The cab comes to halt. She pays the fare and they get down the cab. He looks at the house. Painted in blue, it was an old ancestral house having a small verandah infront. The Door and windows were painted in maroon. The roof was slopy and made of tiles.
Shehnaaz: Come! (She calls as she took few steps towards the house)
He followed her. The door was open and she took off her sandals before she went inside. Up until now he didn't fear of anything but as he approached closer to the door, his feet trembled. His conscience scolded him that he was doing wrong.
Shehnaaz: Come inside Sidharth.
He left his slipper and went inside.
Shehnaaz: Amma, this is Sidharth. He will handle the cashier's job in our sweetmart from now on and will stay with us.
Shantiben: Jai Shri Krishna (she folds her hands and greets him.)
Sidharth: Jai Shri Krishna (he folds his hands in reply)
Shantiben: Dikri, Ahi Avo.. Hu taari saathe vaata karavaani jarura che. {Come here, I need to speak to you)
Shehnaaz: I'll show him his room. Hu Aavu chu.. {I'm coming}
Shehnaaz takes him along with her and shows him the room. He looks around at the room. It had a big bed, a wooden cupboard, an old table with few drawers and a big mirror attached to the table. There were few photo frames kept on the table. Photos of plumpy little Shehnaaz with her father and another photograph of her parents together.
Shehnaaz: This is actually my room. Since we've only two rooms. You can stay here for now. I'll take my belongings afterwards.
Sidharth: What? Where would you stay then?
Shehnaaz: I'll stay in another room with amma.
Sidharth: How will you three people stay in one room? I can sleep in the hall.
Shehnaaz: No, my father is no more. He left us few months back. It was the darkest day of my life. (Tears fill up her eyes)
Sidharth: I am sorry!
Shehnaaz: (wipes her tear which was accumulated on the eyelashes) Why are you sorry about it? There are quiet a few people who need to be sorry for it. Anyways, do you have anything in that bag of yours? Like clothes and other basic things? Let me know if you need anything, anytime.
Sidharth: I do have what I need. Thank you.
She excuses herself to go and meet her mother.
Sidharth picks up the photo frame and looks at it . He then pulls out his phone and dials Radha's number.
Sidharth: Hello Mom! I will be out of station for somedays on work.
Radha: When will you return Sidharth?
Sidharth: I don't know exactly till when. May be a week or two. I shall keep you posted. Mom, I will call you whenever I get free but if you want to reach me, then leave a message and I will call you back. Okay?
Radha: Okay dear. Take care of yourself.
Sidharth: You too mom. Bye!
He disconnects the call and puts the mobile on silent before hiding it inside his bag.
.
.
Shantiben: Sana, I understood you hired someone to help with sweet mart work but why did you get him home? If your father was alive then it would have been a different case but with only two ladies in the house, having an unknown man, people will character shame us.
Sana: I have stopped paying heed to people's comment Amma. They always have something or other thing to say regardless of the fact. It's 90% of the time, they are bothered about what's happening in other's life than their own. Let's be smart enough to pay 100% attention to our lives than those who have verbal diarrhoea.
Shantiben: You've stopped listening to me as well after your father's demise.
Shehnaaz: Amma, I respect you and though I was once in your womb, our way of thinking is poles apart. I just choose to ignore where it doesn't match rather than arguing. I need my peace of mind.
Shantiben: Your wish!! You are managing the house so I leave it to you now. If you want to learn it the hard way, than be it. I can't help you.
Shantiben goes into her room angrily. Sana sits in the hall as she gets emotional. She missed her pappa as he was the only person who loved her unconditionally. He never found any faults in her - neither in her appearance nor with her ideologies. She looks up at the roof with tear filled eyes and blinks her eyes few time to suppress her tears from flowing out of them. Her mouth was open, trying to let out the pain by way of forced exhaling. It was more of a fight within rather than the mean society outside. She showed that she doesn't care about the society but deep inside she knew that she does get affected by it. She was affected by her mother's constant nagging, taunts and anger.
She knocks on her room door since Sidharth was there. The door was open and Sidharth appears.
Sidharth: Please come in Shehnaaz. It looks so weird that you are knocking the door of your own room.
Shehnaaz: I.. I came here to take my clothes. I wanted to change.
Her eyes were red and he knew she had cried but why he wondered.
Sidharth: Shehnaaz, is everything alright? Remember we are friends, you can talk to me.
She looked at him
May be God has sent him to share my pain with him. He is a pained soul himself and the doctor said to keep him happy. He might become more depressed hearing my depressing story.
Shehnaaz: I just remembered my father. I was very close to him.
