11. One Week Has Seven Days—Lie .
A/N: There's a lot of things I'd like to say, before going into the chapter, guys.
First of all, I am very very sorry for the late update. My medical Chinese training before I step into my fellowship has not been very kind to me. And this week was full of relapsing episodes of migraine, that I could barely function with the least contented sleep.
I hope I can give another update by Tuesday, or Wednesday, hopefully:)
Himani's hometown—Thiruvaiyaaru—is my own hometown. I chose to write it as hers, since I know most of the things about it, and I'd not have to research. If you've any doubts regarding the chapter, you can always ask me in comments or PM me.
This chapter dedication goes to @TripuWrites . Thank you very much for reviewing Dabara Tumbler in Roasted And Served, Aditi. The review was wholesome, for which I can't thank you enough. Everyone who read the review, including my friends who're not on Wattpad, and a few from family were so appreciative about the way you've written your views on the book.
Guys, if you'd like a book review by Aditi, kindly fill the form in her review book, Roasted And Served. Also, check out her book, Crossing The 'i's And Dotting The 't's for a good read. She's wonderful:D
Meaning of the words in the chapter:
Thaeradi—It's the name of street where the temple car has been kept.
Athai—Aunty; Himani's mom and Mythraeyi's father are siblings, hence she is her Aunt.
***
"Thaeradi ellaam erangu, (Those who want to get down at Thaeradi, get down, now)."
The ticket checker paced along the aisle, belting the roof of the bus with his palm followed by a lengthy blow of toot from the steel whistle looped in his fingers, giving a sign to sleepy passengers, who'd not want to miss their stop, and to those who were love-struck and as absent-minded as Himani.
She was perched in one of the window seats inside the rust covered, green painted government bus, simply gazing at the uncountable sequinning pair of headlights that crazily moved past her through the half-opened window space, just goalless.
Time was half-past eight well into the evening, and she was barely holding herself together from falling asleep.
Himani did not want to pass out, pressing her head against the grubby window glass of the bus, letting her dribble bathe her, and miss her bus stop. So she decided she'd wait until she got home, and relinquish herself at her bed.
Thiruvaiyaaru—her hometown was over three hundred kilometers from Madras.
The day express train she'd taken from Madras ran only till Ariyalur, a cramped town at about thirty-five kilometers away from Thiruvaiyaaru. She had to wait for almost half hour before her anticipating eyes caught on the unpleasantly populous government bus motioning towards her.
Private buses were finer than the government ones but they'd just stop in each and every bus stop all along the way, which'd consume at least an hour more than she could reach if she boarded a latter one.
Uncomfortably squeezing her worn out frame into the jam packed, turbulently shaking bus, she chose to walk to the middle of the aisle, hugging her compact backpack to her bosom. A few sudden brakes, several deafeningly long sound-horns, and twenty minutes into the rutted ride, the bus had relatively freed and Himani flopped down at the window side, after inserting herself into a three-seater seat.
If there was something Himani had done sincerely all through her travel since she boarded her train from Madras this afternoon, it'd be gazing outside the window, at the trees, farms, vehicles, and occasionally crossing trains buzzing past her, with her mind overworking about what she'd done.
It was challenging, and troublesome—dealing with her unrequited feelings for him—it really was.
There was a hairline of hope about redeeming herself from the stupidity, before her love-struck, miserable-self rounded off that it was impossible, by taking the pledge on her silence—by telling him everything aloud.
Yes, she had contemplated about it too—about confessing that she was seeing him more than just friends.
When Himani had brutally started to fathom the odds of telling him, she had to embolden herself in so many ways—that she was not going to suffocate herself at this, she was not going to cower away like an immature who was crushing on an equally hormonal boy.
What was the worst that could happen, if she did that though?
Denial could go to hell.
She'd already dealt with it when he said all the things he'd said.
Or now that she'd already gone through the subtle version of it—without him being aware, she'd discovered that nothing not so good could happen.
He might just ignore her, and become distant after being aware of it—he might, but was Raghav such callous hearted to do it?
Being addressed as his friend—nonetheless, how annoying it sounded—was bloody reality; he was a good friend.
And there were chances that this total offish thing could sting her bad—even more than the rejection.
But anything—rejection or ignorance or anything—would be better than what she was withstanding right now.
She'd, then, need not feel strangled with the feeling whelming over her heart; need not put on a friend-alone disguise to him; need not be restless with thoughts of him clouding her mind all the frigging time; need not be not able to answer when someone—precisely, Raghav himself—asked what was wrong with her, and need not feel the urge of yelling there was nothing wrong with her, but himself—his oblivious heart and eyes that missed to notice what she had for him, straight at his face.
A loud blow of whistle from the front of the bus stacked over to break into Himani's woolgathering, followed by the ticket keeper's very shrill report.
"Thiruvaiyaaru bus stand."
