The Best of Things
(RagLak, SwaSan) Fan Fiction Series
By Bubble
Chapter 11
Sanskaar was gathering a few files and moving towards his laptop.
"Sanskaar! What are you doing? Why are you settling down to work? Aren't you going to tell Lakshya that shouldn't take Ragini for granted?" Swara demanded, "He's suddenly changed his attitude towards Ragini... what is going through his mind?"
Sanskaar opened his laptop in tight-lipped silence.
"Sanskaar!" Swara said loudly. She came towards him, and closed the notebook rudely. "You can't do this now. Talk to me, please!"
Sanskaar looked at her with resigned irritation. "Let me work, Swara!"
"No!" she held his file out of reach. "I'm already worried about those two and now you've gotten into some state as well. Kya hua hai?"
He looked away. She took his face in both her hands and turned him to face her: "What. Is. It?"
He looked at her then. Earnest and perturbed. He would have to say it. "Why didn't you think it through properly, Swara, when you kept pushing Laksh to accept Ragini? Even with all this double marriage mess, we could have cut the tangle and you could have gotten together with Lucky. But, after this, Swara... it's too late. I know you're upset. I know you're hurting about the fact that they came together, but it's too late for you to have second thoughts!"
She sat frozen for a full half-minute. And then drew her hands away. "Sanskaar Maheshwari! I'm so mad at you, I could hit you. I keep telling you, I keep telling everybody that Laksh and I are done. You don't listen to my words, you don't trust me to understand myself... I don't even know why we're supposed to be friends."
She stood up coldly. "I'm feeling sleepy - I want to switch off the lights. If you want to work, please go to the guest room."
"Swara..." Sanskaar started to speak.
"Goodnight!" she said, and stalked off into the bathroom. When she came out two minutes later, Sanskaar had put his work things away and was picking up a blanket. She still looked angry, so being a wise man, he turned to leave.
"Sanskaar!" she called.
Oh, was she willing to talk it out now? "Haan..." he turned hopefully and smack! got his pillow thrown forcefully in his face.
***
Sanskaar felt a hand shaking him awake.
"Uttho!"
"Wassup?" he mumbled, hugging his pillow closer. Actually, even as she was throwing him out, Swara had instinctively done him a kindness, because she'd known over the past months that the manly Sanskaar Maheshwari couldn't sleep without hugging his special extra-long pillow.
She looked down at him now, determinedly resisting her efforts to wake him up. She pulled the pillow out of his grasp. Bereft, he opened his eyes a crack.
"What're you doing, Swara...? Sone do mujhe, yaar! Give it back!" he mumbled.
"No! Get up."
Five minutes later, she was frog-marching him down the stairs, Sanskaar still looking very much like a zombie. She deposited him in a deep chair in the side verandah, and as he groggily adjusted to the sitting position, she brought out two hot mugs of badam milk.
He squinted at it. "Swara, it's two in the morning. Why are we drinking badam doodh?"
"Because I want to talk," she said, sitting on the table in front of him, propping her feet against his chair and blowing on her milk.
"I was talking before and you kicked me out," he remembered, "and why can't we do it when I'm awake?"
"Because I can't sleep, because I was mad at you earlier, but now I want to know what Laksh was saying before I came in."
"Laksh... who's he?" Sanskaar was drooping hypnotically into his milk.
Swara started laughing helplessly. "Stop clowning, Sanskaar!"
"I can't be serious after midnight," he intoned, "and certainly not sharp enough for a He-said, I-said' narration."
Swara pouted and punched his shoulder. "Try, na, please!"
So he straightened up and told her what Laksh had said.
"So he thought it through, it wasn't an impulse? He's committed to her?" Swara confirmed again.
Sanskaar nodded, "That's what he said."
"Okay..." Swara thoughtfully took a sip from her mug.
He looked at her, eyes surprisingly intent under his drowsy lids. "You ok?"
She narrowed her eyes at him. "Why wouldn't I be?"
He shrugged. "Because the man you love has just committed a lifetime to another woman. That's why."
She took a deep breath and gathered her words, exercising what seemed to be considerable patience. She enunciated each statement clearly as if she were reciting a bullet-list to a five year old:
"Lakshya is the man I USED to be in love with.
I am no longer in love with Lakshya.
I am NOT upset because I am jealous or possessive!
I am quite honestly only concerned for my sad, pathetic, messed up sister!
Lakshya no longer means anything to me, apart from the man who is married to my sister. Lakshya is my past, but he is NOT my present.
Lakshya..."
Sanskaar raised a hand. She stopped.
"Got it!" He downed the last of the milk from his mug. "I will try not to insult you again with the suggestion that you are still in love with Lucky. In my defence, I feel that you can't turn off love... it's not an on-off thing, and it would be very understandable if you had conflicting feelings. It's an emotionally mature trait to deal with everything that you are feeling instead of shovelling unwanted feelings under the carpet." He stood up.
Swara looked up at him. "You think I'm in denial? Being dishonest with myself? Trying to feel only the right convenient' feelings? Sanskaar, I'm not doing that - I don't deny there is sadness, or regret, or pain... but there is no conflict about what I want from life at this moment."
Sanskaar looked at her for a moment and then nodded, "Ok, understood." He extended a hand to help her up, and with a relieved smile, she took it.
Edited by soapbubble - 9 years ago
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