The Unventured Passions

The Rule of Consents

A real marriage is not a thing of externality - not of family, age nor background - yet a bond between two souls that has a reality only the two of them can see. For we cannot truly become aware of this sixth sense until our soul-partner arrives.

Anirudh and Bondita were soul-partners to each other. No matter how much they argue, or disagree, they knew they can never outgrow each other, for the friendship and respect in their relationship weighed way more than the conjugal bond they shared.
Wives would fight with their husbands, over a dirty towel, or a strain that a cup of tea would leave on a glass-top table, and husbands in turn would calm their wives by claiming her with love... That's how the world works, that's how love grows, and that's how Anirudh and Bondita were meant to re-establish their undying love for each other.
No matter how much they fight indoors, no matter how much the arguments are weighed down by the counter arguments, but the moment an external threat poses even the slightest of intimidation, all the arguments and counter arguments, and everything else falls apart, and the only thing that remains was the overpowering urge to protect the one whom they live for.

The incident at the hospital had brought Bondita and Anirudh closer, their hearts being able to beat again, in sync, looking past the confrontation that they had in the morning.

"Exams in ten days, Bondita?" Anirudh had asked, and Bondita nodded in agreement.

"Prepared?"

She nodded again, and smiled.
"You were a little too much today. The man was almost crying."

It was a little before five in the evening when Bondita and Anirudh had returned back from the hospital. Rudhi had already fallen asleep and after a small luncheon, the couple sat in their lavish drawing room, he with the evening newspaper, and she with her textbooks.

"I should have made him cry tears of blood!" Anirudh had hissed softly. "How dare he talks to you indecently."

"I'm wondering who made him a RayBahadur! Or, was he lying?" She widened her eyes.

"No Bondita, I think he wasn't. If he knows Satya as Sarthaki, then I think he has to be related to the Mukherjee's." His eyebrows had a frown too.
"I'm wondering why would Satya ask the man to see him, knowing that he won't be available at the hospital, and that his ruse might be blown?"

Bondita was listening quietly, her face too, was serious in thoughts.

"We'll have to be careful till Monday, Barrister Babu. The evidence needs to be submitted to the court, and we can't afford to miss this time."

Anirudh sighed.
"About that... Bondita, I wanted to let you..."

Bondita was somewhere lost, deep in her thoughts, and she failed to acknowledge his words, and spoke up instead.

"The man was no doubt a vile one, he made me repulsive." She paused, thinking, "The world is probably full of such people, Barrister Babu, wherever you go...", she closed her eyes, her mind drifted back to the menacing encounter that she had experienced with Rishit Sinha.

"Are you thinking about Dehradun?"
He suddenly asked, startling her at once.

"How do you know?"

Anirudh didn't reply. Instead, he pulled down his casted leg and got up from the couch.
"Come here", his face had that same calmness that Bondita had seen the day he had married her, and pulled her in his chest to soothe her from the devastating trauma that had threatened to rip her off her childhood innocence.

"Barrister Babu... I..."
Bondita suddenly felt overwhelmed. This was the same man who had saved her life, the same man who had given her life a meaning, fighting against all the odds, and here she was trying to win an unequal argument with him!