She stood-up stiffly, after fishing for her phone from the front pouch of her backpack, and sauntered over towards to exit of the bus, as it advanced inside the arch of the bus stand, amidst many such busses piling in, and out.
Himani took the leaf of shawl she had around her neck to rub the sweat that'd laced over her forehead, and had doused her nape; appreciating herself for having worn it in the first place. When she had tried to book her ticket in the last hour, seats were only available in the AC coach, and she just had to go with it. Day express wouldn't provide her with a blanket, hence she'd simply wrapped a cotton shawl around her neck, over her khadi kurta and stretch pants.
She waited to exit the bus, simply waving one end of her dhupatta at her face, for air until the bus came to complete rest and that's when the mobile in her hand started vibrating.
Call display flashed Mythraeyi's butterball smile, along with her name.
Himani took the phone to her ear, a moment after getting down from the bus, and started walking down the stretch of the road that was bustling with vehicles and corresponding engine sounds, and loud honks.
"Mythu, I just got down from the town bus," Himani said, still waving the dhupatta at her face. For a place that was so close to delta, the expanse was too stingy and tight without a trifling amount of breeze making her transience inflame.
There was scorching noise of dosa batter pouring over a scalding iron-cast pan—probably, Mythu was prepping up dosa for dinner for her and the kids—before her composed voice fell in. "Fine. I was just about to ask that."
Himani paused at the interjection of two perpendicular roads for the congestion to loosen up a bit, so that she could walk across the road. "I am just walking home from the bus stand, what are you doing?"
Mythraeyi let a few drops of oil drip around the cooking surface of the dosa, before clutching the phone back from the press of her ear to shoulder. "I am making dosas for dinner, Himani," she said, her brows knitting together in some realisation, "Have you eaten, anything at all, after you've started from home? I don't think you had your lunch here?"
As the junction of the road cleared off, Himani whisked across the road after looking out at both the sides. "I have not languished to that phase, yet, Mythu—the skipping food phase." She found herself smiling dryly, "I packed myself some sandwiches before leaving, and I can't put up with a growling stomach, you know?"
Mythreayi turned the stove off, taking up the last dosa. Skillfully holding the dosa over flip-ladle, she puttered around to the living room to toss it in the plate in front of Hrutvi. Nonetheless the exhaustion wrecking her body, she could barely restrain the dull smile on her face, whilst she spoke up, "I know, but you're not quite yourself these days—just needed to check up."
Himani sighed loudly, "You are right, Mythraeyi."
Mythraeyi walked back to the kitchen to place the flip-ladle on the empty dosa pan. She turned the kitchen lights off, as she scuttled back to the living room. "Hrutvi, Amma balcony la Chithi kuda pesitu irukken. Edhavadhu venumna koral kudu. (Hrutvi, Amma will be in balcony, talking to your Chithi on phone. Just call me if you need something,)" she said, striding out to the balcony and to the staircase that led down to the ground floor portico.
Hearing Mythraeyi's message to her daughter, Himani couldn't help but put out a very dreary chuckle, "It's ridiculous how as kids, we had thought that adults have a solution for everything." Her voice was weak, and frazzled.
Mythraeyi discovered she needed to sit down to deal with Himani, right now, and lowered herself in one of the steps, half-way in her descending. However unhappy and restless she heard her cousin appeared to be, whatever she said was the truth. She'd wondered how her kids seemed to seek answers from her, for their everyday pickles. And how as a kid, she'd thought the same—that adults were fully capable of finding a solution to every problem.
At the same time, on the other end of the phone, Himani wondered how she'd wept when she lost her pencil box when she was an eight-year old, who had no idea that it was notably better than losing your sleep and sanity over a broken heart.
"Only to grow up and realize none of the real world problems have an immediate solution," Himani spoke, at the crude realisation reeling in her mind, as she started walking through the lane that was parallel to her street, and was dimly lit with an yellow array of sodium-vapor lamps and an assembly of smoking men, their heads huddled together, in their casual palaver.
Mythraeyi pulled in a lengthy breath. She had been there. She had had her heart broken when Prasad wanted a divorce from her, claiming that he can't love her. It wasn't his mistake, anyway. It wasn't hers either. "There's no solution to most of the real world problems here, you're right," she mumbled, her voice starting to quack, insignificantly, "not having a solution and being okay with it makes a pretty good Band-aid."
But being okay with a broken heart could never be the Band-Aid.
Himani pressed her lips together, her senses succumbing to the sobs that were starting to rise at her throat. It'd been corked within her for long now, and for once she was afraid she might not take it anymore—making a fresh, coarse anger zip through her, at her inconsistency.
"—and silently go through whatever is wrecking us down, and wait for it to figure itself out," was all she'd managed to say, her voice quaking with blubber that'd triumphed its way, for once, after being repressed for long and long.
