Happy New Year, everyone!!! And with this comes a great news! I GOT A JOB! I am so sooo happy!!! So, here's chapter 15. I have been working on it all day and finally this chapter's done. Hope you guys like it. Enjoy and do write how you felt. It's always nice to read about your reading experience. Unedited, cos i'm tired and i just wanted to put it up as soon as I could.
Chapter 15
"Are you sure you want to come to my place?" Rey asked Sharon for the fifth time, while the chauffeur drove to Rey's apartment. "I really think you should go home, Sharon."
"If I'm uninvited, might as well just say it, don't you think?" Sharon hissed out.
Rey gaped at her, stumped. "You really think, after everything, I would not want you with me."
Sharon immediately felt a twinge of guilt but kept her mouth shut anyway, glaring at the gliding scene outside the window.
Rey paused for a couple of moments before he sighed, "Sharon, love," she felt a hand on her shoulder, "I have noticed how distant you have become to your mom, after... everything," he said, "and I don't like it..."
"Please, stop, just stop, Rey," Sharon interrupted him, "If you don't want me, just tell your chauffeur to leave me at my home."
"You will always be welcome, Sharon. I know you're agitated about this, so please, for one second, just shut up and listen."
"No, Reyansh," Sharon turned to face him. "I suggest you don't talk about things you don't know."
Pause. "Since when did you stop telling me things?" he asked quietly.
"Rey..." Sharon sighed, pinching her forehead. The trip, the activity, the flights, the... everything else... had left her exhausted, "look, I will go home, just not now. Not today. I don't have it in me to face mom right now. Please Rey... it's not like I have distanced or something, you got that wrong, no I'm not lying," Sharon quickly added when she saw Rey open his mouth to speak, "I love her... I still love her a lot... but there are a few things about her that I hadn't noticed before which I can't help but notice now... and they get on my nerve... I... I will go back, just let me catch on some sleep first, okay?"
Rey pondered, scrunching his eyebrows, and nodded, "Well, it's your call really. Just... Sharon, please don't push her away. You two only have each other, you know..."
Sharon felt something heavy rise in her chest, weighing her down, and blocking her ability to breathe, metaphorically (or maybe not).
"I know," she replied, over the lump in her throat.
***
Swayam woke up to utter darkness. Shit! He realised he had fallen asleep as soon as he dropped his bags inside his apartment and collapsed on the couch. He got up, clumsily making his way to the light switch, cursing on the way when his foot hit the leg of a chair. He felt the opposite wall and fumbled for the switch, the thumb of his left foot throbbing. He flicked the switch on and his 1BHK apartment was bathed in fluorescent white light.
With the dizziness from sleep finally wearing, he realised, he was covered in dried sweat, which now felt utterly gross, his belt was too tight on his waist and his feet were sweating because he still hadn't taken off his week old soiled socks. In other words, he was in dire need of some tea and a shower.
Swayam fixed himself some tea when he got out of the shower, water droplets from his damp hair running down his back. Why bother with hair dryer when he wasn't going out anyway. Besides the cool hair felt good on his skin.
Swayam sipped the tea perched on his platform, scrolling through his phone for new messages. Absently scrolling through messages and emails, majority of them advertisements, or a recap of the finance magazines he had subscribed to (he would read them later), a couple of messages from his parents and relatives... Swayam froze when he saw the message from Kapil. His eyes scrunched in confusion. What did this mean?
He immediately called up Kapil, who answered in four rings. "Hello?"
"Kapil, I just saw your message," Swayam paused while Kapil made a noise of assent. "What does this mean?" he asked.
"Dude, there have been changes in the merger contract, and they are not good," he answered, through the phone.
"I read that. But JR Cements agreed?"
"That's the surprising thing. They did. I saw Sunaina Raiprakash's sign on it."
"Shit," he cursed, running his hand through his hair.
"Swayam, your friend is the next heiress of this company, right?" Kapil asked, quietly.
"Yes," he mumbled. Friend, if that.
