DAIWIK
I hugged her closer to my chest, as she sobbed for a brief while taking deep breaths, waiting desperately for her answer but she did not say anything to me. Eventually, the sobs disappeared, her breath slowed down, and I realised she was faking her sleep once again.
I knew it was fake because her breath kept skipping the beat like it always does when she tried to hide her true self. The way she has been for 3 days.
She admitted she is throwing herself at me, but she did not share the reason. And it's breaking me inside my chest is heavy with the thought that I fail to understand her need.
I was supposed to look after her every requirement, and she felt the need to offer me herself for something she wants.
I hated myself, for being a failure.
The night went by with me in her arms, she hardly slept, but I supported her decision to pretend to be asleep.
She doesn't want to marry me, for whatever reason she fits in her little play, I will erase it. And keep destroying it until she is tired and ready to put my picture in the empty place of her heart.
I closed my eyes, letting the sleep drift me into itself.
~
The morning I woke up alone in bed, she was nowhere in sight, no sound of her in the kitchen, I looked at the clock it was late. She must not be bathing, I tried to focus my mind on the television but it was off too.
Did she run away?
I wondered as I sat up, and walked out of the room, around her neither in the kitchen nor in the bathroom. The television room was as dead.
I ran into Maa and Divya's room but she was not there either. The house was clean though, with everything in place.
There was freshly made food in the kitchen. I looked up, at the second fl, but as always shut, everything on the second floor is shut and I never felt the need to open it. But rooftop?
I stood in the middle of the veranda, my hands on my hip, as I looked around. Maybe she is on the rooftop, I followed my head's instructions and climbed up the stairs, reaching the top, and there she sat under the sun.
My breath was heavy with the run, I stood there sweaty in the early morning, she turned around her beautiful eyes caught me, "Everything okay?" She asked me, unhinged! Completely unaware that her little move from her daily routine nearly gave me a heart attack.
But another question that found my head was, what if someday she does choose to leave me? And runaway? What will I do?
Will I defy her happiness and drag her back into my settled misery compared to the world?
It's a question I don't ever want to face.
"Yes, it's Sunday!" I said reminding her, and she frowned. "You wash your hair today." I reminded her, the conversation from the last night segregated on both of our faces.
Her cheeks turned red, as she glared at her tapping feet, while she sat there on the floor, her knees popping up, close to her chest.
"I already bathe." She said shied away, and I turned my hand in a fist. "Come down, the sun is not good right now!" I told her and turned around.
"Sarisha, I and Taara will be looking around the town today, I hope you don't mind?" She reminded me again and I shook my head.
"No, I don't," I said before I left.
I retired to get dressed for work, coming back into the bedroom and finding her tapping something on her phone. "They are in their way!" She told me, I gave a nod.
I picked up my wallet, opening it to see the money in it.
As it is.
I turned to look at her face again, she noticed my action and stare at me with the same hatred-filled look she gave me yesterday when I saw her the same way.
"I did not take money from your wallet!" She said biting her lips, tears slipping from her eye. And I shook my head.
"Exactly! You did not take money from my wallet?" I asked her the question again, there was something we both needed to talk about. A lifelong practice that had been going on since my childhood.
I kept the wallet back on the table, and I took a step ahead towards her. "You said, you are going out with Sarisha and Sahiba, and you did not take money, you will need it, but you did not take the money? Why not?" I asked her again, and her frown deepen, her tears welling in her eyes stopped.
I walked towards her and sat down in front of her on the bed, "Zehra, ever since I was a kid. Before my dad went insane, I and my siblings have seen this constant thing that nerve changed. Every night my dad will fill his purse with money and keep it on the left, next morning he will find part of the money gone, because my mom took it to look after the house, to look after us as regular work, for little things. He never asked her where the money went, he never asked her what she does with it. It was between them, but later, he started keeping his wallet outside, for all of us. And every day we would take money from his purse and he never complained no matter how much we took, because he kept only the much he could afford. And we were content. I still do it. I keep my purse outside on the shelf when Divya and Mom are home because they take money from it whenever they need it. We have never asked for money and never given it in hand. It always worked like that. And I want the same with you." I explained to her in complete detail.
Her scowl deepens, "You want me to steal money?"
