Silent Whispers

Chapter 35: Train Wreck

Grief was a tricky thing.

It brought unimaginable pain with unexplainable release. It drove you to the lands of days gone and pushed you into the realms of days to come. It made you see what could have been, while reminding you of what had been. It had to be the world's most powerful weapon, for it could kill anyone without spilling as much as a drop of blood.

And on a cloudy Wednesday morning in one of the elite colonies of Delhi, Khushi, sitting in front of a window overlooking the small flowerbeds Jaya made sure to nurture without a fail, was grieving.

It wasn't the sort where uncountable tears splashed down her face (there were no tears at all actually), it wasn't the sort where she cursed every little thing around her, and it definitely wasn't the sort where she denied the existence of the hole within her.

No, it was the sort where she was consumed by silence, so calm that it knotted her mind, so violent that it was only thing she could feel, so powerful that she was helpless in front of it.

Three weeks had passed since her mother died.

It was so easy to say that now, to form the words as if it was nothing but an unimportant phrase. It definitely wasn't so when she had called her brother from the hospital that day, trying to tell him what happened, and yet finding no words to explain it.

The days that followed weren't that better. There was a flurry of visitors, the few well wishers they had left, coming to pay their respects to the woman they once knew. The funeral was perhaps the hardest of it all. Shyam alone had gone to the graveyard to perform the last rites; she wasn't allowed and her grandfather, their only remaining parent, had refused. Shyam had returned emptier than ever, leaving behind a part of him to burn along with the body.

And that was it: the end to everyone's condolences. The visitors resumed their lives, her relatives returned to their houses. Even Jaya began to bustle around the house with her never-ending list of chores. It was as if everyone moved on, forgetting that Khushi had not budged even an inch from her misery, that she was frozen in the middle of the road, watching the on coming traffic awkwardly trying to steer clear of her.

Of course, in the initial days, they tried. They tried –hopelessly– to distract her, to convince her. They gave long speeches about the circle of life and death, advice on how best to move on, and recollections of the Garima they pretended to know. Khushi quickly grew tired of them, preferring the company of only two people; her grandfather, whose loss like hers, was too grave to put into words and Lavanya, who knew enough to leave her alone.

But even that was short-lived. Her grandfather returned to the village, unable to put off his duties any longer and Khushi was resigned to complete solitude. The only saving grace –and it would take a long time for her to understand that– was Lavanya's daily visits, which despite being entirely one-sided, never stopped even for a day.

"Of course I don't get bored coming here everyday!" she had said two days ago, when Khushi finally voiced her thoughts. "How often do you think I'm going to get the chance to say whatever I like in front of Miss Krazy Kinetic Gupta without her interrupting me even once?! No way in hell am I giving that up!"

Khushi had almost smiled at that comment; only she heard the rest of Lavanya's answer:

"I finally talked to Akash the other day by the way. He is doing well... he got some restoration project. I think its called Jal Mahal or something like that. But whatever it is, he seemed very happy with it. I was very surprised with his tone to be honest..."

Khushi hadn't answered. She wasn't even the slightest bit stung to know that Akash hadn't even bothered asking about her; her pain was too grave to wallow in his fury. In fact, she felt a bit relieved to know that at least he was leading a happy life; the only one out of the three of them.