"
"Then, why did you say that you wanted to meet Asher?" she snapped, irritated.
"Getting detailed, are we?" he smirked and hopped up onto his drink.
Khushi eyed him stubbornly and tapping the cutlery, very unlike her mannerisms, fired, "You can say that. You see, I don't work with scandalous and secretive people."
"Even you are secretive, Khushi," he whispered, in a tone so subtle that her heart pumped shamelessly.
"I am not secretive. I am not open; that's it."
Arnav managed a chuckle and stated, "Relax, lady, I may be involved in some flings but I assure you that I am not scandalous and as for ARD, it is anything but the former."
Her brows creased and she lingered a bit longer on her Lasagna. Finally, she sighed and a smile scurried its way on his lips when she cleared, "Send the formal documents to my place. I would sign them and our work would start from, say,"
He interrupted again, irking her, "Tomorrow. We will start from tomorrow onwards for I have the documents ready. Check those out with your lawyer today, sign them and tomorrow, we start work."
"You were so sure that I would agree?" she perked up, amused of his confidence.
He shook his head and called out to the waiter for the bill, "I was sure that you wouldn't refuse."
"Years," Asher started as they stood, lonely, on the cliff-edge, after concluding their meeting, "Have passed, Asad. Where have you been? I tried," he shook his head, "We tried so hard to get in touch with you but it was, as if, you had closed every access path to you by us. Did you not want to see us, Asad?"
Asad, without blinking away, answered, "If that 'we' includes you and your wife, Asher, then, you have answered your own question."
Asher's lips mumbled, in a very feeble prior, "You haven't gotten married, Asad, yet. The media keeps reporting that. When will you move on?"
He turned around, his eyes persuading a rhythm of the times that were blissful, "I will move on the day your wife gives me some answers, moving back. And today I am here to move back, Asher, not to move ahead."
He stating this made things go in a hurtful memoir as the days stirred within and gnarled their powers...
Eight years back...
"Why do you think I agreed to this, Asher?" Khushi's loud shrill voice gained Asad's attention as he passed by the room, with a garland and some plates in his hand.
Asher stared, blank and frozen, while Khushi continued, "I agreed to marry you not because I love you but because Zoya loved you! She wanted me to marry you so that I get away from the humiliation that your brother is about to cause me! She knew that you love me but..."
"You knew Zoya was going to meet that as*****?" Asad barged inside, his fists angry and his veins throbbing with aggression.
Khushi turned around, swiftly, and went pale.
"She..." Asher recovered and confronted, "...did not-"
"I knew..." was all she could murmur and then looking back up, into his burning eyes, she added, "...and I also knew when that house caught fire. I knew almost everything that could have," she gulped, disgusted with her selfishness, "Saved our Zoya. But..."
"But you still let her go because you wanted her to persuade Khizer! You wanted to fill his interests so that he lets you go? You gave away Zoya's life to save your interests? You, Khushi, you could do this, I cannot begin to believe!" Zoya's Ammi entered the room and finished.
Asad moved forward and whispered hollowly to Asher, "Move aside, Asher."
"Asad-" Asher tried to comprehend everything.
"They say that shadows are deceitful but you proved this also wrong, Khushi. You deceived your own shadow; you deceived our friendship; you deceived Zoya!"
With that agonized shriek, Asad strode his palm forward to slap the selfish woman standing before him but this could not happen.
"Khushi should not be humiliated..." Zoya's dreading whisper haunted him.
He withdrew his palm back and threw his steps backward, mumbling, shaking his head.
The soft wind that blew across their faces brought them back to reality. Asher's tear-filled eyes blinked two teardrops away and he stuttered, clenching his fists, "I am sorry, Asad."
"Sorry that Zoya did not love me and loved you?" he sarcastically framed and maintained the contact of gazes.
"No," he painfully whispered, "Sorry that you and Zoya lost everything because of..." he gulped, closing his eyes.
"...your wife."
Asad's completing this statement killed a little more of hope within Asher; hope that they could start afresh.
"Khirad Ehsan," Anjali introduced, pointing at Khirad from behind the pillar to her husband.
He kept looking there and agitatedly Anjali queried, "But why did you drag me all the way here?"
"Is she the one whom you thought to be a prospective bride for Arnav?" he questioned again, ignoring her query.
Her brows furrowed and seriously too, she replied looking at the laughing and giggling faces of Khirad, Rimsha, Naani; "Yes. She is the one. But..."