Himani kept tracing her steps in unsteady, haphazard steps with wobbly, watery vision until her exhausted frame started shuddering with hot rush of tears, making her slump down in the entrance of a half-lit passage of the petty, runty construction of a tailoring shop.
Slouched at the third step of the stairs that led into the narrow hallway filled with tailoring machines, Himani locked up her soggy face inside her palm, pressing her forehead that'd started throbbing like her head was having its own heartbreak, too, already.
Mythraeyi did not say anything but just patiently waited, regardless of the sobs she was hearing out from the phone, casting her down. And the silence got Himani's snivel only to worsen. "I... I don't know what I am... this is—I came home... I am supposed to feel okay... and not about him." she grappled with letting out words in between her loud wheezes.
Mythareyi's eyes narrowed thoughtfully, staring off at the plain wall that was next to Himani's locked out door. "And he is all to fill that pretty mind of yours, markedly, even after getting away?" she asked rhetorically.
Tears were still glissading from her eyes, into her palm, making her face too drippy and sticky. "I... I am unable to handle it.."she said, her voice choking, "with... with what I am going through right now, I am perfectly convinced to believe his theory. This.. this is a trap. I am in a trap," she bawled, unable to confine herself from declaring it.
"Himani, you don't seem like you're just crushing on him," Mythraeyi revealed calmly, after leaving her a minute to breathe some air, as she heard her sobs and harsh gasps mellow down. That piece of information—or remainder wasn't the one that she needed right at the moment, but it seemed to bring something that Mythraeyi wanted to hear.
Himani tipped her face up from her palm, "Idhu edho paithyakaarathanamaa irukku, (This seems like a madness,)" she said, sniffling harshly, wiping her wet cheeks roughly with her dhupatta.
"People call it as love, and not paithyakaarathanam. But what love without a little bit of paithyakaarathanam, anyway." An elfin of smile peeked through her lips, which she couldn't help as she added, "You're in love."
Thuds of Himani's heart seemed to drown her words at it, and she rubbed the back of her palm furiously at the lone tear ball that slipped down her cheek at the confession and bit out a moronic laugh, "—with someone who won't love me back."
Both of them needed the next few seconds to register that part.
"And that's okay," Himani carried it on, herself. On the contrary to her very convenient reply, something in her stomach churned, but she managed to keep her spirits up there, from the sobbing. "It's not like I'd die of a broken heart, it's going to be okay, someday," she muttered bleakly, with a crumpled face.
"I am sure you won't die of a broken heart," voice from the other end sighed sharply, "but you're making your life hell because of that, and that's not nice."
Himani sighed, as well, because she was not good at talking against the truth. "Yes, I know. I shouldn't be doing this to myself. But is there someway to not feel everything I feel?" She queried earnestly, although she knew she sounded giddy.
"Woah, woah, that's one thing everyone in the world wants and no one's getting," Mythraeyi said, remembrance of her own life shading in. Quickly, reclaiming herself from the slow-consuming abyss, she opined. "Himani, drink some water."
Himani just hummed positively, before crossing her legs in the stairs under her feet and resting the phone on her thigh. She pulled out her water-can and downed a big gulp of water.
"I can understand how suffocating it is Himani, but cut yourself some slack," Mythraeyi had laid it out, after she'd been notified by Himani about the swig she'd taken.
A hydrated Himani had it better. "Right now, I am just being too cruel on myself." She professed rightly.
"Yes, give some time to it. That's okay. Far better than this," Mythraeyi solicited tenderly.
Himani chewed the insides of her cheek, at what she was going to tell, "One day or the other, I am going to tell him that I have feelings for him, Mythu. I don't care if it's a brutal rejection on face, or if he's going to slowly ignore me after that."
"Seri, apdiye pannalaam. (Okay, we'll do as you say.)" Mythraeyi had the calmness in her voice that she usually had when consoling her son or daughter.
Himani took another swig of water from her watercan and sniffled, "Can't believe I am sitting in the middle of road and crying like a loser."
"It's nature—happens to everyone, Himani."
Himani laughed, her shiny eyes wandering to both the corners of the street, still seated at the same place. "As someone who'd thought—like Vaathyaar says—love is just a matter of androgen, estrogen, testosterone and progesterone, just organic chemistry and nothing else, this is huge for me," she said quoting her favorite writer's dialogue from a Tamil cinema.
Mythraeyi chuckled softly, "You're not a wild, hormonal kid, Himani. Don't do that to yourself, don't disapprove your feelings."
"Hormones are still natural, so I am not disapproving and all that." Himani agreed, scrunching her nose, a little, realizing that she need not suppress her feelings so much.
She rose up to her feet, and fixed her kurta to get going as Mythraeyi opened her mouth. "You are just exhausted, hungry and sleepy to deal with it right now," she drummed as Himani traced her steps towards the street end, "Go home, have a nice shower and ask Athai (Aunty) to make you dosas. Gobble them up and get some rest."
"I will do that."
