You said I was too kind for this world didn't you? I was kind for you. And now you have misused every emotion I showed to you. You are the biggest mistake I have made in my life. And the worst thing is that even after everything you just said I still can't hate you.
Biggest mistake.
I can't hate you.
Tears.
Sorrow.
What kind of human are you, Abhimanyu? Do you only care about yourself? You don't give two fucks to listen to the whole thing. You don't give me a chance to explain myself. You start acting like an ass and don't trust anyone just because of your past and your current experiences.
Human.
Care about yourself.
Don't trust.
Do you realise how much you have hurt? Who are you to hurt me? Who the fuck are you to hurt me Acharya? No one. You are no one to hurt me. To make a joke of everything I feel for you.
Who are you to hurt me?
No one.
I was no one.
Amara Listen...
No you listen. You don't want to listen to my explanation. I don't wish to give you one. Why should I give you a justification if you have already blamed me. You already hate me don't you?
You already hate me don't you?
No! I don't.
I don't hate you!
I hate the feeling of betrayal.
I hate the picture or even the ridiculous notion of you betraying me.
"The poison in your head is far too great for me to deal with Abhimanyu. This is only as far as I can help you. And now let me give you what you wanted..."
Leave!
Leave me!
Don't...
"What we shared that night was not a show. It can't be a show."
It can't be a show.
I know it was not.
My heart knows so.
But my mind is a fucked up place.
"I shall leave you be. I will leave you. Cause that is what I deserve."
"I will Leave you."
"Leave! And Never show me your face again."
"I will Leave you."
Darkness.
Darkness.
Darkness.
.
.
.
"Amara!"
I gasp and jolt up from my bed abruptly. Feeling every breath leaving my body turning harsh and brittle. So painful that I could feel my throat being clogged up and suffocation filling me.
It was not the first time I felt suffocated yet it was the only time I had felt it so vividly. I had been falling into the loop of memories of that day every night ever since that day in the studio.
I hadn't written a word in my novel. I could not touch a single grain of the molding clay. I could not swallow a single bite of food without feeling myself drowning in guilt and shame.
I am weak.
I am foolish.
I am disrespectful.
I am indeed a mistake.
She doesn't love you!
That one line that Aman had said had fucked up my whole mind and the moment I heard Amara say that she didn't love me I had felt my heart shattering.
No one would understand the need and craving to be loved by someone unless they were starving for it themselves.
I have faced a lot of things in my life. More than many people can see in all their lifetime combined in merely seventeen years of my life.
And most of it had been cruel and inhumane actions.
It was so painful to watch and endure since the age of six that I didn't know what else to expect. My trust on the good side of the world was almost little to none.
Children have heroes and role models.
And they look up to their parents for safety and shelter. For adoration and comfort. They need their parents to guide them to show them the world and that is what a parent should do. Yet, I had been ever so unfortunate in that department. One of my parents was a monster and the other was never there.
You, Don't trust anyone just because of your past and your current experiences.
You are so caught up with yourself.
Amara was right.
I had been caught up and reoccupied with my own problems. That I had completely forgotten that I had a princess who kept waiting for me all because I had written a few self made promises and expected her to follow them childishly.
And that made me feel all the more useless and extremely fucking annoyed at my very being.
However I knew one thing for certain.
I could under no circumstance fall inside the loop of self harming. I had just started to come out of it. And there is no way I am reversing all the effort that Amara and Eva di put on me to be who I am today.
I will not be the weak human who is so drowned in his own pain that he sees no one else. I can't be that person. Again.
Do you only care about yourself?
Yes.
Yes, I had only cared about myself up until this point.
My fascination and admiration for Amara had been mistaken by love.
I was not capable of loving.
I was not ready to love.
I was not who she deserved.
I doubted her in every step of the way.
Initially I doubted her choice of loving me and ignored her and then I dragged her back to myself. Then I kissed her and expected her to place her world at my feet but didn't want to date her.
And now after she had helped me survive.
To grow and understand that life is not all about giving up.
It is not about seeing the dark.
It is not a bed of roses. It is filled with thorns.
Just because a rose has thorns we don't destroy it. We understand that thorns are equally important for the rose to be what it is. We admire the beauty of the rose and that is what keeps us going on.
Similarly one had to find their own happiness in life. And if it could not be found they had to make it.
That was the reality of life.
And I needed to understand that.
My father maybe a monster.
That however does not give me the right to judge Amara without listening to her.
It just does not.
I am no one to blame her.