Her voice trailed off as he looked into her eyes and churned the revelation, "Then, you are in an illusion, Anjali. I..." he swallowed, "...have seen her couple of times at the Heights with Asher Hussain. She-"
"But Asher Hussain is married?" her horrified expression grasped.
Anurag carefully nodded and shrugged, speaking, "This is how they do it, Anjali. Their lives are blinked in a ferocious moment of glamour. Now, what I tell you is that, she is not the prompt choice for Arnav. He might be having girlfriends but having affair with a well-known married man is a whole lot of different thing. Don't push him now to make the wrong choice."
"Married man?"
Anjali and Anurag turned, and spotted Rimsha standing before them with a ghastly expression of distrust on her face.
"Affair, married man, Khirad? What are you saying, Bhai jaan?" Rimsha spoke, anger in her eyes.
Hearing the fuss, Naani and Khirad reached there and Naani stated, "What is going on?"
"I-" Anjali tried to handle the matter but Anurag was not going to let her sell any comprise.
"Yes, Rimsha, it is the truth," he momentarily placed a gaze on Khirad and then continued, "Why don't you ask Khirad herself? I may be misbelieving things but I am sure that I have seen Khirad and Asher exit the Heights apartment, exactly before my friend's house, numerous times at night."
"You must be eluding things, Anurag Bhai jaan. Khirad," she turned to her sister who stood dead on the spot, and shaking her vigorously, she questioned, "Tell them it is not the truth. That has to be for professional matters, isn't it? You-"
Tears rolled down Khirad's eyes as she shamefully looked up and pursed her lips, nodding in agreement, and responded, "It is the truth, Aapi. Anurag ji is right. I am in a relationship with Asher Hussain."
With no assurance of not breaking down before outsiders, Khirad ran out of the house, her feet stumbling.
She had chosen the wrong path for herself and she knew that. But now she had come much farther; there was no way back. Even if, there was any way; she drove the car off, without waiting for Rimsha; then she did not want to pursue it. For her, solace meant Asher and she wouldn't be able to live without him.
Their unusual relationship was nothing different from a settlement. They had met two and a half years ago in a conference and he had become her attraction since that day. The darkness that surrounded him in spite of his perfect life was something which she wanted to fill in.
The storm broke, without any warning, and ignoring it, she drove sinfully on the roads; her mind driving back to the confession that she had done.
Two years before...
"You will not get anything except the emptiness that surrounds me, Khirad," Asher said, looking away from her smiling eyes.
"I want that emptiness to fulfill me, Asher, I desire for nothing more."
Her whispering that sentence had filled him with a strange sense of commitment and he had touched her the way nobody else could; within her soul.
Endless meetings, encounters and dinners had gotten him to open up before her. She had finally fulfilled herself with the emptiness surrounding him.
"Khala, please ask Shamsher miya to send off the car. It is getting stormier here and I," she looked at the screen and cursed, "Damn this tower! Now, what am I supposed to do?"
"Ma'am, I would call a Taxi for you," her driver offered but backed off as he saw the weather worsening.
"Bhai jaan, in such weather, we are not gonna get any Taxies. Leave it, I would walk off."
In no time, she was walking in the heavily windy weather. Her eyes closed every moment with the dust but she kept walking for now, there was no option left.
"Khushi!" she heard a cry for her name.
Looking back, she rolled her eyes, "Not again!" and then, added, "What are you doing here, Mr.Raizada?"
He grinned sheepishly and said, "Come, join me in my car and I would drop you home. By the way, it is a public place."😳
😊
Trust your heart if the seas catch fire, live by love though the stars walk backward. The trust that they portrayed upon their choices of the wrong was what made them lead to a road of faith and experiences.
PART 3: 'Some choices and some decisions...'
Scorching heat of the sun shone brightly above the persons' heads. They, oblivious to the heat of the atmosphere, drowned back into the heat of the fire that was ignited years back into their lives...
Eight years ago...
Asher froze still, despite the ashes burning before his eyes, and gasped. The low gasp that escaped his lips broke away the thunderous silence and the police broke away their gaze to look at the youngsters standing there.
"You are the brother of Khizer Hussain, right?" one of the policemen eyed Asher and wondered.
Asher, closing his eyes in hurt and delusion, nodded his head.
Khushi barely moved, staring wide-eyed at the ashes going down; of her best friend, her life's biggest achievement and her own shadow dying down.
She ran forward, forgetting all the security systems, as the fire-brigade rescued Asad of the inflamed place.
His dark and hollow eyes were showcasing nothingness as several memories hunched his heart. The last moment which he spent with the love of his life will haunt him for the rest of his misery and he knew that.
