Part 7
Author's note: Apologies for the delay. I hope the extra long update compensates for that though. My only warning for this one, is that there's a lot going on and it's pretty heavy emotionally. Will be looking forward to any feedback you guys would have.
____________________________________
The last two months have felt like a paradox in existence. The dead mansion lit with lights and music, faces carrying pure anguish amidst the whirlwind of forced celebrations, a visceral silence among the rather loud claims of a promising future. To those who were barely holding on to the familial ties with a closing sense of obligation, it felt like the globe was on the edge, waiting to be tipped over.
The marriage had taken place successfully, but the aftermath was a contradiction of the awaited triumph. Despite all of Kaveri's attempts at humiliating Abhira, she had left the house with her head held high on the wedding day, despite her prolonged stay due to her pitiful circumstances after Sanjay Bansal had gone out of his way to ruin her career, that landed her with the job of a wedding planner for the grand Poddar-Goenka wedding. However, the Poddar family was subjected to an unforgettable public indignation when someone released a media statement about Ruhi's status as Armaan's sister in law prior to their new status as husband and wife. While Vidya, throughout the wedding preparations had managed to convince herself of the correctness of her decision to get them married, she wasn't very sure now after witnessing the disasters that have followed.
Even though Abhira had left, there were pieces of her scattered in the way the members of the family now led their life, in form of a garland of thorn sewn from their own guilt for the way they had treated her and in form of a defeat. Madhav didn't wear his badge without a safety pin, Kiara and Aryaan wouldn't eat poha because nobody cooked it the way their Abhira Bhabhi did. Vidya spends half of her day observing the wreckage that her short sightedness had caused, in form of failure of her own marriage that had only started to mend after Abhira entered their lives, she stared at the wreckage she had made of Armaan by forcing him into marrying Ruhi and in the deepest corners of her heart, she prays she could turn back the clock. Kaveri Poddar has always been too egoistic and too narcissistic to see anything beyond her own beliefs. While a part of her knew her hold on her family was slipping away from her fist like grains of sand, she was too knee deep into consequences to now make a difference, so she sat back and she watched her world burn, the undeterred pride never leaving her eyes, because she would rather have herself buried in the house she built, believing it to be the same, rather than accepting that the foundation itself has always been weak.
Ruhi got what she wanted, she was married to the man she had claimed loved, she won or did she? Even in moments when Armaan was beside her, she would try to find him. His movements were almost mechanical these days, he woke up early and came back late. And Ruhi got from him was a slight forced smile he would give at the end of the day, when she would look at him with her broken smile and longing eyes. And now she had begun to question was it actually all worth, to commit all the sins she had for this cursed marriage?
Manisha spent her days closely indulged in lives of her children, and that included Krish and Abhira. Throughout the wedding preparations her only task has been to protect Abhira from any further damage, while she tried her best, there were moments where it just seemed like Abhira was slipping away, ever so slowly and as helpless as she was, all Manisha could do was make sure she is fed, make sure she knows she is cared for and make sure that she doesn't have to face Vidya and Kaveri alone. Amidst all this Manoj has stood by her and now they were planning to move out, build their own little home away from the shackles of this family.
Krish has totally shifted his focus on his career. He was working hard, like Abhira did, like she had inspired him to. Him and Manisha were probably the only people still in touch with her, aware of her whereabouts and well being. There wasn't a moment throughout the wedding fiasco when his eyes did not follow Abhira, ensuring she was well but he couldn't protect her from the ultimate heartbreak and everything that had followed only strengthened his resolve to be there for her, so he continued to, by dropping her a text every now and then, calling her once a day but that was mostly for his own need to know that she was fine, especially after everything he had seen her go through.
He was about to make a call when he heard a loud noise of a glass shattering from the hall.
"HOW DARE YOU?", Kaveri's voice however merely a whisper, her eyes scanned Manisha's face with an unmatched fury. "How dare you think I would allow you and your husband break this house? How dare you go behind my back and make plans to abandon your family?"
Manisha flinched when Kaveri roughly grabbed her arm. But Manoj was quick to come to her rescue. With a gentle yet firm grasp he removed Manisha from Kaveri's hold and stood in front of her. A weird anxiety gripped his heart knowing well enough what turn this conversation would be taking.
