Let go.
Let go.
Let go.
If there was ever a bullshit advice, Dhruv had heard it was this. How easily his father had let go, of his mother's memory, of him when he ran away from home. That was something he didn't want to do.
He remembered that when he was in school, he used to get attached to even his pens which is never threw away. How could he let go of her? She was a part of him.
When he came back home, it was home now because she was there. He entered the front door and the house was quiet until he found her in the kitchen desk with her laptop open.
"Oh you're back." She said.
He said nothing.
"What did he want to talk about?" She asked him but he knew she was trying to dodge the awkwardness of what she had confessed.
"About my mom." He moved to the coffee making station he had installed.
"Oh." She was silent for a moment and then she quipped in a chiller tone, "Well! Dishu was telling me that she was in mood for Chinese and she wanted to go out so I'm looking at restaurants!"
He finished his ministrations and put down a cup in front of her, it was her favourite concoction, dark chocolate mocha.
"Relax, I won't bring it up again." He said taking his coffee to his room, he didn't have to see her expression to know she didn't expect that. Any other day, he would've happily played along but he was tired now. There was an old ache that seeped in till his bones. There was no niceness left in him anymore.
***
"Bhai!" His sister called him and she twirled around the room. She wore a pink kurta and jeans.
"You look pretty!" Dhruv said laughing.
"It's bhabhi's!" She said to him beaming.
While the door opened again and his breath caught as she saw her. She wore a black chiffon saree with gold twinkling in her ears. Her neck was empty as she wore a high neck blouse, her hands gleamed with pretty rings and he had realised that in all these years he had never gifted her jewellery. Not even a pendant.
Dhruv could certainly afford it and he ran a mental check on the gifts he had given her and his heart steeled when he realised that he had never gifted her anything. She never anything. On her birthdays he cooked for her and baked a cake.
Dhruv realised, what a pathetic husband, he had been. How had he not given her even a flower? Not a saree, not a trinket. And yet she had been so grateful to his lukewarm efforts that she had willed herself to have sex with him even when she wasn't in the mood.
"Bhai! I'm saying, doesn't babhi look pretty?" Dishu nudged him out of his thoughts and he nodded, "Yeah. She looks pretty. You too, Dishu. Let's go!"
***
Drishti had insisted that Khushi sit in the back with Dhruv, while she drove. She wished Drishti would stop pushing them together because it made everything so awkward. She knew he was mad at her for not telling him about the baby and he was just indulging Dishu who took it upon herself to play matchmaker.
She pulled out of her thoughts when the car stopped at the signal. Someone tapped the window and it was a think boy selling gajra. She pulled down her window and nodded sideways. Her hair was already in a pixie cut, where would she pin gajra anyway.
But the boy was insistent and pulled over a cloth from his basket to reveal Roses. She smiled but still nodded no. The boy left from his window and she heaved a sigh of relief.
Not a moment later, there was a knock on the other window and Dhruv who seemed strangely lost in his thoughts, startled and he looked out.
Khushi felt mortified but Dhruv; magnanimous as he was, brought all the roses. The boy wrapped it in leaves into a makeshift bouquet. Her heart, which she was sure had been frozen, started to warm up.
"Here, Dishu." He handed it to his sister.
Drishti gasped and thanked him.
Kushi snapped her head away towards the window. The signal was green and the car started rolled forward, she fought back tears. She didn't know why she felt so, her icicle heart was coursing with hot envy. Ofcourse, he wasn't buying flowers for her. He never had. Not even once. So, why would he today? When they were estranged and he was upset with her.
Yet, it hurt. She had the soul of a woman. The part that made every woman crave for flowers was a part of her too, she realised.
Something tickled her hand and before she could swat it away, she looked down. Through the flitting street lights she saw that it was no fly or a bug, it was the petals of a red rose, she followed the stem and his fingers were curved around the end.
Kushi trailed her eyes upwards and saw him watching her through the corner of his eyes, his head tilted in an unsuspicious manner. She plucked the rose from his fingers and this time as she turned her head to the window, it was to hide the smile that spread on her lips, reaching all the way till her abdomen where butterflies danced.
***
Khushi had purposely chosen Viren's hotel. It had been so long since she had met Viren jiju and she wanted to meet him. When they got out the car and handed the keys to the chauffeur, Viren was in the lobby welcoming them.
Viren came towards her first, he was dressed in a navy suit and he looked handsome, not surprising considering he was named one of the hottest bachelors in a popular magazine.
"Khushi, I've missed you. It's been long." He gave her a brotherly hug.
"Jiju!!! How are you? How are Aghanya and Krishna?"
