Two weeks after 'Cramps'
Pallavi rarely gets a good night's sleep nowadays. But after what seems like a million years later, she had finally been actually dreaming while being curled on her bed, fast asleep.
She didn't know where she was but it was such a beautiful place. It had a sea beach with stretches of soft golden sands beneath her bare feet and foamy aquamarine waters which kissed her toes. She was wearing what seemed like a baby pink sundress while her hair billowed wild and free. Not a single soul was in sight within the visible range of miles around.
Suddenly she heard footsteps. She didn't turn yet she knew who the man was as he came to a stop directly behind her. She wanted to turn back and see his face but she couldn't. She got his familiar earthly musky fragrance which made her deliciously dizzy. He hugged her from the back and lifted her right off the ground twirling her around in circles. She was squealing and she heard his deep chuckles resonate through her body. He was muscular and his torso was bare. She could feel the drops of salt water permeate her skin through the fabric of her sundress as the contours of his chest and stomach muscles rubbed sensually against her back.
She moaned and turned her face around to see charcoal black eyes blazing into her very soul. The face was bearded but hazy and he had caramel coffee coloured skin which made her want to run her tongue over the enviously chiselled territories of his entire body. He dipped his face and it was becoming clearer as the sun went behind them blinding her momentarily. She craned herself in hopes of catching his shapely lips when suddenly a loud piercing sound jolted her awake.
Pallavi sat up on the bed feeling like a disgruntled cat and looked around disoriented. Her phone was ringing on the bed stand, yet the hammering of her heart prevented her from hearing it or any other sound as a matter of fact. She gulped dryly trying to remove the images of her rather vivid dream, still playing like a blurred reel in front of her sleep drunk eyes. She finally picked up her screaming mobile, highly irritated at whosoever ruined the best dream she had had in years.
She hadn't seen the caller id but her eyes had wandered to the wall clock which showed one in the night. She heard the voice even before she could say hello. But the words garbled through and specially the way they were spoken pierced her foggy brain cruelly, within a second as if a splash of a bucket full of biting frozen water.
"P..P..Palla..Pallavi....Amma..Keer..ti.. dhyaa..n rak..na"
And then like a deafening gunshot the line went dead.
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Pallavi always thought she had a rather good relation with her God. Though He had thrown her into a thousand trials and tribulations since her earliest memories, taking away her parents, turning her into a widow, getting her kicked out of the only home she knew, still He had also been the only one to help her in times of need. Whenever she would be in trouble He would create some miracle or send someone in the form of His messenger.. His messiah and solve her problem.
So, today as she was madly dashing towards the driveway of the Rao Mansion having abandoned her almost overturned scooty, she bargained with Him. With all that she possessed, even her own failing breaths as an ever increasing hysteria build inside her aching chest with the passing seconds.
She had prayed to every God in the Hindu pantheon she has ever heard of and from every other religion during her entire journey from Krishna's place to Jubilee Hills. But as her destination neared, the fear bubbling in her heart had almost transformed into a mind numbing terror. She didn't even know what was she bargaining with.
Not him Bappa.. please not him..
When she had heard his voice stuttering in her ear from the cell, her brain had completely blanked. She couldn't comprehend anything other than the fact that she has never heard him like that. She has detected anger, sadness, agony and even love in rare occasions in his voice. But Raghav Rao and defeat didn't go together. Whatever happens, the sun may rise from the West and the earth may crack open and the sky may fall apart but that man wouldn't accept defeat. Yet that instant what rang in those agonized whimpers, a far cry from his usual husky baritone, was a bone chilling defeat.
What could have hit him so bad that he found himself at the end of his abilities?
And that scared her so much that she couldn't even breathe properly, let alone think, while she crashed into stuff stumbling like a crazy woman for her vehicle, leaving a severally shocked Krishna behind, in the dead of the night.
And then all the way his words rang in her brain.
He had asked her to take care of his mother and sister. Pallavi knew what that meant. Raghav would never let anyone come within a hundred mile radius of his little family. He would never ask anyone else to look after Jaya and Keerti unless... unless..
She didn't even want to think about that possibility.
It was though, a miracle how she reached her destination without meeting with an accident given her mental condition.
She ran into the main hall, her fear in an exponential increase, not helping her panic driven state at all, as she could see no security within sight. The lights of the hall were switched off and she almost tripped over her own pista green saree even as she screamed his name.
"Raghav! Raghav! Please.. kahaan ho tum? Where are you? Farhad! Harish! Rama! Reddy! Naidu! Shree! Archana! Koi.. koi hain? Raghav!"
She screamed the names of every house help and staff and security personnel which she could remember while running up the stairs, all throughout the hall, partly blinded in darkness and partly in stinging tears.
Yet, no one responded.
"Raghav!"
