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A/N: I wrote this last night, before I saw the promo. I was going to make it longer this morning but now I don't really see the need to and I also don't want this to sit in a corner on my hard drive because I was really excited for it until the promo came out. I've always felt that Shravan and Naanu are the only people that Sumo has in her life, and I guess that is the inspiration for this piece. Lemme know what you think :)
She lays on an unfamiliar bed adorned in clean
white sheets in a familiar room, asleep, albeit not peacefully. Her eyebrows
are scrunched, her lips are turned down in a frown and her nose is buried in
the pillow she clutches in her arm. She is covered with a white comforter
that she keeps kicking away at times, and then a shiver goes through her body and he gets up numerous times from his spot
on the sofa across from her and covers her again before sitting back down.
His eyes don't leave her face as he watches her
intently, hoping and wishing that there was a way to ease the pain that
lingered on her face even when she was unconscious. He wished there was
something he could do rather than just sit there and wait, wait for her to wake
up, wait for a phone call from the hospital.
She occasionally mumbled in her sleep and his
heart clenched every time a cry left her lips, he would go sit by her, caress
her hair - she would clutch his hand and he would whisper her name and tell
her that he was with her. The cries would stop and she would calm down for a
while, her strong hold on his hand would loosen and he would go sit back on the
couch.
His thoughts would shift from one thing to
another, at first all he could think about was how he had found her, down the street
from the hospital, crying, standing in the middle of the road as the rain
soaked through her white kurta. He
had never seen her so broken, and the
sight of her had caused his heart to sink.
She had taken one look at him when he came to
stand in front of her, a sob had left her mouth before she wrapped her arms
around him, resting her head against his chest as she broke down in a way that
she couldn't before. She tried to be strong for her family, to keep them
together, but at that moment she knew she could cry for a moment because he would take care of her - he always did.
He had always been there for her, when she broke her arm, when she got her
first F, when she got in trouble with her aunt - he was always there to keep
her together. And he was the perhaps going to be the only one that could
provide her this comfort hereafter. His arms had wrapped around her, he rested his cheek
atop her hair and let her cry but held her together - she didn't quite
understand what he was saying to her but his voice had calmed her down.
She could feel his warm hands gently run
circles into her back but she couldn't see the many emotions that sparkled in
his eyes - from anger to anguish to love as she sobbed against his chest for
what felt like eternity. She had
gone limp against him minutes later, having cried herself to exhaustion. Kamini
Chachi had suggested that he take her home and let her sleep it off, the rest of
the Tiwaris along with some of his family was at the hospital with Naanu. He
had buckled her up in his car and driven her home, Vandy Bhabhi had helped her
change out of her wet clothes with tears in her eyes. He had carried her up to
his room and put her in his bed. She had relaxed into the sheets and buried her
nose into his pillow immediately.
Shravan let out a soft groan and closed his
eyes, trying not to think back to the previous night. All that mattered to him
right then was that she was safely asleep in his bed. Shravan sighed and got up
off the couch again before seating himself on the floor at the side of his bed,
he rested his chin on the edge of the mattress and watched her mumble something
unintelligible in her sleep. He craved to climb into the bed beside her and
wrap himself around her, to protect her, to comfort her, but that was a line he couldn't get
himself to cross. At the end of the day, he was just her best friend - even that was questionable at this point.
He sighed and pushed her hair away from her
face, it was now a dry wavy mess rather than the drenched straight hair that
had clung to her skin last night. He caught himself admiring how beautiful her
dark silky hair looked against his stark white pillow and comforter. He could
imagine a different day, a day where her hair was played on the pillow exactly
like it was right then, but the frown on her face was replaced with a content
smile and her arms were wrapped around his body rather than a pillow.
He felt a tight feeling in his chest at the
thought, he wanted it so bad - to
wake up next to her every day, to play with her hair as they lay awake in bed
looking at each other and talked about random things like they did. He wanted
to tap her cute little nose, caress her soft cheeks, and kiss her pillowy lips.
He wanted to tell her that he loved her, that he had always loved her - that
she was it for him, forever.