"All well, sweetheart." He gave her a smile but she knew that jiju was still coping with his father's loss last year, just like she was with her mother's.
"Dhruv. It's good seeing you both together." He said. They both shook hands and then Viren jiju showed the lm their table.
When they were served, Drishti broke the ice, "So, bhabhi, I hear you writing this research paper?"
Khushi put down her fork and nodded, "Yeah. About covid and it's effect on fertility in women. I don't know whether It'll get approved.."
"Nonsense, bhabhi. You'll get approved for sure!"
"Thanks Dishu. You're the sweetest." She said fidgeting with her food.
"What about you? What are you planning ahead?" Dhruv asked his sister.
Drishti shrugged, looking uncomfortable. "I honestly don't know. I have a degree in Art History, I don't know if I should pursue master's or trying working."
"Think on it. I'm here for you, as always."
"I'm here too. I think Aghanya is working in that line, maybe I'll connect you and then you can figure it out?" Khushi said.
"Really? Thanks bhabhi."
"Why don't you both continue? I'll be back."
***
"I knew I'd find you here."
Dhruv turned to see his school time best friend Viren walking towards him.
"Gone back to traditional?" He nodded towards the unlit cigarette stick in his hand.
"Have you seen the news about the vape lungs infection?" Dhruv shuddered.
"Can I get one?"
Dhruv handed another stick to Viren and passed on his lighter. They were quiet for a while, just smoking.
"So, how is Aghanya?"
"You know how she is. You both stay in contact, I know that too."
"I just wanted to irritate you."
"I'm past that, Dhruv. It's my turn now. How is it going on with you and Khushi?""
"I don't know."
"Aghanya told me about Khushi. She's been feeling guilty about not being there for her."
Dhruv only snickered, "Tell her, welcome to the club."
Viren patted on his shoulder consolingly,
"She's a bit mad at Khushi too. For not telling her and suffering alone."
"Like I said, Welcome to the club." Dhruv felt the smoke cloud his chest and he felt stress leaving his body. He tried to not let the conversation affect him but he could feel his control slipping away.
Viren leaned his elbows on the balustrade, "I can only imagine what you must be feeling like, Dhruv."
"Yeah right!" He snapped involuntarily.
"I get that you're angry and your anger is valid."
He shook his head unwilling to accept that anger was ever acceptable. Dhruv had seen his father lose his temper in anger, which eventually pushed his mother to end her own life. He could never lose himself, he would not. That was something he had decided when he had held his mother's lifeless body.
Dhruv was incapable of anger. While other women found it his most redeeming quality, he took it as a flaw. He couldn't get angry even when he felt anger. Because he felt, he would jump off the precipice once he let go of his control.
"As someone who had explosive fights with Aghanya, I can tell you that pushing down anger is not healthy, Dhruv."
"I cannot get angry. You think Khushi doesn't know that I'm upset at her? She does. And she tries to make it up and she apologised as if she was wrong for thinking the worst during the most difficult time of her life. I have no rights to be upset, Viren. I wasn't there. I abandoned her when she was most vulnerable. How could I be angry at her?"
He wasn't finished. He threw his cigarette butt down and stomped on it vigorously.
"Do none of you know her?" His voice shook partly in anger and partly in pity; for her.
"How can all of you justify my anger and not hers?
"That's not what I meant, Dhruv. I just don't want you to blame yourself. The blame game in marriage gets pretty old pretty fast. I am not blaming neither of you, but I do think that both of you, blame yourselves."
Dhruv could say nothing in reply. He knew that she blamed herself. That made him more upset. Why didn't she blame him? There was the age old gratitude again. It was tiring him.
When he came back to the table, he found only Khushi there and not his sister.
He looked at his sister's empty seat and at her. She had a half empty glass of wine in her hand and considering how she had a low tolerance, he was sure she was tipsy, her red cheeks were indicator enough.
"Khushi met a friend and that friend invited her to a club. So I let her go." The stem of the wineglass was hanging loosely between her fingers and she had her chin propped on the other palm, smiling at him.
"That's good. Are you ready to go home?"
"Nope." She tipped the wineglass and emptied it. She set it down and her lips shined wet with wine.
He could feel desire churn inside him. But he shrugged it away.
"It's such a nice evening. And I'm in a good mood today."
"The wine is working it's wonders I guess." He leaned back on his chair and muttered.
She looked at him with her brows arched as if she was confused, "No? It's you."
"Me? Surely not. But, now that we're finished, let's go." He said standing up.
"Fine." She said dejected but stood up. She leaned on the table holding her head. "Oh that just went straight to my head."
He went towards her and held her elbow. "Are you okay?"