"Well, if she doesn't do anything quick, she will lose everything."
***
"My phone's gone dead, absolutely dead," Sharon mumbled, "where is the bloody charger Rey?" Sharon yelled from the hall, hoping her voice made it through the door to bathroom. She didn't know how the name of Siren Sharon' started circulating in college but it caught on for a reason and she liked living up to it.
"In my bag Shar," Rey's muffled voice emerged through the bathroom. "Wait for me to take it out. Do not open my bag," he called, just as Sharon had dragged Rey's bag near her feet. She dropped the bag, scowling. "I wasn't going to," she called back.
She heard Rey let out a bark of laughter, "As if."
Sharon stuck her tongue out in the direction of the door, knowing it was useless but still it made her feel better and she collapsed on the couch. Three hours after returning, all they had managed was to get themselves a cup of coffee and retrieve some fresh clothes, and Sharon had had a shower which took half an hour (she may or may not have fallen asleep in the shower. But if she did, she would never admit it. Still, in her defence, the water was cool and she was tired.)
Rey came out a couple of minutes later, shaking his head like a wet dog. "Charger," Sharon grunted, from her seat.
"Wait, Sharon! God!" Rey exclaimed finally opening his bag and retrieving the charger and tossed it in her direction. Sharon picked it up but made no move. "What?" Rey asked, amused, "now you're not going to hurry?"
Sharon made a clicking noise, and raised her hand with the charger and her cellphone, "Please?"
Rey shook his head but took them anyway. He attached the charger to the phone and plugged it in, switching her phone on. "Now get your ass here and tell your mom you have reached."
"You do it," she replied.
"Sharon," Rey glared at her and received a disgruntled noise and a pleading look. Rey sighed, "Fine."
As soon as he switched it on, the phone started buzzing. Woah! She was pretty sure her mom's never been that eager to talk to her.
"Er, Sharon?" Rey called, "Swayam's calling you."
Sharon felt her hands get cold and clammy, a contrast to her ears which felt so warm she was pretty sure they red, noticeably red. "Cut it," she replied blankly.
"Wha- are you sure?" he asked, eyeing her and her phone warily.
"Yes Rey, cut it," she repeated louder.
"What if it's something important. I-" the phone silenced and Sharon let out a heavy sigh. Almost immediately, it started ringing again. "It could be something important."
Sharon got up, her head buzzing, snatched the phone from Rey and swiped the screen, cutting the call. She pressed on power button and switched her phone off. "There. Done."
"What's going on, Sharon?" Rey asked her slowly, eyeing her with suspicion, who looked away and answered with a blank, "Nothing."
Tring. Tring.
This time Rey's phone started ringing and Rey stooped down to snatch from on top of his bag. He stared at the phone with eyes scrunched in confusion, and glancing one fleeting look at Sharon swiped the green button flashing on screen. There was no confusion in Sharon's head as to who it was.
Even before Rey had answered, Sharon snatched it away from him and sure enough it was Swayam's number. She had given him enough time to explain in Ladakh. Even while they were coming back, the one night they had stayed at the guest house before catching their planes, Swayam had not uttered a single word to her. Not even a hint that he wanted to apologize maybe. She was not giving him any more of her time and emotions. Enough is enough.
Sharon picked the phone to listen to Swayam's frantically speaking, "Hello? Rey. Can you hear me?"
"Yes, I can hear you," Sharon replied coldly, walking out into the kitchen, pleading Rey with her eyes to give her some privacy.
"Oh, Sharon, I-"
"When I shut my phone it means I don't want to talk to you. Come on Mr. Investment Banker, I'm you're smart enough to understand that," she interrupted him.
"It's not-"
"I shut my phone off so you go on to bug someone else. Have some manners, Shekhawat," she continued making it abundantly clear she was not in the mood for any of his shenanigans.
"I understand, but,-" he tried again but...
