OS: Shashikala and Suhana; Last Part on Page 4

Ishaan stood outside the door to his house staring at the large padlock in confusion. It was well into the evening at Chawdi Bazaar and he wondered where everyone could have gone at such at hour with the house padlocked like this. It was very unusual since he knew there would be at least three occupants at any given time of the day. But this was a first.

, he thought to himself. He was just about to fish his cell phone out of his pocket when he was suddenly hit with an idea. No. This is actually a perfect chance for me. No one's home and I can actually figure things out without Inder bhai and Ilesh bhai meddling and poking fun at me. Yeah, that would be a good idea. But the question is, how do I enter my own house without ringing everyone else up and alerting them that I arrived when I had just left early this morning? They will definitely get suspicious.

Ishaan continued to stare at the padlock. Suddenly, he shifted his eyes left and right and licked his lips nervously before he rummaged through his small suitcase standing beside him. After a few minutes, he managed to procure a thin wire from one of his personal technical appliances.

Ishaan manipulated the wire slightly until it conformed to a shape suitable to him. Then he inserted it into the keyhole of the padlock and twisted it a bit methodologically until there was a sudden click and the padlock sprang open. Grinning, Ishaan removed the little obstacle that had just before barred his intrusion and pushed the doors open. Entering his own home, he mentally patted himself for a job well done and almost chuckled out loud. Who would have thought that I was a lockpicker? It was actually something one of his colleagues had once taught him out of sheer amusement and Ishaan himself did not find any use for it. But to Ishaan, learning something just for the sake of knowing never hurt anyone.

After he had closed the doors behind him and lodged his suitcase at a corner, Ishaan made his way to his bedroom. The house was eerily silent and it unnerved him a bit; he was so used to hearing noises around the house that this silence seemed highly unwelcoming. Ishaan wondered where exactly his entire family might be and was very much tempted to call them just to know but he nudged himself forward. After all, with the random opportunity given to him, he had to use it to his full advantage and do what he had originally come here to do.

Ishaan thought back earlier to the day when it was daybreak and he was woken up by his self-set alarm clock. Rousing from his sleep, he had quickly stumbled to the bathroom to get ready as soon as possible before that Shashikala sashayed into his room as she always did every morning to do pooja. When he was dressed and ready, he had pulled his suitcase from under the bed where he had placed it. It was already packed well the night before and so all he had to do was simply sneak out of the house to leave for his planned excursion to Boltenganj.

Ishaan hadn't wanted to leave like this without informing his family but he was also left with no other choice either. A few days earlier when he had mentioned the excursion, Shashikala immediately and happily declared that she wanted to go with him too. Of course his whole family supported the idea despite his numerous protests (after all, what was she going to do there with him, anyways?) and so outnumbered as he was, Ishaan decided that the best thing to do was to make a clean getaway without anyone knowing.

Alas, he couldn't exactly make a clean getaway without his overwhelming conscience burdening him on the way to the bus stop so he phoned home and spilled the beans while being adamant about not informing them of the place he was to be lodged at. His family was a bit upset at his actions but also relieved to know the general gist of what he had planned. Shashikala, on the other hand, blasted him completely on the phone. It was quite disconcerting and Ishaan winced at the memory of it. But he also felt a sharp pang in his heart when he remembered how she had finally broken down into tears after raging at him and then hung up. He knew he had broken her heart especially since she had been so excited to go with him and it upset him greatly. He was tempted to turn back home but had decided against it after he had managed to convince himself that Shashikala would get over it soon. She had to anyways since she couldn't hang around him forever, whatever her reasons are for wanting to cling to him like this.

Ishaan sighed. He just couldn't figure this Shashikala out. Why she clung to him was beyond him. But even worse than that was the deeply weird attraction he felt towards her whenever she was around. It was inexplicable and frightening. To think he could even feel such a thing towards a married woman was enough for him to bang his head repeatedly on a wall, wondering how he came to be so sick-minded.

But enough of that. His mind was digressing from the main task at hand and he knew it. Forcing Shashikala out of his mind, Ishaan thought back to the reason he had returned home in the first place. It had been two of his friends who were the cause. When they had arrived at Boltenganj, in a lighthearted conversation, they reminisced of their initial excursion at the same location. Amidst the conversation, they had suddenly teased him about a Suhana. Ishaan's ears had immediately perked up at the mention of the name and it was with utmost astonishment that he listened to one of his friends laughingly state, "Who would have thought that Ishaan was going to very quickly marry that Suhana who had just been a random stranger that picked on him here in Boltenganj?"

Ishaan had been shocked to the core. He could not believe his own ears. He was a married man. And to none other than the girl who was haunting his dreams in such a vague way that he wasn't sure whether he was fixed in between a distorted sort of reality or hazy unfathomable dreams. Immediately, all sorts of questions had tumbled into his mind. Who was this Suhana? Where was she now? How come she never contacted him all this while? And above all, why did his own family pretend that he was single all this time when it was obvious that he was married for over a year now and still is?

These questions pricked at Ishaan and he wanted the answers to them. He knew he could not ask his friends any further since he had never disclosed his partial memory loss but his family certainly had to answer to him. Therefore, with a confrontation in mind, he decided to dispatch towards home and make sure that his family could no longer hide anything more from him. Unexpectedly as Ishaan had just recently found out, nobody was home. But Ishaan decided that he would use this to his advantage and uncover more truths before demanding answers.

Ishaan looked around his room. There was nothing in it that would suggest that it belonged to a married man. Everything was his and only his. That meant that after his accident, his room must have undergone a makeover to make it resemble its current appearance. Ishaan's brows crinkled in confusion. But why would his family go to these lengths of hiding his marital status from him? It was certainly odd and definitely not characteristic of what his family might do.