She nodded and wound her arm in the crook of his elbow. "I'm always okay when I'm with you." She said giddily.
He scoffed. Only, Dhruv knew that Khushi had the soul of a romantic. As much as she was tightly wound the rest of the times, she poured out all those bottled emotions when she was drunk.
While previously he found it endearing, it only hurt him now. The implications that she hid her true self and was vulnerable with him only when she was drunk said a lot now. She didn't trust him with her vulnerability and he had and now he stood destroyed.
Dhruv had led her out of the hotel and she stopped suddenly, "I was thinking...why don't we walk home?"
"I don't know, Khushi. You're tipsy."
"It'll clear my head and make me sober."
He only nodded. And they continued to walk.
***
Khushi walked beside Dhruv. She was tipsy like he said but it was just a pleasant buzz now. The night air was warm and they stopped at a zebra crossing waiting for the lights to turn red even though the roads were remotely empty.
"Dhruv, I think I owe you an apology."
"Why?"
"For breaking the news like that. I didn't want to tell it you like that."
"I think you didn't want to tell me ever."
She took a deep breath and the lights turned red and he extended his hand and she held it while they crossed the road silently. He let go and she let go of his hand too, immediately missing it.
"You're right, I didn't want to tell you ever."
"Why? You lied to me about cheating on me and then you lied to me about this too. Did you have to lie? Did you want me to hurt?"
He walked away from her and she ran after him and held his elbow, "No. No. Dhruv, It's the opposite. I didn't want to hurt you at all. After everything you've done..."
***
Dhruv shrugged away her touch and he let his anger unleash. "I DID NOTHING. God! Can you stop worshipping me like I'm a saviour?! I'm so tired of being put on a pedestal! I'm not a saint! I did what is considered as basic decency! You're choking me with you gratitude!"
"It might be basic decency for you but it was like giving cake to a starving person! How could I not be grateful, Dhruv?" She walked past him. But he pursued her.
"I don't need your gratitude! I don't need you thinking I'm a God when I'm not. I'm human too."
"I never said you weren't. I just appreciated you for whatever you've done for me and my family. What is the big deal in that?"
"What is the big deal in helping your family? You are my wife. Your family is mine too. Why wouldn't I help them?"
"The truth is, many people don't!"
"That doesn't mean that it's not basic."
They halted their conversation when they reached their apartment building. While Dhruv felt the silence brewing and he knew that it would explode.
He had had enough of being the Messiah fit everyone. He wished Khushi would see him as only human and not an angel sent from heaven who saved her.
They reached the flat and he knew she was annoyed too. She quickly left for her room They stayed silent as he switched on the lights and he rummaged around the drawer for a cigarette but there was none.
"You're searching in vain. I threw them away."
That snapped his control again. He turned with red fury towards her.
"God damn you Khushi! Why would you do that?"
"I thought you quit! Why are you starting to smoke again?"
He pinched the bridge of his nose and blew out breaths trying to think of a mature reply but all he could say was, "Why do you care?"
"Ofcourse I care, Dhruv. You have such big qualms about me treating you like a saviour but how about how you treat me?"
"How do I treat you? Pray, please enlighten me!" He scoffed.
"Like I'm replaceable. Like I'm a child! Like I'm so fragile that I might break! I won't break. I'm a woman. Yet I hardly feel so with you."
****
Khushi knew he was angry. His hands were forming fists and then loosening. It disappointed her that he always hid his true emotions from her.
They could never form a deeper connection because he never shared his bad emotions with her. He was all good and all her bad outshined it. It embarassed her that she didn't know how to hide her bad side but yet he did.
"I need a smoke." He raised his hands as if calling a truce and backed off.
Too bad for him, she didn't want a truce. "Disappointing. This is exactly why I don't share my issues with you."
"What? I've disappointed you? Choose a struggle. Am I the pure saviour or a disappointment? I obviously cannot be both."
"Why can't you stop smoking? You promised you'd stop!" She walked up to him and pressed a finger to his torso.
He held his finger but didn't let go. "Right. I did. I didn't stop for my sake Khushi. I stopped because I wanted to live. I wanted a family. And then what happened? What's the point?"
"The point is.. you. Why did you do it for me?" Her voice tore and his eyes glittered.
"Why did you lie to me?"
Their truths were similar. They were one. In mind and in soul. Yet they were far apart.
"Don't smoke, Dhruv." She couldn't meet his eyes anymore so she looked at his chin and then to their hands, she didn't even notice his other hand which was on her lower back. Her other hand was on his bicep.
"Don't ask me that please. Don't raise my hopes. Don't make me think you care for me."