I am no one to question whether she values someone's life or not.
I am no one to care whether she loves Aman or played with his feelings. Especially without any proof.
Aman had given me his point of view and I had accepted it even though I told him that Amara is who I trusted. I had believed him. And that showed the shallowness of my love for Amara.
I had stayed four whole days in solitude contemplating whether I should send Amara a text or not. I had written long apologies. However I lacked the courage to send them to her.
Accusing her had been so very easy.
It took a second.
Just a second.
But even the thought of wanting forgiveness sent shivers down every spine in my body.
Instead I had texted Evara di like the coward I am. Asking whether her trip with her boyfriend and his friends was going on well.
I had stalked every single picture on Instagram that Atharva's gang had posted. Searching for ones with Amara.
She was there but her eyes didn't twinkle.
She was there but her smile was forced.
She was there but her soul was not.
I had tarnished her soul.
I had misused her kindness and dedication and asked for it's validity.
I was wrong.
.
.
.
"Bhai!" I hear a chirpy voice.
"Aesha di, me first!" Another voice spoke hastily.
I sighed closing my eyes tightly pulling together the best facade I can and ponder the best course of actions to entertain my younger cousin sisters.
"What do you two want now?" I asked in a fake irritated voice as I lean against my door frame looking down at my sisters fighting about whose assignment I should do first.
"Katya! My turn. You always make bhai paint. Let him help me write this poem first!" Aesha pushed Katya with a hand on her forehead.
"Aesha! You are a bookworm. I need bhai to draw. Cause if I draw a circle the teacher will see a rectangle and she will give me a zero in my art assignment!" Katya tried to reason.
"Why don't you both do that yourself?" I asked pinching the bridge of my nose.
"Abhi bhai! I will make you fabulous Black coffee and clean your bike for a week if you write my poem!" Aesha bribed me with her doe eyes going wider.
"Abhi bhai! I will eat the sweet from your plate for a month that you dislike so much!" Katya said.
And I pinched her cheek.
"Is that to help me or is it because of your love for sweets?" I asked, my eyes narrowing at her and she pleading, muttering sorry repeatedly.
"Abhimanyu! Beta can you come down stairs for a moment I need a favor." Chandini Maa's voice resonated through the mansion.
I see my mother roll her eyes and walk past me as if I didn't even exist.
My heart clenches missing the moments I spent with my mother as a toddler. They were the only memory I had of her smiling at me now.
"Abhi Bhai?!" Aesha and Katya pull me out of my reverie.
"I will help you both just give me a minute. Let me listen to what Chandini maa wants."
.
.
.
"Abhi and Jiji thank you for coming downstairs to talk to me immediately." Chandini maa takes another sip from her glass of water. Things had always been tensed with her and my mother. One usually would forget that they are siblings.
"Chandini. Stop wasting my time and tell me what you need. " Maa spoke crisply and harshly. Her tone not at all warm towards Chandini maa and her eyes pinning her down with rage and a few other unpleasant emotions.
"Jiji... I... I just." She fumbled with her words trying to speak without a stutter. Her lower lip trembled under the intensity of the harsh word and the years of drifted and strained relationship.
"Chandini. You know that if there is one thing that I hate about you is it is you victimizing yourself and and stuttering. Stop that."
"I'm sorry jiji. I just wanted to say that Maa sa's shraadh is coming up in two days and we need to do the hawan for her and our childrens' benefit. You know the hour in which she died was extremely inauspicious. Especially for her soul's peace and our children's lives. You know how they are bound to struggle and face pain and suffering due to it." Chandini maa spoke tears now leaving her eyes like a river that rushed after being held back too long.
"Our Eva and Abhi have not done any wrong yet they are destined to such ill fate along with our mother just because of an ill hour."
My mother listened to what Chandini maa said before laughing humorlessly.
"You are asking me to care about the woman who sold me off to a beast just because they wanted you to marry Aadarsh. You can't truly believe I would feel an ounce of remorse for her ill fate would you?"
She inhaled a sharp breath her knuckles turning white and eyes turning soulless.
"I had begged your maa sa to stop this marriage. I had told her about the abuse that Amit put me through and she had promised to talk to baba sa. But she broke her promise. She married me off to that merciless man. She killed me while I was still alive. All for baba sa's deal. She protected her husband from bankruptcy.
By selling her eldest daughter to bear a heir for the royal Acharyas. To a man she knew was a beast! She ensured that I have a fate worse than death.