Sidharth: Like I am to my mother.
Shehnaaz: Hmmm
He still can't get over his mother's demise. He is talking as if she is alive.
Sidharth: You know what, you can share anything with me. I am always here.
Shehnaaz: I know. So tell me do you like sweets?
Sidharth: Hmm.. not much!
Shehnaaz: Wow!! You seem to be a best candidate to work in the sweet mart then..
Sidharth: Huh? How?
Shehnaaz: If you don't like it much then you won't eat them yourself. (Giggles)
Sidharth: (laughs) What if I start liking it? You know they say that you fall in love with things or people with whom you spend more time.
Shehnaaz: Is it? I think it's the other way round. Too much of anything is irritating, right?
Sidharth: I was talking about love.
Shehnaaz: Yeah, me too. Just think, why do we have more jokes on husband and wife than girlfriend and boyfriend?
Sidharth: (laughs) I don't have that experience yet and I think most of the time those jokes are cracked by singles just to console themselves since they are not yet married. Married people don't joke much about marriage I suppose.
Shehnaaz: May be because they aren't happy being married! (Her face showed sadness)
Sidharth's smile disappeared.
Does she consider herself as married or unmarried? I need to know so that I can help her come out of it. If she is sad because of me, I should take her out of her sorrows so that she can move on in life.
Sidharth: So when are you getting married?
Shehnaaz: I am already married!
Sidharth: What? (Did she marry again or is she talking about me?) But you are staying with your mother. What about your husband?
Shehnaaz: I.. I don't know..
Sidharth: Huh?
Shehnaaz: I married an unknown person who I have never seen until now.
Sidharth's thought:
Oh hell! She is talking about me! She is an absolute idiot, why can't she just move on in her life? Why does she have to call herself married? She should consider herself unmarried like me. She needs help.
I have to act as if I don't know anything right now. Besides I only know I married her and nothing else. So this is right time to put an end to my curiosity. The earlier I know, the earlier I can go away from here.
Sidharth: That's a kind of a strange marriage and confusing one. Why haven't you seen his face yet?
Shehnaaz: My father had taken a loan from a person called Ramnik but since he lost his investment, he couldn't repay his loan. So Ramnik asked my father to give my hand in lieu for loan.
Sidharth: Huh? What the hell!! Did he think he was buying you for money?
Shehnaaz: He was an oldman with kids of my age so he wasn't getting bride to remarry. He found this as an opportunity to marry. Since we didn't have a way out, I agreed to marry him unwantedly. On the day of marriage, somebody locked him in the bathroom and married me. He eloped after marriage and I didn't even see his face since he was behind a Sehra.
Sidharth's thought:
Oh hell!! That's me! And my reason to come here is about to get revealed post which I will make sure I wipe off my imprints on her life so that she could stay happy in future.
Sidharth: Oh no! What happened next?
Shehnaaz: Before we got to know that I was married to someone else, my father who was heartbroken to see me marrying a man who was older than him, had passed away due to heartattack. My mother didn't realise until she touched him after the marriage got over.
I was still dealing with the pain when Ramnik came to the pandal and announced that it wasn't him who married me. It was a second biggest shock in one day but there was no time to mourn on my bad luck since I was already mourning my father's death.
Ramnik waited until the final rites completed and he demanded us to return the money at the earliest. We were totally bombarded and drown in problems when my Singing Master ji asked me to participate in a singing competition as he believed that I had a potential to win.
I sent the singing company my audio track. In the meantime, I continued handling my father's business myself. My song was a hit as I had more number of views along with a huge margin difference from that of my competitors. The music company offered me a contract of an entire album along with the token money. I repaid Ramnik's loan and invested some into nurturing my father's dream. That is growing his brand Kantilal Halwaai to Kantilal & Daughter's Sweet Bhandhar.
Sidharth: Shehnaaz, amidst all this I don't understand why would you choose to call yourself married when that person is as good as non-existent in your life.
Shehnaaz: Who said he is non-existent? He is very much existent. The people around me constantly remind me that I am married to someone and that he left me. If body shaming wasn't enough, they tagged me as a rejected girl. If not the society, my mother herself reminds me that I wasn't getting proposals when I was single due to my huge body and now it's all the more worst to move on with a tag of married and a rejected girl.
Sidharth felt that his behaviour was truly reprehensible.
I never realised that my one mistake would lead her to this much pain. How do I undo the mistake I already committed?
She took her clothes from her cupboard and went away, whilst Sidharth was lost in his thoughts as he was conscience-striken.
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To be continued.. ❤️❤️