She trailed her hand to his cheek and cupped his jaw and he shut his eyes. "Dhruv...I do care for you."
At once he pushed away and walked past her. She turned to see him holding his head and he truly looked broken. Her stone heart cracked. She had broken him.
"You don't care for me Khushi. Let's not lie to ourselves. You think you care because you think you owe me."
It was true to an extent. But that wasn't why she couldn't care like he did. It was because she was more broken than him. Her mind pushed the same narrative, everything she loved was snatched from her and now so was Dhruv.
"I don't want you to smoke because cancer is no joke." She pushed through in a neutral tone.
"Damn you! So it's a medical concern now right?" He turned around and in a flash he walked to her and gripped her shoulders.
"What is wrong with you? Why can't you ever tell me why? Don't look at me with those dead eyes and your dead heart!"
She looked away snapping her head to the side.
He continued, "Don't look at me while I stand her with my bleeding eyes and my bleeding heart! I'm ashamed to stand before you like this!"
"You have never stood with a true heart in front of me Dhruv!" She looked at him in all her rage. His heart wasn't the only one bleeding, her heart albeit stone had bled too.
"You want me to treat you like a husband yet you never treated me like a husband would! You were always eternally understanding and compassionate, always putting my need before yours, I only choked you with my gratitude after you strangled me with your altruism!"
Khushi could feel his control slipping. His breaths came out in harsh pants and his eyes were clouded with rage and something else she only knew as desire, she decided to push him further.
"How could I ever deny you when you never denied me anything? How could I have paid you back? You are standing her now with your desire clouded eyes and yet you're struggling to reel it in because you feel guilty of something I freely did! For once, why don't you just let go, Dhruv?"
She trailed her fingers to the nape of his neck and and he shut his eyes. He was shaking his head but she pushed closer and pulled his head down towards him.
"Let go. Let it burst."
"No...no.." he whispered barely audible.
"Do me justice and don't make me beg please."
She was glad that it pushed his buttons enough because he burst and how gloriously he had. It was like fireworks on a beach. His warm lips sought hers and she didn't let herself be restrained too. Her stone heart be damned, she only wanted to burst just like him.
***
They both laid on the carpet painting and covered in cool sweat. Khushi stared at the ceiling, the only sounds in the room being their harsh breaths.
Out of all the times she had had sex with Dhruv, this was far by the best. She couldn't even feel herself beyond the hard beating of her heart.
"That was cathartic." She said and turned to look at him but he was already looking at her with a guilty expression.
"Oh no. Don't you fucking apologize Dhruv. If I could walk away I would but I can't feel my body at all."
"You have bruises...damn it." He said with guiltily. He raised his torso upright and brushed his thumb on her shoulder. Her blouse was asked and she was sure her saree was torn in many a places but she didn't care at all. She leaned down to looke at her shoulder and recognised the indentations of his teeth.
She shivered as she remembered him biting into her skin as he pushed into her from behind. They had never tried that since he told her how demeaning he found that position was.
"That part was good....way too good." She sighed.
She looked at him and he only frowned in concern rubbing over the mark.
"Stop that." She held his hand and read his mind. "No. I am not hurt. I am perfectly fine. Please don't ruin the best sex of my life with your brooding."
He leaned down and kissed her cheek. "Are you sure?"
"Now what did I tell you about ruining the mood. Let me peacefully bask in my afterglow please."
"It was good then?" He brushed the hair from her forehead.
"It was amazing. Wherever did you learn that thing, my sould left my body when you did that." She sighed again.
He laughed. "It was when - shit."
They both froze when they heard the door open. In panic, they tried to stand but his legs had tangled in her saree and he slipped taking her down with him. He let out a groan in pain and she heard an audible gasp and saw that it was Drishti.
"I'm going to take a walk and come back..." She said quickly and walked out the door. All Khushi could do was flush in embarassment while Dhruv laughed.
***
Khushi didn't get out of the room the whole night because of embarassment. Dhruv she knew slept in his. Now that all three of them were at the breakfast table, she couldn't stop being mortified.
"I am thinking of moving out." Drishti was the first one to break the silence.
"Why? Do you feel unwelcome here?"
"No Bhai, I just think I want to live alone, learn about being independent. The friend I met yesterday told me about this opening at her workplace and I'm thinking of applying there."
"That's amazing. But I thought you wanted to study further, Dishu?" She swallowed her embarassment and asked.
"Babhi, I thought about it and I think it's time that I stand on my own two feet and I will study yes but maybe I'll apply to an open University? But I want to be independent babhi. Kind of like you."