He wanted to see her blush and giggle happily
beside him, he wanted her to pull him back to bed when he tried to get up and
go to work, he wanted to tickle her and hear the room fill with her tinkling
laughter - he wanted to be with her,
he wanted to love her every day for
the rest of his life. He wanted to tell her that she had a hold on him that he
couldn't break even if he wanted to, and that he had tried and failed miserably
because his heart knew nothing but her, that trying to not love her was the
hardest thing he had tried to do - it had been overwhelming and painful. He
wanted to tell her that he was at a point where he couldn't stop loving her
anymore than he could stop breathing.
But he didn't know if she wanted to hear it, if
she would ever be ready to hear it. He didn't know what she would say in
response - would he lose her? That was his biggest fear, he had never been more
scared of losing something in his entire life, because losing her was losing
the one thing that meant the most in his life. But he realized he would also
lose her if he didn't tell her, and that scared him.He closed his eyes and willed his thoughts to
stop, but a fear had settled over him lately and he couldn't stop thinking
about it once he started.
She woke up to a bright light streaming into
her eyes through the open curtains behind the sofa. For a second she was
confused as to where she was but then her senses kicked in, the first thing she
noticed was that she was engulfed in his
smell, and then she realized that it was his
room she was in - the brick feature wall, the car, the blue walls. Then she
heard steady breathing and felt warm air against the skin of her hand.
She slowly turned her head, her head pounding
from the minute movement and noticed that Shravan was sitting on the floor by
the bed, his chin resting on the edge of the mattress, his eyes closed. She was
taken aback for a second and then her mind decided to wake up from its slumber
and the previous night came back to her, she let out a gasp and Shravan's eyes
flew open and met hers.
"Sumo." He whispered but she didn't say
anything, but he saw her eyes well up with tears again and the tightening
feeling in his chest worsened.
"Naanu?" She stammered as she sat up on the
bed, the white comforter fell onto her lap with the movement.
"Still critical." He answered slowly. Her face
paled and she wrapped her arms around herself before the tears started
streaming down her face again.
"Sumo." He whispered. Before he processed what
he was doing, he was off the floor and on the bed beside her, cross-legged, he pulled her into his lap sideways. She melted into him, her head
resting into the left crook of his neck, her right hand clutched the material
of his shirt and her left hand went around his back as she sobbed into his
shoulder. He could feel the material getting soaked with her tears and his
heart felt like it was being twisted in his chest.
"Sumo, shhh. He's going to be okay." Shravan
murmured wrapping his arms around her and holding her tight - cradling her,
protecting her from the world and herself.
"What if he leaves me?" She sobbed into his
shoulder. "You two are all I have."
Shravan's face registered shock for a second,
he had told her many times that she always had him - forever, but this was the
first time she had acknowledged it. "Sumo, everything is going to be okay,
shhh." He murmured rubbing soothing circles into her back and placing a kiss
atop her hair.
"What if it's not?" She asked.
"We'll figure it out, together." He answered. "Shhh, now you need to stop crying, take a
shower and then we'll go to the hospital." He said against her hair, his lips
pulled up a little when he felt her nod and heard the tell-tale sniffle that
meant she was trying to stop crying. He felt her move her head, almost as if
she was nuzzling his neck.
"Five more minutes." She mumbled against his
neck, he held back a gasp when her lips grazed the skin of her neck.
"Five more minutes." He agreed and she melted
into him, he pulled her tighter and tilted his head so it was resting on top of
hers.
She needed to be taken care of for a few more
minutes before she could be strong for her family again, and he was the only
person that could be strong for her when she felt weak. He always had been her
source of comfort, her anchor - when
things got tough he was there for her, when she needed someone to talk to he
was there, when she was sick he was right by her side. For ten years that he
had been gone, life had taught her out to be strong and independent but she had
always felt alone, there was only so
much she could share with Naanu. For the first time in a long time, she didn't
feel so alone, she had him and a part of her knew that she would always have
him.
Shravan's hand rubbed circles on her back,
trying to give her comfort she craved. His mind went back to the numerous times
she had been there for him - the most
recent memory being how she had stayed by his side all night when they thought
his father had died. She had been there for him numerous times in their
childhood as well, when he came to her crying or in a bad mood, her badass facade melted, she took care of
him, made him his favourite foods, tried to distract him and cheer her up.
This was their relationship in a nutshell, they
were always there for each other, they had faltered a few times due to their
own mistakes or circumstances but they always found their way back and that is
all that mattered.
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