Chapter 13
Jeev closed his eyes and exclaimed, "Pia, is that really you?" and Pia replied in the affirmative. Jeev opened his eyes and let out a deep sigh before asking why Pia was seeking Maya after all these years. To which, Pia replied: I recently ended up buying the same house we used to live when I was a kid and it brought the old memories back. I was just wondering if you know anything about her.
Jeev smiled and said: Or rather you were wondering if I am the guy she ran away with?
Pia and Abhay were taken aback, but they smiled sheepishly at him seeing him not offended by such a thought and Pia spoke up: actually we were thinking if you could have any idea about whom she ran away with and where she is? I mean you must be aware of all the men in her life, so maybe you could enlighten us.
Jeev spoke with a stiff expression: I see that you have been following the local gossips too much. Maya wasn't like the way she was made out to be by such gossip mongers at all. She was a very nice girl who was quite mature for her age. The very fact that she chose to marry your father and be a loving mother to you show her maturity.
Abhay and Pia were slightly taken aback. They have never thought about this side of Maya at all. They had never thought about this side to Maya at all. But now, thinking about what Jeev just said, they were forced to wonder, if they had been wrong in their assumptions. But Abhay asked him: But then why did she broke off the engagement with you?
Jeev replied with a pained expression: Because she never loved me. We both knew it. I was besotted with her, but she wanted to study further and be independent. She did not want to settle down so soon.
This confused Abhay further: But then why did she marry Pia's dad?
Jeev replied: Strange are the ways of the heart. You never know when it falls for someone even if you are not planning for it to fall for anyone.
Abhay was more confused and also made him wonder if Jeev had accidentally slipped some important clue and so asked:But if she had fallen so much for Major Rathod, then why did she left him in just six months?
Jeev calmly replied: I never said she fell for Major Rathod, did I?
Abhay and Pia were completely confused and shocked at all this and asked him: Then who did she fell in love with and then why did she marry Major Rathod? And do you think it could be that man whom she ran away with?
Jeev sighed and replied: I see that you both are hell bent on knowing the past. Well I will tell you as much as I know but even I cannot say with surety whom she ran away with, though the man she fell for does seem to be the most or rather only possible person with whom she could have run away with.
Abhay and Pia waited and silently heard Jeev's narrative about Maya as he went on:
I first saw Maya when she was 16 years old. She was visiting Dr. Roy's house in vacations. She had that innocent beauty on her face which would melt anyone's heart and which each man desires in his wife. I was pursuing my third year of law studies in the law college of Mumbai and was visiting my parents at that time. It was love at first sight for me. I had never felt this way before. With great hesitation, I finally mustered up enough courage to express my feelings to her just before she was to leave back for her hostel. She gave me a warm yet sad smile and said that she wants to make a career for herself first. She said that she would prefer to be an independent woman before committing herself to anyone. But, she also suggested that we could remain friends if I wanted and well something was better than nothing for me and I gladly agreed to be her friend in the hope that maybe in time she would start reciprocating my feelings. And that was what I hoped when after two years, she suddenly called me one day and asked if I would marry her immediately. She sounded a bit troubled when she had called me but I overlooked that fact and assumed that it must be her nervousness and so immediately got down to make the wedding preparations. She was going on an educational tour from her college to UK and was to return back in 15 days and that's when the wedding was to take place. But it was there that she met this man. He was an Italian and it was love at first sight for both of them and after reaching back here, Maya knew that marrying me under this circumstance would be unfair to me as she knew she would never be able to love me the same way as she had fallen for that Italian ' Angelo was his name and by marrying me she felt she would rob me of ever finding my own soulmate and so we called off the marriage at the last moment. So, in a way we were never truly engaged in the first place for her to break off the engagement.
More questions were filling their brain at this narrative and they could not help but ask: But then why did she not marry that Italian fellow? Why did she marry Pia's dad then?
Jeev went on: You might find it as a contradiction to my views about Maya and you may find what I am about to say as a confirmation to the gossips that you heard about Maya, but I genuinely believe that this was another sign of Maya's maturity. Being young, you must be having very strong opinions on right and wrong, but having more experience by my side and seeing so many couples falling apart and some coming back together and others rediscovering love elsewhere, I know that our heart does not know any right or wrong. It just follows its own direction and many a times end up falling in love with the forbidden person. Same thing happened with Maya. Angelo was already married and had two kids. He was unhappy in his marriage which was arranged by his parents as a business deal ' a fact which his wife always used to rub in his face as to how her father had done a great favour by helping his father in his economic crisis. She used to treat him like a slave and had no respect for him. Maya could relate to him as she always felt herself to be unloved just like him. Having lost her parents at a very young age, she had always craved for love which Angelo also did. They both could not help their hearts from finding solace in each other, but their minds were well aware of their responsibilities. They both knew that unhappy as he might be in his marriage, he cannot be unfair to his kids and leave them as deprived of love as they both themselves were and so they both chose to part ways just keeping the thought of having experienced true love for a short while as their guardian spirit. And it was this feeling which made Maya realize that marrying me, she would deprive me of love just the same way and so cancelled our wedding.
Pia could not help but ask: But then why she married my father?
Jeev replied: To give you the love of a mother. With your father there wasn't a question of depriving him of his true love as he had already found it in your mother. Yes, your father had adored her and her death had left him completely broken. When Maya met your father, she wanted to fill the void in your father's and your life which your mother had left. She wanted to give you the love and your father the hope which she herself never got. But maybe love finally won over when Angelo and Maya met again here in Mumbai when he had come with his wife and kids to Mumbai. And maybe they finally decided to listen to their hearts. But I do not know it for sure. I did not know Angelo and his family too much. I just met him at the club party an evening before Maya disappeared where Maya and Danish were also present and by his name and by the way he and Maya were stealing glances at each other, I knew that this was the man, whom Maya had loved and lost.
Questions were running in Abhay and Pia's mind. This new story contradicted whatever they had heard of Maya from others, but in a way fitted with the fact that Maya did not and could not have run away with anyone. She was murdered, but then who murdered her? Could it be this Italian Angelo who wanted to shrug his responsibilities and embrace his love Maya but ended up killing her in a wave of passion when she refused to leave Major Rathod. Maybe there was something animalistic about him which made Maya broke off with him in the first place and maybe it was him she was afraid of. Or could it be Jeev who resented that Maya did not marry him but married Major Rathod because maybe she was always afraid of him only. In that case, they did not know if that story was true or not in the first place. But somehow, Jeev's story fitted more with Maya's murder than her running away with someone. And since they knew that Maya was murdered and that she did not run away, they were inclined to believe that what Jeev was saying was true. In that case, everything that they had previously heard seemed to be false. Then from where did these false rumours about Maya's character start? Was it Bijoy who in his resentment of being fired maligned her image and later on murdered her? Or was it Angelo who murdered her when she refused to run away with him or was it Jeev who murdered her resenting her marriage to Danish when she had broken wedding with him just a couple of months back. They had three suspects each with as much motive as possible. And Jeev and Angelo were definitely around at that time. Was Bijoy around too?
CID
Anupamaa
Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon
