Part 19
The next morning Gopi wakes up feeling rested. She slowly wakes up and realizes she is once again in Ahem's bed, she lays still for a minute feeling strange. She must have moved in her sleep because instead of him just holding her hand, she was now laying in his arms, with her head on his shoulder and his arms holding her tightly
She couldn't resist laying there for a minute and enjoy being in his arms. She couldn't help move her hand over his heart and feel his heart beat. Realizing what she was doing she stopped and tried to get up, but her mangalsutra was caught in his sherwani's top button, she looked up to make sure he was still sleeping.
Ahem has been awake, watching her for some time, when she looks up they both lool into each other's eyes, he slowly raises his hand and moves her hair from her face, and carasses her face, thinking how beautiful she looked first thing in the morning, and thinking how much time he wasted not noticing this before, but everything looks different when you look at someone with love. He is thinking this is how she must have felt when he had ignored her existence, how much he must have hurt her everyday.
Gopi is getting nervous because he kept looking at her, she untangles her mangalsutra and tries to get up, but he tightens his arms around her and makes her look at him. He says to her, remember what I said last night, move your things in here today, no more sleeping by yourself. She doesn't say anything, she is thinking he will probably change his mind later, how many times had she lived on false hope before, she could not do it anymore.
Ahem is watching her and know she is reluctant to make the move, so he says to her, fine be stubborn, if you go to that room tonight, I will just carry you in here, and I won't care if the whole family is watching, its you who will be embarassed. Gopi quickly looks to him to see if he was joking, he just looks back at her and raises his eyebrows as if asking what are you going to do now. Gopi tries to reason with him, she starts by saying Ahemji, why are you doing this? It is not necessary, I promised your dad I would stay till the wedding, I won't leave no matter what I am accused of, until after the marriage.
Ahem makes her look at him again and says this has nothing to do with the family's reputation, or Kinjles wedding, this has to do with us, we need to get to know each other better, we can not live like this, we are married. We should think about working things out between us.
Gopi laughs bitterly, and says what marriage, I already took the wedding vows back, and besides you are in love with someone else, don't sacrifice that for me or your family, let it be Ahemji, lets just get thru the next two months, then we will both be free to live our lives the way we want to, saying this she gets up from the bed and leaves the room, not giving him chance to say anything else.
Ahem thinking, how bitter and cynical she has become, she has lost her innocence somewhere, and it was all his fault, if only he had taken the time to get to know her before. Just when he thought he was getting close to her, she puts up more walls. He is asking himself, did I kill the love she felt for me with my ignorance and mistreatment of her. He can't blame her, if he was in her place he would have done the same, now he has to come up with a way to convince her that he really wanted to be married to her, he has changed. He finally gets up and starts getting ready to go to the office, he smiles to himself and thinks let her be stubborn, but one way or another she will be back in this bed tonight, even if he have to trick her to get her there.