"It's not stealing! It's taking what is rightfully yours! It's never his and mine in the family. It's ours! Okay? Now go and take as much as money you want from my wallet to go out today."I told her, I wanted her to understand this one thing that is passed on to me by my family.
And I wanted to continue it because it felt like the right thing, my dad's little actions never made my mother feel like she was less or low to him, or a slave to him because she has to ask for things. He gave her the right to have whatever she wanted and us.
Well, his madness later became a problem. He was a nice man before.
She blinked still confused shaking her head, "Just keep the money on the table. Whatever you feel fit." When she said it, a sharp image played in my head.
In this line, I know where they are speaking to keep the money for what they find fit.
I gulped down my urge to shout at her for saying the same thing to me, for thinking in the same way as her past. But I restrained, holding on to my urges and shaking my head. "Go and take the money!" I ordered her and she opened her mouth to retort but my red eyes by now were the period.
She stood up, shakily, walking towards my wallet and picking it up very carefully, "I have been hit once for stealing money from a wallet."
"Not the same life. Not the same man." I said, and she nodded. Removing money from the purse, she clutched it in her hands, before keeping the purse.
"I okay took, five hundred rupees! I will return whatever is left!" She said shaking and I shook my head standing on my feet as I walked to her, hugging her. "No!" I said hugging her shivering body.
The dread of her past still resides in her chest and occasionally overcasts her actions.
I pulled her away, picking 9 more five hundred bucks, as handed her the money in her tightly clutched hand, eyes blinking.
"This is...."She started but drifted, "It's so much!"
"Buy whatever your eyes land at, don't even think twice? Did you hear me?" I ordered her once again she was still unsteady. "Can I use this money for something else?"
"I will never ask what you did with it!" I told her, and she opened her mouth but then nodded in response.
~
We had breakfast, and I was about to leave for work, I heard a car pulling up, the door was already open so Sarisha practically came running inside, standing on the veranda, Zehra walking beside me, Sarisha hugged her tightly, before pulling apart.
Vidyut walked behind his wife, as he leaned in his mouth to her ear, "Next time! Try walking." He and demanding her, I saw Zehra daggering him with her eyes, but Sarisha just ignored his remark.
He extended his hand towards me, "We met sooner than expected Daiwik!" he said, as he took my hand.
"Vidyut! Did not think you will be personally dropping your wife?" I said offended at his notion that my house will be a harm to his child-like wife.
"No offence! It's her I don't trust!" He said she sneered.
He joined his hand towards Zehra, giving her a namaste when she returned his greeting with her Adab.
I chose not to personally greet his wife.
"It's such a beautiful house! It's so open and ventilated with such a closeness with family members!" She said cheerfully as she stepped fermentor into the house.
"Our haveli is beautiful too!" Vidyut said, remarking to his wife when she did not say anything.
"You live in Haveli?" Zehra's question, was an instant reflection of her growing uneasiness with the friendship before she felt that she was high standard.
"No, I like a Jail Quarter! He lives in the Haveli!" She said, completely meaning her words. The question Zehra asked me about if Vidyut hurts her is reflected in my mind.
But the way Vidyut's eyes rested on her exploring wife, who found my little home so fascinating, was a clear review that he will not hurt her.
"Let's take our leave!" I said to Vidyut who turned to me, his lips stretching in the corner. "Yes!" he said, and we turned, the door opened wider and Taara walked inside, Babasaheb behind her.
"Zehra!" she paced herself elegantly, dressed in a rather black dress than the saree. I see her daily, she smiled at me as she crossed and both of them hugged each other.
"Vidyut!"
"Babasaheb!"
Both of them gave each other greetings, Vidyut with his hand intertwined and Babasaheb too elite, he only gave a nod in response.
The ladies were already lost in the conversation they were having about places Taara was telling them to must see if there are in Chandravanipur.
Vidyut called his wife first, Sarisha walked obediently towards him, as he leaned on her ear again. "Behave," he warned her like a toddler, Babasaheb walked towards Saheba and kissed her cheeks before he said something audible too, "If anything happens to either of you or my kids? You will be killing me too!"She nodded, with a smirk.
Zehra turned to me, I don't know what I was allowed and what I was not. But she found herself, standing somewhere she was wishing for the same.
Both Vidyut and Babasaheb left, and as I and the women were left alone, Zehra and I covered half the distance together, as I extended my hand and she gave me hers, "I love you,"
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