Do, you think it is entertaining to get raped! Every single day after marriage. Just to get that beast a legitimate heir and Failing! Do you realize the pain I had to face while walking up to the kitchen every morning to help you while bleeding due to the bite marks and lashes he left on my thighs? Do you understand the pain I had to go through for so many years of my life never letting you know about a single thing that happened to me all because I thought that you would have a happy life. My baby sister at least lived.
Had you ever once tried to know what was happening with me Chandini? Did you ever stop by to even ask a simple 'Jiji... do you need help? Are you ok?' No! you didn't. I begged maa sa to take me back to her! I begged her to take me away from this hell. From this torture that never seemed to end. And she asked me to give him a child like he wanted and that my husbands home was my only home!
Do you know how the day I got to know that you were pregnant turned out to be the day I was raped to the extent that I couldn't gain consciousness till a month after! Just because Amit was scared that you will have a boy and he being the eldest can no longer have power?
Do you realize that the day I gave birth to my son. He was snatched away from me by that monster to be bred into his own spawn. He didn't let me hold my Abhimanyu! He didn't let me be a mother to my son. He taunted me so much and put me such a painful mental space that me breastfeeding my child would be like poison to my baby!"
My mother shattered. She had shattered to the point of no return. There was no saving my mother. My father had broken my mother.
"You not even once asked me why I never fed Abhi. Instead you accused me of lacking maternal affections towards my own flesh and blood and snatched away my son from me. Deeming me unfit to be a mother! You robbed me off the only feeling of life I had felt after marrying that monster!
And due to never feeding on breast milk. Abhi was weaker as a child initially. He was so fragile. He fell sick. And because I had never even taken care of my own child I didn't know what to do when he was burning with fever and his small body trembled. All I could do was hold on to him tight and give him medicines after asking bhabho ma. I almost lost my child that day."
Maa wiped the tears that fell down her cheek. Her face now red. Her eyes bloodshot and voice so painful. Unlike the voice I remember from my hazy memories that played with my fingers and sand in a beautiful tone to me. The voice I remember the melody to in my heart even today.
"And after that day I was robbed off my child by my brutal husband telling me how incompetent I am as a wife, as a womb, as a asset that could satisfy him. He said I was too much drama and that is all I deserve. He snatched my child away telling him me that his son would turn like me. Weak and always crying.
Yet, I tried to stay strong. I tried to I really did. I looked outside the window looking at my Abhimanyu playing with Evara. He looked so happy. His eyes twinkled. His smile felt like hope to live that I lost every second of the day. I was happy knowing that at least the life I created was happy. Even...Even if I couldn't hold him in my arms. Even... Even if I couldn't feel his innocent warmth against my skin. Even though all I could do was longingly look at his sleep face every night from afar."
She brushed away her tears her eyes locked with Chandini maa's who was looking at maa with nothing but shame, guilt and pain.
"But then why would my child also get any sort of happiness. When I am the one who gave birth to him! He was brought into my bedroom at the age of seven to watch his father exploit his mother all because he had the childish heart and right to play and shed tears! And when I couldn't stop that I was sure that I had failed as a mother just like maa sa failed with me I failed with Abhimanyu. I don't deserve to be called his mother. I am a helpless fool who can't stop her son from the influence and power of the monster that will stay in our lives all thanks to my maa sa."
"So, do as you please for her Chandini. She was an excellent mother to you and a brilliant grandmother to our children but she was nothing but the writer of my doom. Hence forth never call me to something or anything related to that woman." Maa said with finality lacing her voice and eyes looking at me with the emotion I could finally understand.
My mother.
Never.
Never hated me.
She was guilty.
She was ashamed.
She was broken.
She couldn't love me because that would only endanger me more than I already was.
And the look in her eyes was longing to one day be a mother I deserved.
.
.
Chandini maa sobbed and my heart clenched knowing that both my mothers were upset and I was devastated knowing that I could not wipe the tears that both of them shed.
"Chandini maa... please. please don't cry." I spoke in a low and almost feeble tone. Rubbing her back softly to calm her down.
"I.. I ne..never knew." She sobbed in a broken and almost inconsolable tone.
"It's ok. My maa is stronger than she seems Chandini maa. Trust me she will find her happiness and solace away from that beast one day. I hope she is able to love me as her son one day. But please don't cry Chandini maa." I begged wiping the tears away from her face.
"Get Eva please. We need to go for maa's shraddh. I have many questions. I have many grudges but, I wish to help her soul find peace so that she can help jiji too. The mighty lord. The almighty Krishna will definitely help us."