"We are not abandoning our family Maasa, we are finally choosing to protect them, from passing on the same dysfunction to them that has been passed on to us, we are protecting our children from the fate that Abhira was subjected to for voicing out the truths and realities that we have denied and veiled for so long", Manoj spoke, without raising his voice but with a grit that Kaveri didn't know her son was capable of.
"So this is the influence she has left behind on you and your wife. This exactly is the reason why I have always loathed her. I knew she was a homebreaker...", Kaveri reiterated with her usual detest for the young girl.
"She did not break our home...she couldn't even if she wanted to. We were always a broken family, some of us knew that, someone of us accepted that to be the way of life", Madhav interrupted, throwing a glance Armaan. "That girl...was just a catalyst for us to finally see the extent of cracks that exist in our foundation and she was just someone who dared to speak about it. She threatened you because she had the capacity the blindfolds you had tied on our eyes. It's unfortunate how despite everything she has loved us all, she loved us with all her heart and we couldn't protect her from you and your tendency to kill people if they don't abide by your principles."
Kaveri looked away, refusing to bow down, refusing to accept the dysfunction of this system that she had created. "You talk as if I ever always behind her life, I tried..."
But Krish has seen too much and heard too much to let Kaveri continue to insult Abhira, "Weren't you actually behind her life though? Did you and my dad did not try everything that you could to make her as miserable as possible, as dead as a person with a beating heart could be? And guess what, she almost did die, but you wouldn't know because you don't care enough to see? We are all corpses under your control but I refused to live this way, I refuse to live like Armaan Bhai does, I refuse to let you continue to lead your lives as if you all just didn't kill a twenty two year old out of your own spite and ego!"
There was an eerie silence that engulfed the air, the kind that circumvents a graveyard once the banshee's cries die down and the funeral comes to an end.
"We are leaving and that is final. Whatever the consequences maybe, we accept it. But we won't be staying!", Manoj spoke before he walked back to his room with Manisha.
Every member scattered back to their separate rooms like beads falling from a necklace, with an awareness that things were changing in ways that would make it impossible to go back to the way they were. Armaan stood beside his Daadisa and whispered, "Maybe it's time...you realise that your need to have control has made you a monster and maybe it's time...I tell you, I have become one too", Armaan looked straight into Kaveri's eyes, feeling an anger he was unaware of, "You called her lie...but she has been my only truth, she was my friend, I called her a lier when she is probably the only one who has never lied to me. I...made her a corpse when she was only teaching me how to breath and I hope. Abhira did not deserve what I put her through, the way I hurt her and I will carry that guilt with me like a noose around my neck. But I didn't deserve to spend my entire life feeling indebted to the people who claim to be my family. I don't deserve her, I never will but you...don't deserve me either. I really hope someday you will see what you have done but let me tell you, it will be too late...it already is."
___________________
"Bury me in the place I called home, for that I was the first graveyard I knew."
Abhira stared out of the bus window as her mind reeled with the events that plagued her in the last two months. Every moment spent in that house felt like a bullet piercing through her skin. She remembered every single moment that tightened the knots in her chest in a visceral ache.
She remembered the day vividly, just like she remembered the scar that lay underneath the layer of bandages. The wound didn't need the bandage anymore but she did, because every time she would look at that scar she would remember a weakness that made her pathetic, a weakness that made her want to throw away all the sacrifices her Mumma had made for her and as much as she wanted herself to remember the grave mistake she was about to commit she couldn't bring herself to look at the extent of her own failure at preventing herself from falling apart.
It was the night of the grand wedding when the hallucinations started to hit, random figures appearing and dissolving, some faceless, some with faces with a look she had now come to fear because of the way it made her feel, like she was something that was required to be broken and moulded to fit in, like she was someone intolerable, a mistake...an unwanted responsibility. Then the voices in her head got louder suppressing her own words into silence that made her tragic.
She clutched her ears but the voices only got louder. She shook her head and tried to look around but the walls in the room only seemed to cave in on her.
And then there was a second of quiet before the voices of everybody she had loved echoed in a chorus melody, "Do it, you know you have to! Drain yourself if you wish to deserve love. Empty yourself to entirety and maybe you would have a home."