She ran into the bedroom and slammed on the walls to find the lights almost falling over things obstructing her movement. She found the switch but no lights came on, cementing her assumption without a doubt. This was someone else's doing. The flashlight from her mobile which she was using like a torch went madly all over the dark room.
She was calling out frantically to anyone who would listen while moving around the room almost blindly when suddenly she stepped on something soft. Or rather someone...
She heard a whimper and her heart leapt to her mouth.
Just then as she looked below about to direct her flashlight the lights came on blinding her momentarily at the process and she saw Farhad stumble in the room, looking just as half dead in terror as she might be.
Pallavi stepped aside stumbling only for Farhad to catch her from the back breaking her fall as she saw him finally.
As a little girl of ten Pallavi remembered she had fallen off the massive staircase of her ancestral home. It was in the dead of the night and no one was awake to hear her scream of terror. Then she had laid on the ground at the foot of the staircase with four of her ribs bruised and one broken, a fracture in her left hand and blood pouring out of her forehead, for an hour before someone spotted her. She remembered the pain in her chest being so extreme that she couldn't even cry.
And that she had thought was her most physically painful experience till date..
How wrong could she have been?
Because that seemed nothing in comparison to the violent ache in her chest seeing her Rao in his present condition.
Raghav was sprawled on the floor in what looked like his trousers and the night robe, subconscious, writhing mightily in a pained effort to draw breaths. His face had turned completely white, mirroring a starched paper as the veins in his neck stood up like poisonous blue pipes. But what scared her the most was the blood pooled beside him from what seemed like vomit, and the shattered pieces of the glass embedded in his arms and chest.
What happened after that had become completely muddled in her brain. She remembered bits and pieces of it like shards of broken glass moving in a high speed reel in front of her eyes. She might have screamed. Farhad might have screamed as well. She remembered dropping beside Raghav unmindful of the glass or the blood on the floor to gather his quaking form in her arms. She saw the other people slowly entering the room. Soon, there was a pandemonium in the Rao Mansion with servants running around, Farhad and Harish in the middle of the chaos as Pallavi sat on the floor of the bedroom cradling a severally incapacitated Raghav Rao in the middle of the worst anxiety attack of his life.
She remembered wiping the tears running down the scrunched corners of his eyes with her trembling fingers whispering soothing nonsense in his hair unmindful of her own tears which had by then wetted her entire face. She remembered the doctors swarming in and literally swooping Raghav off her arms and soon he was placed on the bed, hooked to more tubes and machines she could possibly count.
She stood there silently trembling in the corner as she saw the doctors work over him, ripping open his robe, rubbing his palms and feet and increasing the sedation levels of the numerous anti coagulants attached to his system and cleaning the cuts embedded with the glass from his hands and chest. After what seemed like forever which could have been only a few minutes, all was deafeningly quiet again, the only sound in the room being the sound and steady beeping of the ECG and his slightly uneven breaths. The doctors spoke with Farhad and left as she inched closer to sit on the edge of the bed over which he laid sedated at the centre.
She brushed the hair off his forehead with her shivering fingers and leaned over to press her lips to his forehead and kept it there for much longer than what could be deigned as strictly proper. She could feel the assembled people's eyes on her as she kissed his forehead again swiftly, but she couldn't find it in her to give a damn about it right now. She finally sat up to stare at the assembled audience and a surprising bout of unprecedented anger overtook her.
"Where the hell were you all!!!?"
She could see Farhad and Harish flinch at the sheer anger in her tone but she didn't care at the moment.
"Answer me! Where were all of you? There was not a single person in the bloody mansion when I came! Not a single bloody person!!! I was screaming madly for anyone to respond but...Why do you all get paid?"
She saw Rama and Reddy bow their heads in shame. She might have felt bad for them some there time knowing very well how all of them adored Raghav and felt equally horrible about the same but at the moment not even their tears could quell her rage. The thought that, had Raghav not called her then he could have died... alone.. choking in his blood made her feel sick.
Farhad gulped the tears collected in his throat mightily yet a few washed his eyes nonetheless and came forward. The others sighed mentally in relief knowing that the only man in this world, who possessed the power to quieten both Pallavi and Raghav's rage was one Farhad Ahmed.
"I am sorry Pallavi... this shouldn't' have happened. We never leave Anna alone.. there is always people present around him. There was a miscommunication somewhere.... the routine and schedule of the shifts may have been tampered with. I don't know how.."
"Do you know what could have happened had I not reached on time? Do you want me to spell it out for you!!! One miscommunication! One mistake from all of your side could have resulted in something disastrous!"