Mythraeyi's eyes narrowed speculatively, at her abrupt thought. "Hey, does Athai know about your feelings for Raghav?" She quizzed in kosher interest.
Himani twisted her lips. "I have never really blazoned it to her, but I think she has an idea, from whatever she's seen me telling about Raghav."
"Hmm."
"I mean, every parent discovers it when their kid falls in love," she said, shrugging to herself, as she took a right from where she could catch a glimpse of the house that stood at about one-fifty metres from there.
The other one agreed, "Right."
"Veetuku kitakka vandhutten, aprama saaptutu message panren. (I am almost home, I will text you after eating.)" Himani filled in just when she was becoming aware of an advancing sound of motorcycle on the phone. Figuring out that it was Raghav's was no rocket-science.
"Vandhuttaan. (He's here.)" Mythraeyi mumbled faintly into the phone, smiling gently at Raghav, who'd dimmed his headlamp, consciously, spotting her sat down in the steps, straight opposite to him.
Unlike Varsha, Mythraeyi did not feel the urge to retort at him, whenever she saw him. As Himani used to mention, he was just being himself, and there was nothing wrong with it.
Himani's brows creased at the mention of him, and her fast strides along the lane sped down, unknowingly, "Varattum po," she grumbled, contorting her face.
Mythraeyi waved a hand at him, still having her phone to ears. "Hey."
"Hi." He returned the gesture, hopping down from his bike and taking his helmet off. "Himani ah? (Is it Himani on phone?)" he asked, nonchalantly, fumbling with the keys from his backpack.
Mythraeyi's brows shot up at at his question—and Himani scowled, listening to it.
"Sollaadhe sollaadhe sollaadhe.. Naanthaan pesarennu avankitte sollaadhe. Apram phonea kondaambaan, ennaala pesa mudiyaadhu! (Don't tell, don't tell, don't tell. Don't tell, it's me on phone. I don't want to talk to him right now!)" Words lacing with short, sharp gasps, Himani recited insistently, pausing in her track momentously.
Mythraeyi replied her by clearing her throat, and leveled him a look. "No, It's a colleague." She lied, tipping off a quaint smile.
"Oh," he muttered plainly, but Mythraeyi took a note of his eyes remaining distracted, as he paused in front of the first step, "She should've reached home by now, right?"
Himani couldn't help but roll her eyes at it, while Mythraeyi replied him. "She's reached, Raghav. She messaged me sometime ago."
Heeding it, Himani's forehead puckered more, "Ellaam avanukkum thaan message panirken. (I have messaged him, too, alright.)" She said grumpily, as if she was admitting it to herself rather to Mythraeyi.
Mythraeyi pressed her lips together in order to suppress the smile that was rising at her lips, at the running commentary Himani was delivering at his questions. They'd make an adorable pair—she couldn't help the thought—only if this duffer would get something out of Himani's subtlety.
Himani frowned toying the pebble on the road with her toe, "Idhellaam nallaa pesuvaan, Mythu. Kadesile, friendunu case close panniduvaan. Enakku aluthu pochu. (He will talk all these sweet things, make me a stupid, and then declare that I am his friend. I am fed up with this.)"
Mythraeyi ascended to her feet, taking in a deep inhale, opting to return to her home rather staying here, and make Himani crumble, all again. Taking the phone off her ears, she waved at Raghav, "Seri, naan mela poren. (Okay, I will just carry on.)"
Raghav beckoned his thumb at the compound, "Ippove gate ah pootidava? (Shall I lock the main gate?)"
Mythraeyi gave him a quick nod, as she whipped around to proceed to the first floor, "Thanks Raghav. Good night" she said, as she started walking upstairs.
"Yeah, good night." Raghav reciprocated without turning back to her, as he latched the gate and locked it with the weighty, steel lock in his hand.
Himani found her lips bumble with a cushy smile, at the faint voice she could heed on the phone, as a picture of his boyish smile flared up in her mind.
Raghav put his discarded shoes in their place on the top row of the shoe rack—not before glancing wistfully, for once, at Himani's spot, which was empty.
He chucked the ball of socks in his laundry basket, and downed his backpack in its place, dutifully, once he entered his room with a grimace on his face.
Habitually, he came home to an opened door, and a Himani who'd pop her head out of the kitchen, if she were there (where she'd be pretty much all the time) to say him a hi with a huge, wobbly grin on her face; or Himani who'd be on the sofa in the living room, having her legs stretched, her head dunked in her laptop typing away furiously, accompanied by a used notepad, and a pencil; or Himani who'd just be sulking while folding her dried clothes—that she hated the most of all house chores—in the middle of the hallway, but would brighten up as he smiled down at her; or Himani, who'd be standing on her tippy toes to mark up the dates of her online baking classes in the monthly calendar in their living room.