"Asad," Khushi frantically threw her arms, holding his collar, and yelled, "Zoya is going to come with other rescuers, right? She is going to come back, right?"
Asher glanced back at Zoya. The police-man questioned him, "Did you have any idea that your friend, Ms.Zoya Farooqi, was supposed to visit your brother, Mr.Khizer Hussain's bungalow?"
His eyes far-off, Asher shook his head. If he would have had any idea then Zoya wouldn't have been dead today. He surrendered himself to guilt or it held him somewhere; he was unsure.
Khushi ran after a morose Asad and held his wrist into her grip, digging down her nails to scratch his veins, and yelled out, "Tell me, Asad, where is Zoya? She was supposed to come out with you, she always did! Whenever we used to get into trouble after bunking classes, you were the one who got her out of it!"
Asad looked into Khushi's eyes, her deep hazel eyes, which always whispered meaningful tales. But at this deadly moment, her eyes were not her. They were afraid; frightened; angry and guilty.
"Zoya is dead..." Asher's whisper tried to strike its way into Khushi's mind.
Ignoring it completely, Khushi angrily pushed Asad and shouted, "Where is Zoya, Asad? Where is my Zoya?"
Asad shook his head and tilting his head rightwards, whispered softly, as if sharing a secret, "Our Zoya is burnt, Khushi."
Asher slapped her hard as she stood still, rooted, and shrieked, his eyes fiery red with anguish, "Zoya is dead! She is dead, Khushi!"
"Asad..." the whisper of Asher Hussain, which had once caressed their lively days, sealed the moment with its presence.
Asad's eyes, moist, blinked and he stated in a plain tone, "It is wonderful to meet you, Mr.Asher Hussain. Shall we proceed with the meeting?"
"Khirad!" she exclaimed, limping forward to hug her best friend and her sister.
Anjali's affectionate embrace filled warmth within her and she softly smiled.
"Asalam-walekum, Anjali Aapi. Rimsha Aapi discusses you a lot."
She laughed and fondly held her best friend's hand, chirpily saying, "That is her specialty. She discusses a lot."
The three women laughed and finally entered the mansion taking slow, moody strides. As they entered, their chatter reached its ultimatum.
"Khirad, you and Rimsha sit here while I arrange for some snacks and bring Naani to meet you guys," Anjali explained and moved back, smile still lingering on her lips.
Khirad comfortably settled herself on the sofa set and muttered to her sister, "She is absolutely amazing, Aapi, just like you described."
"She is; I told you. And her husband and Naani are also too good. You must meet Anurag Bhai jaan," Rimsha told her sister.
Khirad nodded and checked messages on her phone. No messages from Asher.
"Naani!" Rimsha shrieked and ran forward to hug the elder lady.
Naani, indeed, was a very pleasant lady. In her early eighties, she had the heart of a child; a sensitive innocent child. But on a front, she had the authority surrounding her and this was showcased when Anjali arbitrated.
"Naani, Khirad is a writer. You read the novel Musloom?" Anjali spoke while Khirad smiled, talking to Rimsha.
"Yes, what a beautiful book Musloom is. Wonderful!" Naani praised.
Anjali placed a warm hand on Khirad's shoulder and said, "Then, meet the author of it, Naani. Khirad Ehsan is the writer of Musloom and Zahir."
Naani's smile widened and she burst in excitement, "What a beautiful book you wrote, Khirad Bitiya. I can't begin to tell you the emotions that I felt after finishing Musloom. It was heart-touching, Bitiya."
Khirad curved her lips into a smile and, tilting her neck, responded, "Thank you, Naani, it is your interest in reading that makes you feel such strong emotions. Otherwise, we writers write what comes in our heart with Allah's will. He is the sole reason of why such strong feelings crave within us. Musloom happened..." her smile pondered somewhere but fixing it, she gulped and continued, "...because it was Allah's will that I write it. Nothing great about it."
"Anjali?" her husband called out to her.
Their conversation got intervened mid-way as Anurag Singhania descended the stairs, submerged in his tablet, and called out to his wife another time, "Anjali?"
"I am here, Anurag," she addressed him.
"Then, where is my-" his deep blue eyes landed upon Khirad and halted there for a moment.
Khirad's smile evaporated. She had seen him somewhere before but recognition failed her.
😉
"So, Mrs.Khushi Hussain," Arnav stroke his chance after a weary silence, as the waiter served their light lunch, "You need time to make the decision?"
She looked up, her bulgy eyes fixated, and then, adjusting her veil, she answered, "But I have already made my decision, Mr.Raizada."