"No, that's the issue, you don't understand. If you did, you wouldn't have... I can't believe what you... and I had thought..." Sharon's voice thickened with all the hurt that was built up in her body. God, she didn't want him to affect her in this way and more importantly, she didn't want him to know he affected her this way.
"Sharon," he groaned, "I'm sorry about all that but"
"Me too. I'm sorry too."
"Sharon, your-"
"Please don't contact me again, please. I beg you."
Swayam was still saying something when she cut her phone. Sharon took deep haggard breaths in, willing herself to stop crying but they just won't bloody stop.
The phone buzzed again with Swayam's number. Irritated (God! Why doesn't he get a message!), Sharon swiped the phone to end and shut it off too. She was trembling all over, experiencing having truly been rejected for the first time in her life.
Sharon had failed on multiple occasions. She had failed as a dancer, and that had hurt. She had failed as a daughter, and that had hurt way worse than she could have ever imagined. She had been rejected by life too many times for her self-respect. But when that had happened, it had been all her. She was the only one to blame, and that was easy. Hating herself was easy. But this was the first time she had been rejected by a human, and not just a human, a human whom she had torn down her walls for, the walls which she had built through years of struggle, pain and self-hatred. She couldn't believe she had been that easy to be broken again. Just one night, just one conversation, and she was the same mess she had been four years ago.
Sharon bent down on the sink, splashing water over her face. "Sharon?" she heard Rey call, voice soft and wary.
She hummed in response. Her eyes still stung from the shed tears and she knew if she turned around, there would be no other options but to confess.
But maybe she didn't have any other option anyway.
"What happened?"
***
"Please don't contact me again. I beg you," Sharon said, voice thick and trembling. Swayam didn't need to see to know she was crying. He would apologise later but right she needed to know...
"Sharon, the mergers not a good idea. Please listen to me once. I swear I'll never call you again if that's what you want... Hello? Sharon? Hello?" he stared at the screen to see she had ended the call. God! Sometimes he absolutely hated her stubborn ways.
He dialled Rey's number again, knowing against hope that his call will not be answered. He closed his eyes, dropping the phone on the couch when the same automated machine started, "The number you're calling is currently not available. Please call again later."
"There's no point," he snapped at the automated female voice saying the same thing on repeat. He stood up, pacing the room. No, he couldn't accept defeat so easily. He had to bloody do something. He couldn't let Sharon lose everything.
But maybe she already knows all this, his cynical mind thought. Maybe you don't need to tell her. She might think it's your ploy to get her attention. But what if she doesn't? Either way, she's not losing anything, is she? She's getting married to Rey and...
Swayam stopped pacing. And then it was clear to her. This was the reason she was getting married to Rey. She knew about the contract of merger. She didn't love him; that truth was evident from the way she had spoken to Swayam that day. So this was the reason they were getting married. It all makes perfect sense doesn't it, he thought bitterly. And anyway, it all makes perfect sense. Back from the college days it made perfect sense. Sharon the diva, and Rey the heartthrob of college; they were the power couple in college. Of course it made sense. But Sharon doesn't love him, the optimistic part of him squeaked, pressed underneath the growing pain in his heart. But no one can deny that they are made for each other.
Swayam sat down, curling in on himself. His palms pressed into his eyeballs, begging them to stop stinging.
Despite everything that happened, he couldn't help but feel a little hopeful that maybe, someday, Sharon and he could belong together. He felt like laughing on his face for even thinking that way. He felt disgusted. God! Had he never grown up from his teen self? It had been four years for God's sake and still he was clung to this fantasy of finding love in Sharon Raiprakash. How stupid was he?
Swayam stood up again, feeling restless. Like if he didn't do something soon enough, he would combust into pieces. He wanted to do something crazy, dramatic, something irrational. Something he knew he would regret. But regret always made him feel like having the upper hand. He would chose it any day over desperation, over helplessness, over feeling weak, small and unwanted.
"Why do you want to go after things you can't have when you can wish for things within reach?"
