Married to my best friend

30. Partings

IMPORTANT: 

This chapter was supposed to be posted first before lies but I messed up the sequence and posted lies first. I messed it up. Sorry for the inconvenience but this is chapter 30 and Lies is chapter 31.

N A N D I N I

"Did he pick up?"

"No." I said in a low tone, waggling my head sideways. I had been trying to call Manik since the last half an hour and every single time it had led me to his voicemail.

"You have your flight in half an hour and he is still out of contact." Mum let out a sigh before dialing Manik's number with hope that he would at least pick up her call but he didn't. "Let's just take a cab. The airport is just five minutes away."

"No mum I'll go with him." I denied. I didn't know after today when I would be seeing him and I really didn't want to go without seeing him.

"My godd. Did you two fight?" she pried, redialing his number.

"No." I denied. "We didn't."

The lines in her forehead deepened. "Really?!" I could clearly figure out by her expression that she wasn't convinced with what I had said.

"Fine. I might have said something harsh to him yesterday." My voice lowered down towards the end as I looked away from her.

"And what exactly did you say?" she held my chin and gently lifted my face, making me meet her gaze.

"I..." I hesitated. "I said that he was cruel."

"And-" she urged for me to continue.

"and... that we should take a break." My voice became almost inaudible as I uttered the word 'break' but I knew she heard me.

"You two-" she face palmed herself lightly shaking her head in disbelief. "my god- still act like stubborn kids. Don't tell me you signed up for this employee exchange program because you wanted to take a break from him?"

That was exactly why I unwillingly had signed up for it but I didn't want her to think that we were on bad terms because we weren't. "No mum why would I do that? I really wanted to try that branch and I really miss my mum and grandma."

"Doubtful." she pointed an accusing finger at me. Before I could speak anything in my defense, the screeching sound of brakes interrupted us. My head turned towards the source. "Thank god you haven't left." Manik's voice followed along with the rolled over window.

"Where were you?"

"I'll explain it on the way. Load the luggage first. You don't want to miss your flight, do you?" he got out and opened the trunk of the car.

"Where's your hand bag?" he asked as he loaded my suitcase into the trunk. "Here." Mum handed me my handbag, hugged me and also gave me an earful of do's and don'ts before I finally left for the airport with Manik.

"Now will you explain where you were and why  you didn't pick up my call?" I turned to look at him. With his one hand he reached for the small bag kept in the glove compartment. He placed it on my lap.

"Because of this."

"It's for you."

"For me?" I took a look inside and there was a gift box inside it.

"Yeah for you." he nodded. "The goods I ordered got misplaced with someone else and I had to travel all the way to S city. Moreover my car broke down and it took me an additional-" he lightly slapped my hand that had managed to pull out a tape from the wrapped box. "Don't open it now."

"Why not?"

"Because I want you to suffer in curiosity."

"My curiosity has officially declared me dead from all the suffering. Now let me open it." I was just a movement away from tearing apart the gift wrapper but before I could do that, he took the gift box from my hand and kept it back in the glove compartment. "Later Nandini."

"But why? I want to open it now."

"It's a surprise meant to be seen when I am not around." he emphasized.

"Now this is making me even more curious." 

"Then suffer in curiosity."

"Urghh fine." I reclined on the seat and crossed my hands around my chest. "You know I called you so many times. You didn't pick up and I thought you didn't want to see me after what I had told you yesterday." My tone lowered.

"How stupid of you to even have that thought." he said in an accusing tone. "I didn't pick up because I couldn't. I dropped my phone and my touch screen is busted. Seriously stupid why would I avoid your calls?"

"I wanted to see you so bad and you weren't even responding to my call. So I couldn't help it." 

He let out a sigh. "You are my best friend first before anything else. So don't you ever have such stupid thoughts again. Got it?"

I nodded. "I am really stupid." 

"You really are." he admitted. "Stupid plus stubborn and a huge dense head."

"Now that's too much."

"Trust me it isn't." he said as he pulled over the parking lot of the airport.

After taking out all my luggage, we met a nagging Navya near the waiting desk. Manik then handed a pocket mirror to Navya with an always engraved on top of it mentioning that Cabir had told him to pass it on to her. She looked at it with glassy eyes but no she didn't cry, at least not in front of us. She just stuffed it into her pocket and excused herself to go to the washroom.

"Why didn't Cabir come?" I asked after Navya had left.

"He didn't know how to say goodbye." Manik paused, handing me the small gift bag. "I don't know either. Just have a safe flight."

I looked at the gift bag and then at him before hugging him tightly. "Take care of yourself. Eat on time. Sleep on time and don't overwork."

He let out a chuckle as he hugged me back. "I think I should be the one saying this."

"I can take care of myself better than you okay." I loosened my hold around his chest and looked at him. 

"Don't miss me too much." he gave me that cheshire cat like smile as he said that and I ever so lightly hit his cheeks. "There's nothing to miss about you."

 His smile stretched. "I'll miss you too stupid." 

"Idiot." I hugged him as tightly as I could hiding my face in his chest. I didn't say it but I knew I was going to miss him. 

****

I had written this but in the middle of editing the next chapter and I completely forgot that I hadn't uploaded this and all this mess of chapter 31 being misplaced as chapter 30 started. Sorry for the inconvenience. This is the original chapter 30 and after this follows Chapter 31'Lies'.

Thank you for reading this even though I kind of messed it up. 

Love,

Aaku