"And that is?" he pestered, taking in the hygiene potion.
"That I am afraid I can't accept this generous offer," she very cautiously replied.
Arnav's spoon stropped mid-air for a second as he raised his eye-brows and queried, "Ahaan?"
"I am afraid that I can't accept this generous offer of yours, Mr.Raizada."
Her statement raised a sense of mockery in him and him out rightly shot, "This is no generous offer, Khushi."
"It might not be, Mr.Raizada, but I am content with the amount of deals that are on slide currently. I can't take one more and plus, my team is booked with-" she started her explanation.
He sharply cut in, gulping the prod, "But I wish to work with you, Khushi; the best; not with your team."
"You mean individual collaboration? I am sorry but I am not open for that," she, surprised, mustered up.
"Look, Khushi, this is pure business. Our company needs establishment, here in Pakistan, and your work needs expansion in South side of India. Then, why not seal a deal?"
"Then, why did you say that you wanted to meet Asher?" she snapped, irritated.
"Getting detailed, are we?" he smirked and hopped up onto his drink.
Khushi eyed him stubbornly and tapping the cutlery, very unlike her mannerisms, fired, "You can say that. You see, I don't work with scandalous and secretive people."
"Even you are secretive, Khushi," he whispered, in a tone so subtle that her heart pumped shamelessly.
"I am not secretive. I am not open; that's it."
Arnav managed a chuckle and stated, "Relax, lady, I may be involved in some flings but I assure you that I am not scandalous and as for ARD, it is anything but the former."
Her brows creased and she lingered a bit longer on her Lasagna. Finally, she sighed and a smile scurried its way on his lips when she cleared, "Send the formal documents to my place. I would sign them and our work would start from, say,"
He interrupted again, irking her, "Tomorrow. We will start from tomorrow onwards for I have the documents ready. Check those out with your lawyer today, sign them and tomorrow, we start work."
"You were so sure that I would agree?" she perked up, amused of his confidence.
He shook his head and called out to the waiter for the bill, "I was sure that you wouldn't refuse."
"Years," Asher started as they stood, lonely, on the cliff-edge, after concluding their meeting, "Have passed, Asad. Where have you been? I tried," he shook his head, "We tried so hard to get in touch with you but it was, as if, you had closed every access path to you by us. Did you not want to see us, Asad?"
Asad, without blinking away, answered, "If that 'we' includes you and your wife, Asher, then, you have answered your own question."
Asher's lips mumbled, in a very feeble prior, "You haven't gotten married, Asad, yet. The media keeps reporting that. When will you move on?"
He turned around, his eyes persuading a rhythm of the times that were blissful, "I will move on the day your wife gives me some answers, moving back. And today I am here to move back, Asher, not to move ahead."
He stating this made things go in a hurtful memoir as the days stirred within and gnarled their powers...
Eight years back...
"Why do you think I agreed to this, Asher?" Khushi's loud shrill voice gained Asad's attention as he passed by the room, with a garland and some plates in his hand.
Asher stared, blank and frozen, while Khushi continued, "I agreed to marry you not because I love you but because Zoya loved you! She wanted me to marry you so that I get away from the humiliation that your brother is about to cause me! She knew that you love me but..."
"You knew Zoya was going to meet that as*****?" Asad barged inside, his fists angry and his veins throbbing with aggression.
Khushi turned around, swiftly, and went pale.
"She..." Asher recovered and confronted, "...did not-"
"I knew..." was all she could murmur and then looking back up, into his burning eyes, she added, "...and I also knew when that house caught fire. I knew almost everything that could have," she gulped, disgusted with her selfishness, "Saved our Zoya. But..."
"But you still let her go because you wanted her to persuade Khizer! You wanted to fill his interests so that he lets you go? You gave away Zoya's life to save your interests? You, Khushi, you could do this, I cannot begin to believe!" Zoya's Ammi entered the room and finished.
Asad moved forward and whispered hollowly to Asher, "Move aside, Asher."
"Asad-" Asher tried to comprehend everything.
"They say that shadows are deceitful but you proved this also wrong, Khushi. You deceived your own shadow; you deceived our friendship; you deceived Zoya!"
With that agonized shriek, Asad strode his palm forward to slap the selfish woman standing before him but this could not happen.
"Khushi should not be humiliated..." Zoya's dreading whisper haunted him.
He withdrew his palm back and threw his steps backward, mumbling, shaking his head.
The soft wind that blew across their faces brought them back to reality. Asher's tear-filled eyes blinked two teardrops away and he stuttered, clenching his fists, "I am sorry, Asad."