He'd just be sitting in the sofa with his notebook and his favourite fountain pen, where he'd scribble down his ideas for his shows on the days he'd wrap up early, and came home before Himani. And when he'd just wave at her from the sofa, he had seen her having a hard time repressing a hastening smile that'd waver across her lips, despite how tuckered out she'd appear on those evenings, after several torturous hours of shift at work.
This had been their routine ever since he came here before a couple months—the one that he'd never grow tired of—and the one, perhaps, that'd just grown dear to his heart.
Well, waiting for Himani had become his superb-favorite pastime—a little more than coming home to her.
In the infinitesimal time he had for himself, he'd just hold himself in the sofa—his brown eyes expectantly darting to the entrance every ten minutes—whilst, there'd be a relentless list of things he'd make in his mind to make sure he told every little of those things about his day to Himani, after she came and they sat down for a cup of kaapi together.
Raghav brushed a hand down his dazed face, when he realised he had had his face splayed with a silly smile all along, after he'd changed into a pair of short trousers and exited his room.
He fell on the sofa, stretching his neck over its backrest, simply gazing back at the ceiling fan.
The muted walls, stark, spotless kitchen and the entrance of Himani's locked room—none of them was pleasant—and to worsen, all of them made him feel alien to the place he'd been living for the past few months. It was something he'd never felt before—not yesterday, not any other day when he had had Himani there.
Pulling in a lengthy breath, he jerked his back up and as he swayed to his right, he lazed down stretching his back over the handrest of the sofa, his eyes—museful and inspective—dawdled over the void across the hallway that led to the kitchen.
A very vivid picture of Himani's smile gleamed in his memory—pronounced and bright—bringing a smile out of him, although he was still glancing down the hallway, dreamily, as if there was someone in there.
Mobile from his trousers' pocket vibrated in a minute, tugging him out of the glaze. The last time he was alone, he did not remember staring at empty places and smiling stupidly, missing someone. Sighing, he groped for his phone in his trousers and the name it displayed brought back the smile, he'd eased some time ago.
Himani had messaged.
I have reached home, it read. It'd come an hour ago.
Thanni lorry number- 99905679**, the second message read.
Glooming at it, he brisked up from the sofa and walked over to the calendar to check up on when they'd purchased a tanker of water last month. It was some fifteen days ago, and despite the water from the city corporation that came every morning, they still needed excess water at times.
Thank you, he replied and espied the empty spot on the sofa for a flash.
Had he been waiting at the sofa, despite knowing she wasn't coming tonight—or the next two weeks, for that matter?
He knew he loved waiting for her, on those days he came home early.
But, waiting for Himani, knowing she wasn't going to come was not fun.
It was a gruesome torture—as it was right now. And it made him wonder why, nudging him unsettlingly in his chest.
When Raghav had towed himself back to his room, he dropped himself at his bed, not caring about the door that was swung open, widely, which helped him snatching a view of the empty space from his bed—as if just expectantly gazing at her truancy would bring her back—and he had not kept tabs on the hours he'd lied on his stomach, with an arm tucked under his face, just aimlessly gazing at void.
The night's slumber—with recurring images of her face in his dreams—wasn't hushed.
He did not know what jarred him awake brusquely, as he sat up in a drift, glowering at the walls around him, with crumpled up, dull eyes. Stretching his arms up, he rubbed the numbness in them as he glanced at the window side.
There was no flagrant light, except for the gentle, and distant wisps of the sun.
Simply blinking his eyes, surveying around his room as if it was some place he'd never been to, for sometime, Raghav flexed to the nightstand to pick his mobile phone.
Time was a little over five in the morning, and it—the fact that he had to glide by a harrowing four more hours in this house, all alone, before he could go to work—cast his heart down.
Solitude could be salutary—but, solitude made up of someone's memories, could be a misery—and he felt it a little alarming, perhaps, because when he missed Himani, he felt it appalling. And exactly, how he had never felt before while he'd missed anyone—Khushi, Meena, Rahul, Suhasini—who were in his good books.
Missing Himani was, well, different—and to his awareness, it wasn't like he was just missing a friend.
And it—the missing part—wasn't nice, thieving him of the might to be unwavering.
He brushed a hand down his face, just unmindfully, feeling weary and a bit fagged from the niggling rest he had had for the night, as he strode over to the bathroom.
He was out of his room, after good twenty minutes, he was done with all of his duties, dressed with the first shirt and pants that he put his hands on from his almirah, when he'd just padded down to the kitchen to make himself a cup of kaapi.
Pouring the searing, bubbling hot water over the layer of coffee powder in the filter, he waited for the decoction, whilst, he hoped for a packet of milk from the refrigerator. Putting it up on the stove, Raghav shuffled to the rack of utensils and plucked out two tumblers out of the rack and set them down to add sugar to them.
And when he discerned there was no need for a second tumbler, right now and how ridiculously out-of-habit he'd acted, a bitty smile grazed his mouth in a twitch, while he managed to put back the second tumbler in its place.