"Abhi beta. Go get my Eva."
.
.
.
Dehradun.
The city of love.
Quite cliche that Eva Di would want to come here and of course Atharva was a dramatic asshole who would flaunt like a peacock and crumble to the wishes of my sister.
I inhale a deep long and fresh breath of the lush greens that surrounded me. Away from the pollution and pain that Mumbai had filled me with.
One step closer to Amara.
One step closer to beg for forgiveness and listen to what she wanted to say that day.
I misunderstood my mother's guilt and shame for hatred towards me.
Maybe I misunderstood Amara's words for betrayal?
I look at the cottage that was situated in one of the most beautiful valley's of dehradun. The surrounding filled with frozen lagoons and ice on the pine trees.
The feeling was so enchanting. The place was absolutely breathtaking.
"Yeah Isha, I am tired. I will rest... Yeah I will talk to bhai too if he is back with Eva." I heard Amara's sweet and calm voice filling me up with bliss and contentment. I hadn't heard her voice was almost four and a half days. It had been so very long.
"Amara?" I whispered slowly almost a 100 meters away from her at the porch. But the area around us was so silent and breezy that my voice appeared to echo and seem louder than ever before.
I saw her freeze on spot upon hearing my voice and turn towards me instantly. Her eyes twinkled with those flakes of gold and her lips parted as if she wanted to say something. But her demeanor changes back to the cold and frigid expression from that day at the road where she left me to collect my words which didn't leave. To apologize.
She turned back to open the door and I felt myself rushing fast towards her before she can shut the door on my face. Just as she was about to slam the door on my face I push the door ajar. My force far greater than hers making the door push back allowing me with enough time to get inside the cottage.
"What are you doing here?" She asked her eyes still holding the muted rage from that day now.
"I came to get Eva di back." I answer and bite my tongue upon seeing her face droop.
"Oh! My bad. Left me call Evara for you then." She answered her eyes no longer looking at me. Not caring to entertain me with any more conversations.
She rushes up stairs towards a room and I can't do anything but drop my bag on the floor cussing myself so hard for not saying that I wanted to beg for her forgiveness and that it mattered so very much to me.
I followed after her only to find her looking around for my sister in an empty room. Her eyes scanning various rooms of the cottage in a rush. Panic lacing her features.
"Where is Eva di?" I asked feeling panic flow through me at the possibility of something happening to my elder sister.
"I don't know." She said before harshly knocking on another door.
"Come in." I heard Atharva's low muffled tone..
"Bhai...! You and Eva never came near the waterfalls did something-" she asked frantically rushing inside the room and I followed after her feeling a sense of possessiveness and fear curling inside me.
"If you so much as made my Di shed a single tear you are finished Atharva." Amara's question is rudely interrupted by me.
My eyes darted to the dried tears on my sister's face as she now slept quietly on the bed.
Unable to control my anger I glared at Atharva and gripped onto his t-shirt's neckline. Atharva didn't utter a word. Seeming lost in thoughts of his own. He wasn't smiling like an overly jolly person. He seemed somewhat quiet. If I dare say.
I feel a soft presence brush past me and forcefully pull my hands off Atharva.
"You don't threaten my bhai or interrupt me while I am speaking. Assumptions are not always the best way to find the answer to anything. Moreover as you can see. Eva is fine and sleeping." Amara points and accusing finger at me. I notice Atharva frown at the passive aggressive personal remark Amara had just made. Having no context what so ever of what was actually going on between us.
I felt jaw tick and anger towards myself surge through me.
"Ok ok. That is enough. Evara is completely fine and sleeping peacefully. Let her rest she is tired. Also Abhi what are you doing here?" Atharva interrupted our heated gaze and gets up from the bed where he was sitting next to my sister just a few moments ago.
"Ahh first of all I am sorry. I shouldn't have acted that way. It was wrong. And um I came to take Di home. Actually we have to go for Nani's yearly shraadh. Back to Jaipur on 31st. So I came to pick her up before Aadarsh papa came home and created a ruckus." I said looking at the floor.
"Please take rest too Abhi. You must be tired. Leave tomorrow. Hmm."
Atharva said after pausing for a moment his eyes drowning in nostalgia.
"Ok." I say without thinking too much about it. Wanting nothing more than to apologize to the girl who had not looked into my eyes ever since I started speaking to Atharva. She seemed lost.
Atharva hug Amara by the side and whisper something into her ear. She looks up at the other boy dazed and then nods slowly. Her face unreadable.