Pallavi almost screamed shocking the poor house helps and Harish into jumping out of their skins at her uncharacteristically fiery tone. Farhad sighed and looked down unable to counter her words though not that he wanted to. This was a major mistake. They couldn't afford to do mistakes like this. He looked at Pallavi and felt his heart break for her as badly as it had for his Anna when he saw him in that state an hour prior.
The poor woman looked terrified and pale with blood staining her clothes and tears staining her cheeks in equal levels.
"Sorry madam.. this wouldn't happen again.. "
Harish spoke fearfully and Pallavi shook her head closing her eyes in disappointment only for them to fly open hearing his weak but amused voice from the bed, gravelly but possessed that unique zest which was characteristically Raghav Rao.
"Oh my Deshmukh... you will be an impressive drill sergeant. Look at my lionhearted bodyguards trembling in front of you... should I be proud that you managed to make ex navy seals quake in their boots or ashamed of these idiots...?"
"Raghav.."
Pallavi turned so fast that Raghav was afraid she would have given herself whiplash. He felt her comforting fragrance drift over him as her dandelion like touch ghosted over his face and chest like a million butterflies flying rapidly. The other people in the room had wisely left by then shutting the door softly behind them.
He almost moaned at the soothing effect it immediately brought out in his burning heart. He had no idea when her touch had become equivalent to a potent drug which temporarily manages to wipe out all the crushing pain and aches he had hidden in every fibre of his body since years.
"What the actual hell was that Rao! What were you thinking? Do you take pleasure in scaring the shit out of friends in the dead of the night giving them mini heart attacks?"
She tried to keep her voice steady and light hearted but it cracked towards the end nevertheless and he opened his eyes to gaze at her mournfully. She blinked rapidly looking away trying desperately to hold back the treacherous stinging liquid in her eyes.
"Pallavi.. I..I am sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. Its just that.. I thought I was dying and I couldn't bear to leave without hearing your voice.. asking someone to take care of my.. Amma and Keerti..."
"Its okay Raghav.. I didn't mean it that way.. its just. Never mind. I am glad that I could reach in time though. You have no idea how terrified I was.. all the way here and then to see you in that state.. I.."
She shuddered feeling bile rise in her throat as the horrible scene from an hour ago assailed her vision once more. She shook her head as if to clear her overtaxed brain off those images. She felt his large fingers wrap around her lithe ones entangling her hand which was kept casually on his chest while she was twitching the saree with the other which was on her lap. Mercifully his touch was warm now, as opposed to the ice cold which had been when she had first cradled his writhing body in her chest.
She chuckled awkwardly.
"Well, whatever it was. Don't you dare do that me ever... ever ever again.. never again. Do you understand Mr. Rao?"
"But I.. don't have anyone else but you."
She looked at him startled at his rather timid confession and their gaze locked for some time till he broke it off uncomfortably. She found her fingers stroking his bare chest even as his were loosely wrapped around her wrist. She was unconsciously trying to relive him off any lingering pain.
"Raghav.. look here.. hmm.."
He turned to face her but kept his vision somewhere at her chest, lowering his long eyelashes curtaining the starkly visible despair in his molten charcoal irises. She tsked and lifted his chin to face her forcefully with the other gaze. Raghav knew he couldn't hide anything from her. Somewhere somehow at some indistinct point of their acquaintance he had unconsciously given her a scary amount of power over him. She made him vulnerable like no one ever could.
"Bolo.. kya hua tha..? Anxiety attack kaise ayaa? And it was so terrifyingly bad.. please tell me. I am here. Trust me.. please..?"
"Woh.. main.. I..."
"Ghamandi Rao... don't even think of lying or hiding. You know I know you better than that..so tell me.."
"It is.. was yesterday actually... It was Arjun's birthday.. I.."
Pallavi's eyes softened. She didn't know what had happened which led to his father and younger brother's death but she did know it has traumatized Raghav much more than he would ever admit. Something so terrible had occurred in his past which had separated him from his only living family and has left him twisted, broken and mutilated from the inside. He plasters a fake smile which looks blindingly plastic to her even as the paparazzi buys it hook, like and sinker. No surprise though. He has always been exceptional in subterfuge. And though his strength both physically and mentally remains unparalleled and leaves the world in an envious awe she sees the cracks.. oh she does! So candidly that she berates herself for not discovering them earlier.
Raghav has gone quiet again but the unevenness of his silent breathing represses her desire to poke her lingering curiosity any further.
"It is okay Raghav. You should have called me earlier... I could have come over.. you know. Watch a movie or something? I have told you before that I am always available for you.. so don't give me the excuse of thinking that I might have been busy."
"Its not that. I.. you remember that day, when we had gone to that client's house, you had to collect some samples for the saree you were working on for her daughter's marriage? She was telling about her life... her husband's death and everything."
Pallavi chuckled at the memory remembering her partner's utter disdain at being kept waiting in the living room which was so small that it made him look more gigantic than ever and his utter misery at being harangued into listening her client's long speech.