The morning after he'd learned to make kaapi from Himani, while she was still sleeping in—well, she always managed to wake up before the sun, precisely, if she'd had early shifts—he was thoroughly out of sleep.
And since he'd gathered how to make a decent kaapi from her, he was in the kitchen, trying his hands on warming up his morning coffee, when Himani had stepped out of her room, still in her baggy t-shirt and pajamas, her coily black flexing down her shoulders with a few strands of them bushy and unruly.
She pressed the back of her palm to press it to her yawning mouth, and as she did that, walking over to the kitchen—as he'd flashed on her—her midnight black eyes widened a little, when she halted in her tracks, rubbing the languor in them.
"You're making coffee—" Himani had mumbled, her voice sleep-rubbed and hoarse.
He had smiled sheepishly at her, before diverting himself to the stove to turn it off, "You taught me just yesterday, don't you want to put it to test?" He had replied, taking a fleeting look at her, over his shoulders.
Himani's back touched the wall, as she folded her hands to her bosom, "But you made coffee, last evening already, and you passed," she'd answered, as he poured the scalding milk, into two tumblers in front of him.
"That was under your supervision, Chef." His eyes narrowed into two little brown pebbles, he'd asked, "was it a distinction though?"
Himani snorted, "That was a just pass."
Raghav returned her mocking glance with a scowl on his face, as she roamed over to the coffee filter in which the decoction was straining down, her hands piling up her raven black locks of hair in a chignon. She cambered over the cabinet to whiff the strong aroma that enlivened her senses.
"I live for this," Himani mumbled, as she waved her hands at the steam that came out, fanning it to her face.
Raghav chuckled, as he walked through the door that led to the backyard of the house, and sat down at the slight platform with coffee he made in his hands, with reminiscence of that day, quietly gazing around the really small enclosure of plants that Himani had had.
She was not a sanguinary gardener, but she liked to have a few plants, and loved to take care of them—there were several rose bushes, and yellow Chrysanths, and a few green chilli plants uncoiled over the bordering places.
When Raghav had gulped down a good amount of coffee to meet the day's needs, which as he'd hunched—with unknown restlessness that'd been unraveling in him since yesterday—was going to be troublesome, he frowned at the noise of two-wheeler from the front porch, as he turned his head around to scan the area through the front door, that was just across him. His brows shot up, spotting Varsha getting off her bike, as she hung the helmet in the rearview mirror.
Raghav sashayed over to the living room, after shutting the backyard door, blocking off the light it exalted the house with.
"Hey," Varsha greeted him, walking over to the living room, and neatly setting down her backpack on the sofa.
Raghav furrowed his brows, "Hi, what's with morning visit?" he told her as he looked at her bag on the sofa, and lifted his face to her, "Himani is not here."
Varsha scoffed, "That's exactly why I am here," she announced, her eyes flouting at his confused ones, as she strode around the sofa, to reign over the kitchen.
Raghav tailed behind her, rushing his pace to the entryway of the kitchen before Varsha did. He stretched both of his arms as barricades from entering the kitchen.
Planting hands at her hips, Varsha glowered at him, as he chanted mechanically, "Himani doesn't like someone else in the kitchen."
Varsha threw him a ferocious look, before it lapsed into a mocking expression, "Oh, sweetie, I have been here more than you have, and certainly, I am not someone else." Her words, as they became louder and emphatic with passing moment, she barked at him, "Quit kvetching about it, and leave me my way."
Raghav scowled at her, and he let her in, moving aside to lump himself to the wall. She rolled her eyes, questioning his declaration about Himani's preferences, stepping inside the kitchen, while he opted to stand there, and watch the back of her head with a rumpled temple.
He didn't really know why was she here, and he needed to know, "Why are you here?"
Varsha purled around on her heel, and chinned up with a nepharious grin, "Be nice to me," she jeered, with an arched brow, "You don't want to get poisoned, do you?"
Raghav heaved a sigh, after an instant, when he realized what she really meant, "Hey, hey, hey." He marched inside the kitchen to look at her straight in her eyes, "Are you going to cater me until Himani comes?" His eyes were flimsy at the idea, as he croaked.
Varsha grumbled out a derisive laughter, "Didn't I ask you to be nice?"
Exhaling harshly, as if he was upset with something, Raghav raked a hand through his hair, and veneered it with a gawky smile, "Consider this as me being nice," He spoke out with his lips twitching stiffly with that made out smile, "Are you going to cater me?"
Varsha chucked him a nonchalant glance from the corner of her eyes, with an one sided evil smile. "Yes. You paid her for the whole month. Not availing it for the whole two weeks wouldn't be fair, so I assured her that I've got this covered." Her tone was cool, and her explanation was logical.
But somewhere in between her practical words, Raghav had a tinge of pang in his heart at them. Varsha had laid it down as if there was nothing more than business between him and Himani, and it incensed the rattle in his heart more than it should.
