NEW ASHLOK FICTION : GUILTY Chapter 29page 140 - Page 21

What is she doing here at my doorstep at this hour. Oh! Dear lord she's out to get me. She's come for her daily moo! And I'm it. Or maybe she just couldn't get enough of my awesomeness, who can blame her, her only reference point being her husband. Is there any comparison possible between road kill and caviar. Oh! Just open the damn door and put her out of misery Saint Shlok.

Just as he was about to open the door his phone rang.

What the hell, I'm still on my bed. Holy cow! Why am I dreaming about ... or rather having nightmares about chucky. "Yes! I'm on my way" he was already reaching for his pants. And he was off again. It says that Mumbai is the city that never sleeps. But for once I hope they'd let me get a good nights sleep at least once in a blue moon.

Tell me again why I'm doing all this when I could be sitting in a beach in Acapulco sipping a Bloody Mary surrounded by pretty...since when do I go for pretty, correction sexy long legged bikini babes. Not juvenile pansy worshiping cow girls.

Why are you even bringing her into,this conversation again. What's with this cow girl and me. I'm dreaming about her, correction...or just give it up man..admit it she's got you all rattled. Me no way. She gives me the creeps.

Getting back to more serious matters at hand, Einstein it was your choice, you choose to drop out of Harvard Business School and decided to fight crime in the streets of Mumbai. Sounded good but not as glamours as you hoped it to be. You did it out of your own free will. No one forced you to do so. No one forced you? Youre forgetting someone. You're forgetting him? He forced my hand. He pushed me so hard for so long. It's a miracle I didn't end up behind bars. You're still up on the deal my boy...for you ended up in the sunny side. Things could've gone so bad, so wrong. Trying to suppress those unpleasant memories, he was racing against time to reach yet another crime scene. This is my life. Oh! You poor little rich boy! Stop feeling sorry for yourself.

" Astha! Astha! Where are you my child? Daydreaming again!" All the kids in her 5th grade burst into giggles. Except her best friend. She looked at her and urged her to answer the teachers question.

Tell me what would you like to be when you grow up? Asked her again.

A teacher just like you miss! She answered without thinking twice.

From then to now...today at 23, first she was Mr. & Mrs Kirloskar's daughter and Anushka's sister. Then Mr. Almeidas' wife. And today the victims wife. Tomorrow the widow of Mr. Stanley Almeida. How did life get so complicated and so pale and colourless. When do I get to be "Astha". Never! Life played a very dirty trick on me. Why? I never hurt anybody. I was a good daughter, loving sister and a dutiful wife. Then where did I go wrong. But they all betrayed me. They all used me. I was always a player. Never got the chance to sit back enjoy the game. Always the one to get pushed, pulled and knocked down. Blamed upon, frowned upon.

Her heart cried in silence, remembering the sarcastic remarks of what his name, Detective. look at me I'm so handsome. She knew not just him but everyone will think she got him killed. These killed for his monkey. But what most of them didn't know was, she already had all the money to keep her in lap of luxury for many generations to come. She never used it or had the urge to show it to the world.

What's gonna be my identity. All my life I was someone's somebody. Not anymore. What am I gonna do with my life. Most of her classmates are either still in university or working, doing what they like, living their dreams. She didn't keep in touch with any of her friends after she got married. They were all in Bangalore. Many had tried to contact her, but she choose not to. She isolated herself from everybody.

She was angry with her parents. It was their wish. She was not given a choice at all. Not once they asked for her concent. They had already agreed for the marriage when they told her. Just like that She was to be married off to some rich business tycoon from Mumbai who has seen her at a wedding and wanted to marry her. They didn't even ask her if she likes him or if she's ready to get married. All they kept saying was he's rich beyond anybody's comprehension and that he'll treat you like a queen. That I should be thanking my lucky stars. All they saw was the number of zeros in his bank balance. They were blind to her pain, her tears and turned a deaf ear to her innocent pleads. She saw him for the first time at the church.

He seemed like a kind person, but what stuck her was the fact that he looked old. Much older than her. Yet again they have decided She was going to play one of the lead roles, but decided to keep her in the dark. Only when the curtains opened she found out which part she had to play. Everything made sense to her. All the missing pieces of the puzzle fell in to place.

How her father suddenly got the biggest contract of his life, beating all the other tenders. The fact that she was never shown a picture or the fact that he didn't make an effort to meet her. With each step she took forward a little bit of her died. Little bit of her love and respect towards her parents died. They choose money and power over me, over my happiness. How can they do that to their own flesh and blood. Until that moment she believed that her parents loved both she and her younger sister the same regardless of what she felt and saw. But that moment proved she had been living a lie.

She was dressed in a beautiful Pure white Anna Singh wedding gown with a long trail. Her tear ridden face covered under the veil. She was shivering, not because it was cold, but sweating and shivering all at the same time. She's going to have to live with this stranger for the rest of her life from this day forward. How do you do that? How can one just adjust like that? She wished to be dead.

All her friends envied her. Her parents where beaming with false pride and misguided happiness. Everybody else but her seemed to be happy thinking that she was the most luckiest girl in all of Bangalore. It was supposed to be the happiest day of her life yet she was feeling as if she was being escorted to the gallows. The unknown frightened her. She was going through the rituals like a Zombie.

She walked down the isle with the ever so familiar sound, one which she's heard so many times in movies and in the tv. She too had fantasised about one day walking down the isle with her soul mate waiting with pride and love at the alter. Eager to start a new life together. But all that were fading away like stars before the sun. Today that same music that filled her heart with hope wrapped her with a feeling of melancholy. She felt she was at a funeral service. Her own.

There where gasps as she made her way towards the altar holding on to her fathers hand. She didn't know if she'll be able make it without fainting. It took all her energy to make sure she keeps taking one step after other.

I Astha Rose Kirloskar, take you Stanley James Almeida for my lawfully wedded Husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and health, until death do us part.

The last line brought her back to reality. Death did do us part.