"Papa ki pari will give you a tour of the nearby flower valley. Its quite a site."
He says while walking out of the room before passing one last glance at his sister.
.
.
.
"You don't have to take me there if you don't want to." I spoke softly not liking how Amara hadn't uttered a single word to me since we had started our way up to the flower valley in the car. She only ever looked outside the window.
Not so much as passing me a fleeting look.
She looked so much like my mother... sitting hopelessly by the window sill. Waiting for an escape.
Just that Amara didn't want to escape. She just wanted nothing to do with me anymore.
I sit quietly after three consecutive attempts of trying to make her talk to me and failing. Waiting nothing more than to return back to Mumbai with Evara di.
After almost half an hour. The car comes to halt and the driver tells us that he will be waiting here and we can go look at the red tulip valley which was almost one of the very few valley's which was not covered with ice yet.
Amara nodded acknowledging what the driver had said and walked outside the car. I followed after her. No longer knowing what or how should I apologize. How should I talk to her when she was just within arms reach yet so far away from my heart.
So, I quietly followed as she walked into the the valley filled with tulips. They were red all round. Till everywhere our eyes could reach.
And she stood in between the fields in as the sun set far away between another valley filled with ice and darkness filled the horizon all around the tulip field gradually.
Her white dress topped over by a beige coloured sweater made her glow as the early and young rays of the moon fell upon her as she stood there looking at the flowers and I stood a few paces away following her and admiring the gentle and unknowing smile that filled her features looking at the tulips.
A monarch butterfly flew past her before thousands of fireflies encircles all around us.
"It's so remarkably beautiful..." She whispered under her breath caught up in the beauty of raw nature around us.
"It is..." I agreed not being able to take my eyes off her. My voices drifted and laid back. At ease. Finally filled with the ease to let my heart beat.
She turned back to look at me a frown creased her brows. However she didn't utter a single word.
I felt myself feeling a low and painful throb of my heart against my chest as I walked up to her and gently took her hands in mine. She didn't pull away but she didn't utter a word either.
"I... I... I am here to apologize. Princess." I finally let the words that stayed on the tip of my tongue out.
She inhaled a sharp breath. That smile from moments ago was now crushed.
"I don't require your apology. You are forgiven. I don't hold grudges." She says trying to pull her hands away from mine.
The words she says hits me straight in the heart and cuts up my existence to nothing.
"You don't require one. But I owe you one. For my unjustified behavior. For my accusive nature. For my self centered and selfish wishes and most of all for not trusting the validity of your words. I have deeply hurt you. And I want to beg for my forgiveness."
"If that is what you want. I will not give you Forgiveness Abhimanyu. You don't get to stab someone to death and then sweet talk them into coming back to life. It doesn't work that way. Your sorry will not bring back anyone's burned soul back to life. Sorry is just a word to you Abhimanyu. You say it. And you give me these false notions of happiness and then snatch them away from me. So, I don't accept your sorry."
"I don't want to come back to your life."
Amara speaks her eyes glistening with tears and her tone even and calm today unlike the day she had burst into fury and rage.
"Amara... do you not... Do you not love me anymore?" I asked not knowing why I asked that. Not knowing how to justify my questions or the fact that the biggest fear I harbored at the moment was receiving her love.
She bit her lower lip so hard that it drew blood. Yet, she didn't so much as flinch.
"Love happens once. I don't believe in the concept of falling in love over and over again. And if I ever fall out of love with you and say that I love you again. It means I just loved the memories of you. I will not love you a second time if I ever fall out of love once." Amara pulled her hands away from mine and started walking away towards the car.
"Amara... do you know what red tulips mean... A fresh start for love. A promise of an everlasting love. But, it also means the fear of betrayal princess. Something that flows inside me."
"I couldn't handle the thought of you betraying me... ever. Not even in my dreams." I spoke looking at her coming to halt but not facing me.
"My mind is a fucked up place Amara. And I will try to live for not just myself from here on forth. I will never whine about the things that happen to me and accept them as fate. I will never judge you without hearing what you have to say first. And I just wanted you to know that I will try to trust you. From here on... I want to... I want to trust you." I said lowly.
"And I don't expect you to forgive me." I add in the end.
She turns her head back just a little so that I can see a side of her face. A tear rolled down her face and she sucks in a deep breath.
"Good. Cause you are not forgiven Abhimanyu Acharya."
She says and walks away from there.
And only after she leaves do I see the wilting red tulip beside me.
Unedited: Prone to errors and typos.
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