"Varsha, listen," Raghav said, after a few minutes of deliberately trying to discover what was behind everything going on with him, since yesterday. "It's fine, you know." His voice had softened when he'd said that, and Varsha had not failed to take a mental note of it.
Breathing in deeply, she looked up at him, waiting for him to continue. Raghav's voice came out nothing more than airy words, "You don't have to do this, Varsha. I can see it to myself."
Varsha had a smile ghosted across her lips, at his earnestness. "I did not ask for this much of niceness, Cheta, it's okay," she relented, picking up on his sincere gaze.
Raghav shrugged, "I am just being fair, I guess."
"I have assured Himani, that I'd do it—and you know how she is when it comes to business."
And it pounded on Raghav—hard.
Varsha scanned his face, as his eyes caught with emotion at her choice of words.
"It's not business—" were his exact words, that came out with a frustrated grunt, and his eyes—as Varsha had seen—were stormy. She kept watching his troubled face, and ceased from opening her mouth, until he did it after a few seconds.
"It's not purely monetary. Himani is..." His voice dropped, as if he'd been bumped with something tediously—unsure of how to finish his sentence, and helpless.
"—what? A friend?" Varsha's tone was monotonous, as she opted to hang on to his gaze—which, now was disoriented more.
He looked like he just had one handful tortures, and a jar of bewilderment for breakfast.
Sucking in a long, sharp breath, he muttered, "She is... She is my person."
Varsha let out a sigh, exasperatedly, "So?"
"I will have this talk with her."
Her brows rose at it, "And?"
"You don't have to suffer yourself at cooking for me."
Varsha had to agree to it, because he looked bloody deliberate about it.
***
"It's not nice without Himani."
Khushi brow-raised at Raghav's declaration, as she swung her chair to Raghav, who was in his seat, face-to-face with his desktop, his face crammed with resolute expressions, although his eyes were staying dreamy.
It was a Saturday—eight days past Himani went to her hometown—but if you ask Raghav, he'd have a hard time going easy on it.
Omahazeeya: A week has seven days.
Raghav: Lie. It feels like seven years, go away.
See?
Raghav had always been a bright student—in school, college—but right now, with the mess up he'd hauled unto himself, he felt like a sleepy student who'd been brutally stirred awake in the middle of a Math class.
He hadn't the least idea of what was going on—nonetheless, not knowing the equation to it.
Khushi maneuvered her chair to his side, and touched his shoulders lightly, "What's not nice?" She muttered, a quiet smile playing on her lips, and her eyes glued to his face as if she wouldn't spare to miss an inch of anything up there, whilst he spoke up.
Raghav's shoulder slumped, as he slackened back to touch the backrest of the seat. He shook his head before swiveling it to her, gulping an inhale. "Anything, everything—home, work," he agreed solemnly, looking at Khushi expectant blue eyes. "—albeit, I have never had her here, at work, everything feels harsh," he added, speedily, with a gasp. "I miss her."
Khushi could not help the smile that was fast-smearing on her lips. "Kekka nallaa irukke. Mela sollu paapom (That's nice to hear. Can we hear more about it?)" she mumbled, getting up from her seat, looping an arm around his. "Vaa velila poi pesalaam (Come let's go out to the lounge to talk.)" She declared, tugging him out of his seat.
On their way, Khushi paused by the photocopier, to give a pat on Meena's shoulders. "He feels not nice without Himani. We're going to talk about it," she said grinning hugely. Meena's eyes dilated and amused, pendulated to Raghav who was sulking beside her, and drifted back to Khushi as she waved at the door infront of them, "Come and honour the talk, the eldest of the three."
Meena laughed softly, as she pushed a frowning Raghav, planting her palms on his back, out of the door. "Come big boy, let's talk about it."
As they treaded over to the waiting lounge, Raghav flopped at the plush couch. Meena and Khushi exchanged anticipated glances, before taking their seats across him.
A soundless minute lingered around there, when Raghav was just sitting quietly gazing at the carpet at his feet, something wavering in his mind.
Khushi cleared her throat, brushing Meena's elbow with her palm, signalling her to notice his demeanor. "So tell more about it Raghav." She urged gently.
Raghav recessed himself at the comfy sofa, "I miss Himani." He'd managed to bring those along with the prolonged breath he blew out.
Meena watched him, her eyes analytically narrowed at him. "It happens, Raghav. We miss our friends when they're away." She made sure she was insistent on each word that came out of her mouth. And it worked like magic—making him jerk up, and sit straight from his relented position.
His shoulders had stiffened, and the expressions on his face told them he was not being nonsense right now. "I know," he agreed, taking his hand to rest his forehead in it. "But it's never been this way when you or Khushi were away."
A won smile faltered on her lips, as Meena continued, "You're missing more her than us because you both live under the same roof, Raghav."