Abhira did what she would come to regret. She let the knife slide through the feeble skin and she let her mother's blood fall, while her knees buckled and she succumbed to the comforting pull of the ground underneath. She let her eyes stare at a distant point till it ached to the point of closing. Then there was panic, what had she done. This is not what her Mumma wanted for her, this is not what her Mumma sacrificed her life for. So she struggled to pull her body despite the dizziness that weighed her down. She dragged herself to the table where she kept her phone and called that one person she believed she could turn to for help. It took Krish ten minutes to reach Abhira and the condition he found her in would always haunt him.
That was the day everything changed. Abhira strengthened her resolve to pull herself together. It took her to almost lose herself, almost have a home, almost have a love to realise more than anything she needed herself, she needed her own strength. And it felt as if the world had finally tipped to a side. It was Dev who reached out to her, for a transfer in their Delhi branch. It has been about fifty three days to Abhira working there and as overwhelming everything has been, Abhira was trying to be strong, for herself, for Krish, and for Manisha, the two people who have made it a point to look after her. It was during her stay in Delhi, when Krish started nagging her and talked her into signing up for therapy and allowing herself to heal.
Abhira's mind once plagued with hallucinations and daunting voices, now could build up a shield with the comforting wise words of her therapist.
"What finally made you not want to give up Abhira, what gave you the strength to drag yourself and call someone to help you, save you?", her therapist asked.
With her head bowed down and her fingers fidgeting with the loose ends of her Mumma's shawl, she answered, "I...I felt like I heard my Mumma's voice. And it struck me...I once had a mother who tore herself apart to give me this life, a mother who fought everyday so that I could have dreams, so that she could let me fly. She waved me goodbye everyday with a tiffin box and a prayer. It would be so easy to end it all but I couldn't...I couldn't let her faith go vain."
"And if it weren't for your Mumma's voice Abhira, what would have happened?", he questioned her back then.
She hesitated, her voice quivered when she finally managed to answer, "then I guess...I guess I would have painted the floor red just like she did."
And till date, Abhira remembers every word he spoke after that.
"I am glad you could save yourself Abhira. But I need you to understand, somewhere it was your own voice that reached you, a part of you that wasn't convinced that your purpose on this earth is over. A part of you that knew you had the strength to fight whatever seemed to drown you in that moment. That...is your inner strength Abhira. I need you to believe, that you are meant to live, for your own dreams and ambitions, not just because your Mumma wanted it for you, because it's you who wants to live them, who holds the capacity to fulfill your purpose. Remember, you live for yourself Abhira, you stay for others, you fight for others but you live...for yourself."
Abhira's eyes fell on a family walking out of a restaurant and her mind reeled back to another session, when the therapist had decoded what made her feel she loved Armaan and his family.
"Don't you think everything that you have been accounting to be his and his family's goodness, are mere acts of basic humanity?" he had asked a little taken aback by her answer when he had asked her what made her love the Poddars.
"Abhira, I need you to listen to me carefully and I need you to let me know if at any point you require me to stop speaking, okay? What you have with them is certainly an attachment that stems from all the time that you spent with them and maybe your own personal desire to have a family but the way they treated you... isn't how people who care about you or love you would. Almost every member in that family has made you feel like you lacked something, like you were the one who is incapable of learning family values, they taunted you for never having a family and from what you told me, they didn't allow you to sit with them on the dining table, did they? Abhira...them giving you shelter, and then Armaan reminding you that he took care of you, or his family telling you that you owe them for feeding you, or for treating you like your own, it's like...how you starve someone and then feed them... forcing them to feel grateful to a point that makes them forget who starved them in the first place. That isn't how love is supposed to feel."
Abhira had a difficult night following that conversation, one filled with bouts of panic and gut wrenching sobs at the realisation of the cruelty and abuse she had been subjected to, cruelty that she had started to feel like love. It left her disillusioned to a point that everything about the last 10 months of her life started to feel like a lie.
It was a reality that she was still learning to accept. She looked around at the passengers, families travelling together for a vacation. The sight of friends, couples and kids making memories with each other, brought an all familiar ache back. She still hadn't confronted her feelings about her Mumma and what she had felt in those last moments that she had spent with her. And maybe it was time she did, she knew as she got off the bus and inhaled the air that reminded her of home, her Mumma, her childhood. The land of Mussoorie has seen her being her happiest self, seen her have everything and lose everything. And maybe this is where she would find her pieces back, build herself again. Abhira clutched her Mumma's shawl tighter around her, as she walked towards the place she once called home, unaware of all that awaited her.
Edited by Nocturnal7 - 1 years ago
CID
0