My Nepenthe

Chapter 16

"She must have said that, just to get your aunt off her back."

Omkara closed his eyes in irritation but he remained silent, letting the wind softly blow in his ears.

After walking in on Gauri and Pinky's convo, he stormed out from the room full of people to find sanctity at the building's terrace.

Since it was close to being late evening, the sun almost setting behind the hills giving the sky an orange hue, the artist in him found it peaceful to just look at portrait painted by mother nature.

Alone and calm, he tried to understand the circumstances under which she had to say what she said. However, no explanation could numb the pain that gnawed at his heart.

His stay with her was finite and the thought that she would leave him one day sucked the life out of him.

Did he not have any chance to ever stay happy? What did life want from him?

"I understand you needed to be alone but Shivaay has been looking for you."

"Karan, thanks for checking on me but please do me another favor. Tell Shivaay to take the family home. I will wind up things here in sometime."

"I am not a messenger bro. You should go down and talk for yourself," came the response making Omkara's anger spike.

"Fine!!" he growled, as he walked past him while the former chuckled.

"You are so easily irked man. Calm down, you seriously need to vent before you go down and create a new problem for yourself."

Favoring his common sense this time, Omkara stayed unmoving at his place for a few minutes, as if gesturing the other to continue.

"Look, I agree we are not friends but I think that is exactly what you need now. Your family supports Gauri. Your brothers are her friends as well as your mother. Even if you have something against her, they will be biased in advising you. I assure you that I won't be the guy to preach you regarding anything," Karan said adapting his serious mode which he seldom used.

His opponent remained silent, contemplating whether or not to trust him.

"You can open up Omkara, I promise I won't make fun," he urged once again.

It took some more time to hear a sigh of sheer frustration which disturbed the peace of that evening.

"I... I am tired of being some charity case," Om started as Karan patiently listened.

"In my life I lost my childhood to my father's affairs, youth to my mother's alcoholism. In trying not to be my father, I think I had committed more mistakes than I would have done otherwise. But I am not my father. No!!" he said, his voice trying to hide the embarrassment of sounding like a child complaining about his lost toy.

"I thought I saw one ray of light in all the darkness and I almost believed it is going to stay. As always, my fate had to intervene. I won't blame her because I know I am at fault and nothing I do would ever revoke my mistakes."

"I don't understand why it still hurts. Shouldn't I be acclimatized to pain? I guess I did not learn from my past even now," he finished with a mirthless laugh.

Karan rolled his eyes, walked up to Omkara and turned him so that they faced each other.

"Bhai... rulayega kyaa mujhe... itnaa depressed kyun hai yaar tu"

"You find anything worth a shot in my life? I just don't understand..."

"No, I don't understand how you can miss such an important point."