Khushi eyed Meena with little mischief glinting in hers, as Raghav upped his face from his hands with a thoughtful frown on his face, "Hey, did you realise something?"
"What?" They asked together.
The frown on his face had melded into a dumbfounded expression, when he opened his mouth, "I have... not... after Harshita..." he stammered away to bring it around, because it was a stupendous realization.
And it made a lot of sense, even though he had not said it obviously, since Meena and Khushi had already discussed it.
Khushi bent out to look at his drooping face, "You're meaning to say that you have not been seeing anyone after Harshita."
Raghav, wordlessly, nodded.
Meena snapped her gaze to his baffled face, "So what do you derive out of this?"
"I think.. I like her..."
"Who? Harshita?" Khushi asked muffling a giggle.
Raghav left a stern glance at Khushi, before it left his mouth, "Himani."
Meena shook her head in laughter that rustled out of her chest. "Till yesterday you were the person who wouldn't bat an eye at all these—and now, suddenly you've manned up to agree to it?"
Khushi's lips thinned into a grim line. "She's right. You have never wanted a long-term relationship. Heck, you've never really liked anyone. It had been random hookups, and casual flings—it'd always been like that."
Meena caught off, right where Khushi ended, "And now, out of nowhere, you say you like someone?"
"It is not out of nowhere," Raghav muttered, causing both of them to frown at him, "It had always been there." He blurted out and got up from his seat, upright.
"Himani had always been special. I have been dumb enough not to realize that it's more than just friendship—because, as you both reason out, I have never felt this way with anyone else." He resumed taking a few steps forward towards them.
Raghav had expected a question mark on their faces, instead there was just two blasted, splitting smiles, annoying him a bit more than he was.
"Continue." Khushi enjoined, after a minute's pause.
He looked over at her, with a tender expression in his eyes, "Whenever I felt special being with Himani, I just kept telling myself that she was a friend, over and over."
Watching Meena shake her head unbelievably with a sneer on her face, at his statement, built up an outrage in his mind, "Well, you told me not to mess up with her, that's why I kept convincing myself that she's a friend whenever I felt different with her" he yelled at Meena. He was a patient man, but not today—not when he was having it huge in his life.
Meena got up from her seat, and came across him, with words erupting from her chest, "Hey, I told you not to mess up with her! Not to, not like her genuinely!" Her voice rose in an octave, and it distracted Anant Sir, who was just passing through the door.
He stopped in his track, his gaze wandering over to three faces. "Are you okay, kids?"
"Oh, I am doing fantastic, Anant Sir," Raghav said with a bitter chuckle, and Khushi pulled him by his arm hoping to stop him, but he was restless and edgy. "I bumped into an auto while coming to office this morning, and paid a stupid fine for driving in one-way while going back home yesterday. Seven days feel like hellishly long year, and I am unable get my damn sleep at nights—and I am so good. So fine—"
"Raghav, stop it. You don't talk to him like that!" If not for Meena's intrusion, it was dubious if he would've stopped shut.
Khushi wormed over to the old man, with a beseeching face. "Anant sir, I am sorry. He is just not okay."
Raghav snapped his eyes close, briefly, and opened them as he followed her, as the conscious of what he'd done, hit him. "Anant Sir, I am sorry," he mumbled a heartfelt apology.
Anant sir took it readily, "That's okay, you look frustrated."
Raghav gulped. "I am," he mumbled, regret flickering in his eyes, "But that doesn't give me rights to be an ass like that, I am sorry, Anant Sir."
He chuckled and gave him a pat on his back before giving them their privacy. "Take care of yourself, Kid."
"So is it true?" Khushi asked, several minutes later the mishap with Anant Sir. They were still seated in the waiting lounge, this time one after the other, in the same sofa.
Raghav held his eyes with Khushi's, probing, "Which one?"
"Did you really bump into an auto this morning?"
A feathery smile moved his lips as he remembered what he'd muttered to the Auto-man that morning.
"Innaabaa ootla soltu vantiyaa! (Have you informed your family that you're going to hurt yourself by bumping into vehicles?)" The auto driver had hooted at him.
Raghav sighed, offhandedly, "Soltu varathukku veetle aal illa naa, adhaan prachnaiye. (There's no one at home to inform, and that's the problem.)"
***
At the end of that day, Raghav had come to terms with something that'd been indecisive in his mind all through the week.
He was liking Himani.
And worst, he wanted to be liked back by her.
***
So what do you guys think?
And here you go, Raghav told it out that he'd never felt this way with anyone and because of Meena's warning in the beginning and that is why he'd kept alarming himself that she's just a friend, whenever his feelings whelmed.
How was the chapter? Was it rushed? Haha, but that's how it's supposed to be. and there's more to it. Realizing you like someone being a person like Raghav is, is not going to be easy for him. As of now the realization is really really a huge one for him to take in and process.
They'll talk more about it in the next chapter, until then tata:)