Khushi pushed around her food and smiled, "I wouldn't know about that. I was dependent for a long time on your brother."
"But you were studying." They both said in unison.
"You're right but still..."
***
Drishti had left to meet her friend for coffee after breakfast and Khushi sat on the living room with her laptop working on her paper.
"Hey." Dhruv came in with two coffee mugs. "Are you free to talk?"
"Yes." She shit her laptop and say cross legged on the couch. He sat on the couch before her.
"Do you regret what happened yesterday?"
"I don't, Dhruv."
She saw him visibly relaxing as he leaned back with his fingers crossed behind his head.
"So...was it just a one time thing?" He asked with a flirty smile. Nothing his mood, she relaxed too. She walked to him and straddled his lap.
"I wouldn't like it to be." Her hands traced his chest and his hands was on her waist.
"No. Wait." He shrugged her and she stood up from his lap.
"I honestly have to manually lock the door. I honestly can't go through that mortification again."
She laughed and he did as he said. Soon he walked over to her and drank all her laughter and she did his too.
***
A week passed like that until she recieved a mail that she was accepted for her master's with a full ride scholarship in London. She didn't know how to break the new to him but she didn't want to break the happy bubble they were living in.
She wanted to stay like this forever. She even reconsidered rejecting the offer but she stopped when she realised that it was a once in a life time opportunity.
If she rejected it, she really did need a master's and she pursued one in India, she'd have to borrow money from Dhruv again to fund her education.
She knew the old problems would rear their head of she choose to stay close to Dhruv.
"What are you thinking about?" Dhruv asked her. He was laying beside her.
"Oh nothing."
"I was thinking...I think we should try taking the next step."
She frowned and turned towards him. "Like what?"
"I was thinking maybe we should have a baby."
She stared at him for a long time realising that he had indeed said that.
"I've been wanting a family for so long. Looking at all of our friend's families, I want one too, Khushi. I want one with you."
She sat up abruptly and didn't even care if the sheets had slipped from her naked body. Khushi knew he wanted a family. She knew that was why she had divorced him because he wanted one.
"We had a good thing going on Dhruv. And you had to ruin it...what baby? Are you serious?" She stood and tried to put on her robe.
"We had a thing? I'm sorry. What? Did you think we're in a friends with benefit thing?"
"Are we not? We're not married Dhruv. What did you think was happening?"
He stood up too and put on his pants. "I told you to not give me any hopes. You started this thing just like that, did you?"
"Dhruv.... I'm sorry I am not in a place to look at things long term."
He brushed his hand in frustration. "Then what are we? What are we doing?"
She shrugged. "I don't know."
"Why do you keep doing this to me?" He sounded broken and Khushi only felt her stone heart crack.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
"You're cruel. Everyone told me do. They warned me again and again. I never admitted to it. I always thought you had a tough exterior but you were sensitive from the inside, but they are right. You're fucking cruel."
Khushi felt a lumo form in her throat. She swallowed it.
"I might be cruel but I'm not downright a liar like you!"
She could see that he was angry. He walked to her in a flash.
"I have never lied to you."
"No. You like to yourself."
"Don't play riddles with me Khushi. Say whatever you want clearly."
She tipped her chin up,"Why do you want a baby?"
"I told you. I want a family."
"But why?"
"What do you mean...what are you getting at..."
"A baby is a means to an end."
"What?"
"Weren't you madly affectionate about Rian a week ago? You say you love me. Yet we're all ab means to an end. Just some people who are here to fill that home in your heart!"
"That's not true."
"You have a hole in your life, Dhruv. One that you've been trying to fill. You did that with dee, with Aghanya, with me, with Rian and now it's my turn again and it's the baby's turn next!"
He turned away from her and held her head, "Shut up."
"When will you get it? That it won't be filled? That's why you're too nice. But it doesn't matter Dhruv."
"I've told you to shut up."
"Being nice won't bring your mother back."
"Get out! I SAID GET OUT!" He yelled. And she stood still, her eyes dry. He turned and he looked so furious that she thought he might hit her. But he did no such thing.
He came before her and his eyes filled with unshed tears. "You're right. I've a hole in my heart. One that my mom left. What was that you said years ago? That she emasculated me when she died? You're right. She did. I'm too nice because I compensate for this huge fucking hole. And I try to fill it by being nice and loving people."
He wiped away a stray tear, "But I've never regretted loving them. Not your sister, not Rian. But I regret you. I curse the day I thought of you. Are you happy now that I've made you hate me as much as you hate me? Are you happy? Hope you are. Now my heart is dead too. So, just get out! There is no love in me for you, and there is no pity either."
***
A/N: Vote and comment