"Sorry that Zoya did not love me and loved you?" he sarcastically framed and maintained the contact of gazes.
"No," he painfully whispered, "Sorry that you and Zoya lost everything because of..." he gulped, closing his eyes.
"...your wife."
Asad's completing this statement killed a little more of hope within Asher; hope that they could start afresh.
"Khirad Ehsan," Anjali introduced, pointing at Khirad from behind the pillar to her husband.
He kept looking there and agitatedly Anjali queried, "But why did you drag me all the way here?"
"Is she the one whom you thought to be a prospective bride for Arnav?" he questioned again, ignoring her query.
Her brows furrowed and seriously too, she replied looking at the laughing and giggling faces of Khirad, Rimsha, Naani; "Yes. She is the one. But..."
Her voice trailed off as he looked into her eyes and churned the revelation, "Then, you are in an illusion, Anjali. I..." he swallowed, "...have seen her couple of times at the Heights with Asher Hussain. She-"
"But Asher Hussain is married?" her horrified expression grasped.
Anurag carefully nodded and shrugged, speaking, "This is how they do it, Anjali. Their lives are blinked in a ferocious moment of glamour. Now, what I tell you is that, she is not the prompt choice for Arnav. He might be having girlfriends but having affair with a well-known married man is a whole lot of different thing. Don't push him now to make the wrong choice."
"Married man?"
Anjali and Anurag turned, and spotted Rimsha standing before them with a ghastly expression of distrust on her face.
"Affair, married man, Khirad? What are you saying, Bhai jaan?" Rimsha spoke, anger in her eyes.
Hearing the fuss, Naani and Khirad reached there and Naani stated, "What is going on?"
"I-" Anjali tried to handle the matter but Anurag was not going to let her sell any comprise.
"Yes, Rimsha, it is the truth," he momentarily placed a gaze on Khirad and then continued, "Why don't you ask Khirad herself? I may be misbelieving things but I am sure that I have seen Khirad and Asher exit the Heights apartment, exactly before my friend's house, numerous times at night."
"You must be eluding things, Anurag Bhai jaan. Khirad," she turned to her sister who stood dead on the spot, and shaking her vigorously, she questioned, "Tell them it is not the truth. That has to be for professional matters, isn't it? You-"
Tears rolled down Khirad's eyes as she shamefully looked up and pursed her lips, nodding in agreement, and responded, "It is the truth, Aapi. Anurag ji is right. I am in a relationship with Asher Hussain."
With no assurance of not breaking down before outsiders, Khirad ran out of the house, her feet stumbling.
She had chosen the wrong path for herself and she knew that. But now she had come much farther; there was no way back. Even if, there was any way; she drove the car off, without waiting for Rimsha; then she did not want to pursue it. For her, solace meant Asher and she wouldn't be able to live without him.
Their unusual relationship was nothing different from a settlement. They had met two and a half years ago in a conference and he had become her attraction since that day. The darkness that surrounded him in spite of his perfect life was something which she wanted to fill in.
The storm broke, without any warning, and ignoring it, she drove sinfully on the roads; her mind driving back to the confession that she had done.
Two years before...
"You will not get anything except the emptiness that surrounds me, Khirad," Asher said, looking away from her smiling eyes.
"I want that emptiness to fulfill me, Asher, I desire for nothing more."
Her whispering that sentence had filled him with a strange sense of commitment and he had touched her the way nobody else could; within her soul.
Endless meetings, encounters and dinners had gotten him to open up before her. She had finally fulfilled herself with the emptiness surrounding him.
"Khala, please ask Shamsher miya to send off the car. It is getting stormier here and I," she looked at the screen and cursed, "Damn this tower! Now, what am I supposed to do?"
"Ma'am, I would call a Taxi for you," her driver offered but backed off as he saw the weather worsening.
"Bhai jaan, in such weather, we are not gonna get any Taxies. Leave it, I would walk off."
In no time, she was walking in the heavily windy weather. Her eyes closed every moment with the dust but she kept walking for now, there was no option left.
"Khushi!" she heard a cry for her name.
Looking back, she rolled her eyes, "Not again!" and then, added, "What are you doing here, Mr.Raizada?"
He grinned sheepishly and said, "Come, join me in my car and I would drop you home. By the way, it is a public place."😳
😊
Trust your heart if the seas catch fire, live by love though the stars walk backward. The trust that they portrayed upon their choices of the wrong was what made them lead to a road of faith and experiences.
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Jhanak
Shiv Shakti