As he grabbed his keys and literally ran out of his apartment, Tani's voice filled his head. Within reach. She had been right, of course, she had been right. Always go for things within reach. So he would do that.
"Bhai, you can't be blind or stupid. You must have noticed... Sameera... She fancies you."
***
"What happened?" Rey asked, curious. Like he desperately wanted to know while being scared not to cross an invisible line.
Sharon chuckled, wet, tired, palms flat over the surface of wash basin, supporting herself. Defeated was the word maybe. "Life happened," she replied hoarsely, not facing him. "And yet again reminded, what a bloody big failure I am."
Rey crossed the distance between them and placed his hands on her shoulders, lightly squeezing her. "If you want to talk about it... but it's your choice. I swear."
Sharon turned around and wrapped her hands viper like around Rey's torso. She was sinking and Rey was the only support she had, her anchor. Sharon gritted her teeth, not letting herself cry. He doesn't deserve it. He doesn't.
She felt Rey fidget inside her embrace, unsure of what to do, but still not trying to pace anything. He simply stood, with his arms wrapped around her, lightly rubbing her back.
"I don't know if I can tell you anything, Rey. It is way too... awkward and... personal," she said, upon disentangling herself from him. For some reason she couldn't look him in the eye and her voice refused to go beyond a threshold amplitude which was surprisingly less for Siren Sharon'.
"Tell me what you can. The rest I'll figure out," he replied, trying to console her in his own quirky way. But on one glance from her face, he sobered up, "I mean, if you want to tell me, that is."
They both settled down on the couch, while Sharon distanced herself as much as she could from Rey and pulled a pillow to her chest, as she narrated everything. Despite the dull pain in her chest, her face still grew hot when she tried to describe the Pangong hotel room scene in the least obscene way. Throughout her narration, she didn't have the guts to look up at Rey, finally feeling what Swayam had said the other day. Feeling like she had cheated on Rey. When she finished her narration she glanced up at Rey, praying he didn't hold everything against her and start hating her too.
But when she finished, Rey looked what she could only describe as gobsmacked. "You..." he mumbled, "and I was..." he paused while Sharon's heart raced as she stared at Rey, eyes wide with nerves.
Rey shook his head, as though trying to shake his disbelief off and he gaped up at her. When he finally he spoke, he blurted out, "It's like I was in a real-life po*no scene."
Wait. WHAT!
"What?" Sharon asked dumbly.
"You... well made out per se, right beside my bed. And I snored away... man, was I hammered," he muttered.
"Rey!" Sharon exclaimed, appalled.
"Wait, miss," he warned, index finger up in a classic scolding fashion, "you don't get to feel mortified. You did the deed beside my bed... what sort of blue films have you been watching? And what sort of fantasies are you living?"
"God, you're terrible, I hate you," Sharon groaned, throwing the pillow at him who laughingly took the shot. "I mean you've completely lost focus of my narration. I hate you so much!" She immediately regretted throwing the pillow, because she didn't have anything to hide her face into.
"Anyway," she sighed, shaking her head, "It doesn't matter anyway. I'm getting married to you so..."
"Really?" Rey asked, "Do you still want to get married to me, Sharon?"
Sharon blinked up at him. Rey smiled softly before saying, "Well, this trip didn't go as we wanted it to, but... you know... it did clear a few things..." he scooted closer to her and grabbed both her hands into his, "for one, we both are very much capable of love. So the reason we had agreed to this marriage doesn't stand anymore."
"But... it didn't work out for either of us," Sharon countered.
"True," he nodded slowly, "but there's hope in the future, right?"
Sharon simply stared at him, her emotions in a jumble. She suddenly felt like a burden was off her shoulders, a burden she hadn't realised till then that she was carrying. And that made her feel guilty; realising that she was never willing to marry him in the first place, the fact never quite sunk in.
"Besides, you did cheat on me Sharon," Rey said, all serious expression, but Sharon could easily detect the hint of mischief bouncing off his eyes.
