I'm Dying

24.

Tears were a distant acquaintance to him for the moment. Nothing came out of his eyes. It felt as if every emotion held itself in a whirlpool inside his system, he just looked at her, trying to get her out of his nightmare. Nightmare- which was his reality for the moment. 'What did you do, Suman!!!' he called her out again and scrapped her wet and old shrug to take it off. Her arms were saggy and were cut enormously. They were deep and hostile cuts, which made his breathing tense and hollow.

'No, no...You shouldn't have done that. But we will make it fine... honey! please get up.' he bucked up some strength in hopes to reverse the menacing situation. He finally pulled her up, with his legs finding the courage to take her out of the dark tunnel.

She was quiet. She made no movement in his arms. Her head ducked away and her arms were limp and thrown to gravity without care. Nothing in her reminded him of the woman he had loved. 

-----

'Ravi!' he was already screaming the name of his friend even if the phone was ringing for the moment. 

'AMBULANCE! AMBULANCE! There is an emergency. Yes, no, I don't know. I don't....' at this point, Shravan's voice broke. For the first time, he was incapable of holding his lady and dragging her for help. Maybe, the truth had lingered in his subconscious which he desperately wanted to deny. 'Please. I do... I do... I do know how to do CPR, yes, I will try. But I think her lungs are filled...' with that he lost the ability to breathe.

On the other end, Ravi Gujral- mechanically skimmed through the contacts to find the hospital number and prepare them for an emergency.

Maybe the emergency, that was already over.

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6:49 a.m.

Approximately 50 minutes later, Shravan sat outside the ER. The nurses skimmed through the corridor, with a few doctors going here and there, oblivious of the trauma he went through. Looking at them, made it look so normal. But still, he couldn't feel the soundless rhythm of his heart.

Ravi Gujral came and sat beside him. He wasn't looking through Suman's case. It had been just five minutes since she was rushed to the emergency. But Shravan hadn't breathed since then, it felt like that.

Gujral put his palm on Shravan's wet sweatshirt. Now, as his clothes were soaking the warmth of the environment and were soon drying off, he could see stains of blood all over. With the sudden contact, Shravan turned around with a hint of steel in his eyes. Gujral could feel his friend's heart twist mercilessly under his touch, so he withdrew his advances. 

'I didn't kiss her in the bathtub. I should have. I always did, whenever I met her after a period of time. Every morning. Every evening after coming back from the cantonment. I did. Religiously. But.....' his voice was lost in a gradual low trail. 'But I just forgot it today.' he looked at the white tiles of the hospital, which appeared red to him for a millisecond. He rasped for a breath and rubbed his thighs with his palms and ducked his head back. 'I hope she won't be upset about that. Would she be?' 

Gujral pressed his specs and rotated his head in the other direction. Shravan wasn't even looking for an answer to that question. So, he just got up and walked away for a glass of water.

After 20 minutes, a nurse came out to call Shravan inside. 

The doctor stepped forward, with his scrubs on. 'Captain Malhotra?' he questioned, but Shravan's gaze was still darted on Suman's sleeping figure. But her chest didn't move. She was quiet, so damn quiet.

'Captain Tiwari was pronounced dead at 6:55 A.M, 6 minutes after she was bought in the emergency. We're sorry, Captain.' he moved ahead, with a slight push on Shravan's shoulder. But Shravan was already hit by a hurricane. A disaster his senses couldn't contemplate.

He rushed with whatever dull energy he had been left with. Maybe there was a nurse standing beside her, scribbling something. She might have noticed his violent attempt to get past Suman, but she stayed noiseless. She didn't warn him to be careful.

Why?

Because there was no point in being careful anymore?

Like, if somebody died, they won't need that silence, they won't need people to not walk past them as he did now?

He looked at her moon-like face. He was so, so wrong. She was still, beautiful. Ethereal and adorable. So what if all her blood was drained? 
She could still evoke all his maddening senses.

He ducked his head and placed a chaste kiss on her cold forehead. With his lips chattering and shivering against her cold dermis, he stayed there, until he passed out into oblivion. 

He was warm and out of his senses.

And she...
She was gone forever.
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