Ishaan sat on his bed, a bit lost. This is so weird. Ever since that accident, Shashikala has been living in my house for very vague reasons, I'm stupidly getting attracted to her, everyone has been lying to me about not being married, my own wife is God knows where, and now everyone has randomly disappeared. What exactly is going on?

Ishaan let loose a frustrated sigh. The tell-tale signs of a headache were beginning to emerge so he stood up and rummaged through one of his drawers for a small aspirin. He had just popped the pill in his mouth and drank some water from a jug in his room when he was struck with an idea that could potentially answer some of his questions.

Ishaan whipped out his cellphone and rapidly searched through his list of contacts before pressing call on one of them. There were two rings of bell before a click was heard and a male voice spoke. "Hello?"

"Hello, doctor! This is Ishaan Kashyap speaking."

"Oh, Mr. Kashyap! How are you doing?"

"I'm doing very well, doctor, thanks to you," replied Ishaan. "I just wanted to ask you a little something."

"Sure, go ahead."

"Well," said Ishaan, choosing his words carefully. "I was wondering if I should continue taking my medications since I think I have fully recovered my memory."

"You have?" asked the surprised voice over the phone. "What makes you think that?"

"Oh, well, for several days as you know, I had been getting bits and pieces of my memory back but then it continued with greater frequency until all of a sudden I just remembered everything. My marriage, my wife Suhana, and our times together."

"That's really great news!" cried the elated doctor. "Mrs. Suhana Kashyap must be very happy now that you have finally recovered your memory. It was a very upsetting ordeal for her since you had solely forgotten her and your marriage but I can happily say that my therapy of allowing you to recover your past without blatant exposure to it worked like a charm!"

"Without blatant exposure? I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Ah, yes. I had prescribed that no one in your family remind you anything of your past and in fact, they should continue on as if your marriage had never occurred so that you won't be forced to remember it and thus render more neurological problems for you in trying to recover your memories."

The doctor, however, sounded exceedingly happy with his 'therapy' and said, "Well, I'm glad that your family followed my instructions well. In fact, they did it beyond my expectations." The doctor chuckled. "They even went as far as to rename your wife as Shashikala. I was a little shocked when I heard that from your father's reports on how you were progressing with your memory loss. It was a rather amusing piece of information."

Ishaan was floored. He stumbled slightly before he sat down his bed and gripped his bedsheets. A nervous laugh escaped his mouth and his brain didn't even register the words that mechanically followed after. "Oh, ha, ha, ha...yeah, that was funny. W-well, thank you for your help, doctor. I appreciate your time and patience. Have a good night."

"Good night, Mr. Kashyap." There was a click and all was silent again.

Suhana tried to suppress a sigh that was threatening to come out as she stabbed at her plate full of food. It had been about two hours since she had been here and despite all the cajoling that had been done in the initial half hour and jovial talk that took up the remaining time, nothing could alleviate her of the miserable feeling that consumed her entire being. It made her exceedingly exhausted and all she wanted to do was crawl under the covers of her bed and fall asleep.

But Suhana knew that even sleep would elude her. How could it not when she knew that even in the comforts of her own bed she would be seeking those strong arms that she yearned to be in but would never be there? It was completely disheartening and took so much willpower to not break down over the thought. Nevertheless, Suhana maintained a front. There was no way that she was going to give the bhondu the satisfaction of having jilted her. If anything, she'd make sure it was the other way around.

Suhana discreetly looked at the watch on her wrist and her mind wandered to a different direction. She wondered what he was doing at this hour and if he had eaten yet. What if he hadn't taken his medications on time? Suhana fidgeted a little. Should she call and remind him?

With that, Suhana stabbed at her food for the upteenth time again.

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Ishaan paced in his room and wringed his hands. He had just been dealt a serious blow that nearly swept the floor from underneath him. Of all things, he could not digest the fact that Shashikala was in fact his own wife Suhana Kashyap. But it actually made more sense than anything else. It explained why she was living in his house, why she was "shamelessly" flirting with him, why he always felt an inexplicable attraction towards her, why his entire family was always supportive of her, and why he constantly dreamt of her. In fact, this shouldn't have even surprised him since his own family had constantly through numerous blunders of their own, exposed that she was his wife Suhana.

But surprise it did. And why? Ishaan sat down at the edge of his bed, his face thoughtful. Inder bhaiya and Ilesh bhaiya had on several occasions blurted out that she was my wife...heck, even Jassie literally spelled it out word for word. So why did I refuse to believe them and still continue to do so now?

Although Ishaan questioned himself, he also knew in his heart what the answer was. It was relatively simple. He could not imagine how he could have fallen in love with a girl so starkly different from him, particularly when she did not fit any of the criteria of the ideal girl he had in mind. His ideal girl was demure and of a more shy nature...like him. So where did this energetic, full of spice, and fiery girl come from? How did they meet? How did they fall in love and get married? Ishaan was suddenly thirsting to know more about their shared past.

Ishaan stopped short. They were already married for about a year and a half or so. What did it matter how they met and fell in love? No, all that mattered now was that she was still in love with him and he still couldn't fully reciprocate any of that feeling. His attraction towards her was only vague. It was not enough to return the happiness she deserved after having snatched it unknowingly.

Ishaan closed his eyes in pain. He was such a monster. Each and every day when he pulled away from that sweet girl, he was constantly hurting her, breaking her heart, and never even thinking twice about it. No wonder I deserve to be called a bhondu.

Ishaan drummed his fingers on his thighs and eyed his phone besides him. He couldn't help but think that probably calling her right now would also be a good idea. After all, an apology was still pending from him for his earlier actions. Without further hesitation, he picked up the phone and rapidly dialed a number he knew so well.

How I wish the CVs had followed this track instead of the current track that is being shown😊 Awesome story👍🏼