"I cheated?" Sharon challenged, "You bloody told me that you proposed to another girl. You were the one who cheated first."
"You went all the way with another guy Sharon!" Rey mock-exclaimed. "Your intensity was so much more. Damn, I missed a show. It would have been so much fun to wake up midst your fondling and all the... aaah" Rey dramatically moaned, rolling his eyes to the back.
Sharon felt her face heat up again as she launched herself on him, hitting him with the pillow which had fallen on the floor while Rey continued dramatically moaning slurs. "Ooohh! Goood! Yesss! Aaah!"
***
Swayam pressed the buzzer twice and waited. His entire body felt like one big electric circuit. He was all tightly coiled energy begging to burst open. Swayam impatiently waited while Sameera answered the door.
When she looked at him, it was with grogginess mixed with confusion. Swayam almost immediately surged forward and kissed her. Sameera froze for a couple of seconds before she reacted to it with a breathy mumble of "okay" against his lips, and fell into routine. It was their secret. They occasionally got together at nights when the other one was wound up. In the morning however, there was no mention of last night and they moved on as if it never happened. It had all started with one drunken party with Swayam dropping Sameera to her home and then deciding to stay, since he was too drunk to be sure of reaching home safely. One thing led to another and the next thing he knew, he had woken up to a bad hangover and Sameera beside him, with just fleeting memories to remember what had happened. They didn't talk about it that morning. Things got a little awkward for a couple of days after which they went back to being friends, with not a word spoken of the night. It happened again, on another completely sober instance, when Sameera invited him for dinner at her home, both of them knowing what she was hinting at. That night, watching TV, Swayam tentatively leaned forward, just to be sure that that was what she wanted. When she did kiss back, his movements got surer and after that it became an unsaid agreement.
Sex with Sameera was always satisfying for Swayam. It was not mindblowing, not one of those movie like scenes. It was like scratching an itch, not all that important but felt necessary and satisfying.
This time however, he couldn't feel anything at all. With Sharon, his body had caught fire. His mind couldn't focus on anything other than the feel of her body on his. This time however, he couldn't feel anything. He desperately needed to do something irrational but a part of his brain, one he hadn't been acquainted with in a long time, seemed disappointed in him. There was also the thought of Sameera fancying him. Tani's voice filled his brain, and he reckoned it couldn't be a good thing that his sister filled his head while he wanted to get laid.
He mentally shook his head, and decided to take matter in his own hands. The said hands detached themselves from where they were cupping Sameera's face and started roaming her skin. It reminded of the way he had felt Sharon's body. With his eyes closed he could almost imagine Sharon being the one he was holding. Now that he started, he couldn't stop it, he couldn't stop picturing Sharon.
Holding her, kissing her... making her moan his name...
A yawn made him come out of his thoughts. He snapped back to gape at Sameera.
She look at him, smiling sheepishly. "Sorry," she said, looking guilty, "I'm just a little tired. Kiss me again?"
What was he thinking? It would not be fair on Sameera to do what he was about to? God, when had he stooped so low?
"Actually, it's just... it's been a long time... and... but I shouldn't have come. I'm sorry," he apologized which Sameera cut with, "no, no it's okay. I understand really. But if you want-"
That was the issue. He didn't want. But he looked down at Sameera, so sweet, so adjusting... He definitely didn't want to hurt her.
Swayam smiled down at her and leaned in to kiss her cheek. "You're tired. I'm sorry for coming. You should really sleep," he said. He saw her face fall but chose to ignore it, needing to get out immediately.
He headed towards the door. "In compensation," Sameera called making Swayam turn around, "you could stay here, if you want. I mean it's pretty late."
"Nah, I'm good. I'll see you tomorrow, Sam. Goodnight," he smiled and opened the door.
"Bye, love," Sameera called as he slipped out of the door and shut it behind him. Swayam had never felt like screaming so badly. Or maybe huddle up beneath his bed and never come out again. But unfortunately that was not an option. That would never be an option. Because life always has to make sure that his life is a misery.
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