"Yeah.. crystal clear. You looked so bored out of your mind and then looked like you wanted to murder someone."
He smiled warily at that and she giggled a bit more.
"Yeah.. Despite my self control or lack thereof I was actually listening to her rant. Something she told though struck a chord. She told how she dealt with her grief after her husband's death. Something about sharing your pain lessens it. So.. I... thought just.. all these years I have been suffering the same ache which Amma and Keerti are going through.. maybe if we could share some of it.. maybe it would become slightly bearable."
Pallavi felt her heart break for him as he struggled to get his words out, the halting silences in between tearing into her soul like steel blades. She could guess what Jaya and Keerti's reactions to that might have been. She cradled his face as he tried to bury himself further into the pillows away from her.
"Raghav.. I... did they refuse.. I.."
"No.. that.."
He chuckled hoarsely, the dark amusement in his voice a direct proof cementing her doubts and she felt a tear roll down her own face.
"That... I could have digested. I mean, I have been doing for the past ten years.. used to the rejection I am. I had thought it though you know. I was prepared for the door to be slammed on my face but.."
"But.."
"I.. Amma said something. I mean.. come to think of it now, maybe it was silly of me to overthink it.. she was in pain.. a mother after all... she might not have meant it truly right..?"
The hesitation in his voice just disapproved of his claims of it being anything of the sort to let slide so easily. Pallavi knew how disastrously painful words can be. They are like poison tipped arrows that once spat can never been taken back, however much you try. And some words remain dug in your chest as long as you live, like broken remains of hilts of rusted daggers twisting just a bit, the right amount of pressure whenever you try to forget them.
"What did she say Raghav?"
She asked in a small voice fearing the answer to the question she already knew.
"She.. said that she wishes it was me who had.. died that day instead of Arjun.."
She gasped and closed her eyes as a few more tears slipped past her tightly clenched eyelids anyways. Her hold on his hand increased as she felt his heart thunder underneath her touch. She opened her eyes fearfully. Raghav was quite a tall man of wiry proportions. She was quite tall herself but beside him she looked tiny somehow. Maybe it was more because of his formidable persona than his physical dimensions. But today he looked so uncharacteristically small crumpled on his bed hooked to those grating machines that she felt her chest ache suddenly.
"I understand her anger.. her pain.. her dilemma.. I do, believe me. I know I am at fault here.. and I am asking for forgiveness. I just don't know how long and how much will I have to endure before it all just stops.. is it too much to ask Pallavi..? How long will I apologize? How much will I burn before it ends.. what kind of a monster am I, that my own mother wishes me dead? I don't even know why this hurt me so much? It wasn't the first time she... but..it just happened and I couldn't control myself.. I.."
She had scooted closer to him and her hand released from his grasp was threading through his soft silky hair in a rhythmic pattern which she didn't know was for whose comfort.. his or her own. She had been so cruelly disposed off the people she had given the status of her family, her loved ones. She could relate with his suffering and only because she could she knew it was a hundred times worse.
"It hurt you.. because you believe it to be the truth.. don't you?"
He looked away at that and she knew she had hit the right chord. She sighed and dropped a kiss on his hairline softly.
"Raghav I don't know what had happened all those years ago. I don't know what was your mistake.. why Jaya Aunty and Keerti cannot forgive you.. I don't know anything. So I cannot comment on that but I do know one thing. I know you are good man. You have a heart of gold and you will rather die than let the ones you love get hurt. And you are not a monster. Not by any meaning of that literal. And I believe that with every fibre of my being and whatever you do, or have done in the past cannot break that faith. It cannot.
So all I can say right now is to wait. Wait for a time when your mother finally understands and comes to terms with her suffering. Its not a question of if but when.. because she will. She has to. Till then forgive her. Forgive her for each little transgression she does, forgive her for all the hurt she has caused unwittingly and intentionally. Forgive her so that she could forgive you. It will be all better again.. trust me."
She pretended not to notice the long threads of tears cascading down his eyes and reached for the glass of water beside the bed stand. She made him drink the water and moved up and pretended to move around the room looking at the temperature and adjusting the pillows giving him the much needed space to compose himself.
"Pallavi..."
She looked back at him and saw him looking so straight into her eyes that she felt he might have bored into her soul. she suddenly felt very naked and that had nothing to do with her clothes.
"I.. thank you.."
Later as Pallavi Deshmukh stood under the shower letting the night's blood, dirt and grime wash away from her exhausted frame into little rivulets on Raghav's expensive marble floored bathroom, lathering a healthy amount of strawberry scented shampoo in her hair, she mused how his last words sounded more like an 'I love you...' and tried to ignore the lingering ache in her chest that brought out.
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