There Was You

Chapter 4: Omkara Singh Oberoi

• DADI'S GIRLFRIEND •

"Baby?!" Rudra and I questioned simultaneously out of shock.

As the two women in front of us, one almost eighty and the other barely twenty-five, engaged in a tight hug, I was beyond confused at the sight.

"O, I knew Dadi was cool, but not this cool, yaar! How the hell did she manage to score a girlfriend of twenty years young when even all my biceps couldn't?" Questioned, my duffer brother, mostly to himself.

"GIRLFRIEND? Are you mad, Rudra? Of course, Dadi doesn't have a girlfriend!" I said.

"Hello, O, you don't know how chaalu our Dadi is. This has put her back on my list of suspects," he said, rubbing his stubble.

I shook my head at him and mumbled, "Mad!"

"Not, mad, O. Bad! Bad! Dadi is bad for not telling us about her secret affairs!"

"Rudra, for the last time! She's not Dadi's girlfriend."

"You call your girlfriend or your wife, Baby. Not any other Tom, Dick and Sally," he said.

"Harry," Shivaay corrected him as he came to stand beside us.

"Haan, jo bhi! Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Om, tum nahi samjhonge!"

"Out of the three of us, I'd like to remind you that I'm the philosopher. If any of you guys try it, it just turns out to be excruciating shit," I clarified, for the hundredth time.

Rudra just pouted.

Shivaay said, "Really, Mr. Jatadhari?" Quite cockily.

"Really, Mr. Sadu," I argued, as I was done with their stupid assumption that they could string out some really good life lessons like I could.

"Don't call me that, Om," he muttered looking at the floor, clearly pained.

"Why not? That's how you've been behaving since my Bhabhi left, huh," Rudra said, "Bohot ho chuka Hai, Bhaiya. Abhi bas. You're a Sadu, deal with it," he said before running off to sit before Dadi.

Shivaay's stone face, did not manage to hide all the mixed emotions from me, at least. I'm his brother, after all.

"He's right, you know," I mutter.

He takes a deep breath and says, "I'm hurt, Om. I don't want to talk about it."

This was his answer everytime. I knew Mr. Stone Singh Oberoi will not let anything else out further. It always stopped here, since the beginning of the three painful months.

I regret giving my Kasam to Bhabhi.

Clearly, this decision did nothing but break two lovers into pieces, further thrown as ashes into the deep waters of the ocean called Pain.

We ought to have come up with another solution to deal with Choti Maa.

Calling it what it is, three days is not anywhere close to three months or eternity.

I sighed, "So is she."

I took a step away from him and towards Rudra, who was intently watching the new girl chat away with our Dadi.

"Ek minute, ek minute," Dumbbell Oberoi interrupted, them, " Dadi, aren't you going to introduce your girlfriend to the family? So when's the marriage guys? Is it a destination wedding?"

Shivaay and I face palmed in embarrassment and at our brother's stupidity.

"Rudra, waah! You never changed, even konjum(little)! Still Dumb! I can't believe you forgot me so soon!" The girl chastised my brother with a look of disbelief.