ArHi: Starlight and Moonshine: #16, Pg 54, 29 July

01: Ashwini: The horse woman

Thirty years ago:

"It was a mistake Garima." Surya is distraught. Garima glares at her best friend's husband.

"You had an affair for the entirety of your marriage Surya. For three long years." Garima bites out in anger. Surya looks momentarily ashamed but he bounces back quickly.

"It didn't mean anything Garima. Sanjana knows that." He holds his head in his hands and begs for some reprieve from the pain that is cyclically ripping his skin and stitching back up.

Garima looks at him coldly. "I am angry at you for both my best friend's sake and also on behalf of the woman who you were screwing behind your wife's back. Taking a f**king stand Surya."

Garima doesn't miss the flash of annoyance that crosses Surya's face. She knows him. Has known him for years, as long as her best friend, his wife has known him. She knows he an asshole with no moral compass. Sanjana thinks Garima has outdated set of morals.

"Who is the woman?" Garima asks when Surya simmers in his chair. Surya avoids looking at Garima and shrugs carelessly.

"It doesn't matter G. I have ended things with her. Besides, it's none of your f**king business." Surya almost yells. Garima watches him through the thick of her eyelashes, maintaining a stoic interface. "And for her sake, I won't tell you who it is."

"Do I know this other woman then?" Garima asks, narrowing her eyes. She gets another disingenuous careless shrug as a response. She wants to throttle him.

"Is Sanjana okay? I want to fix things with her G. I may have had an affair. But I always I came home. Home to Sanjana, my wife." Surya rationalizes.

Garima screams into a throw pillow and when that isn't enough to shroud her rage, she throws it at Surya's head. "You are such a f**king asshole. You slept with someone else and you have no idea the extent of damage you have caused on your wife. She is betrayed by your choices, you asshole. She wants to hate you but you are her first and only love. She is confused and she doesn't want to see you."

Surya hangs his head and doesn't reply for a long moment. "I don't know why you did that Surya." He looks up when he hears another voice near him. He knows that voice. He loves that voice. He has made that voice yell in happiness, scream in pleasure and now its desperate in misery. He did that. He hates himself for making the gentle voice hoarse.

"Sanjana." He stammers.

"What are you doing?" Surya hears Garima hissing to her friend. He is oblivious to the whispers of the two women. He is twirling the tail of his wife's sari and has no plans of letting go.

"Let's go home," he hears her say.

"Are you forgiving me?" He is surprised.

She smiles weakly at him. "Not yet. Someday, maybe."

Hope clutches his chest and squeezes painfully. "I can live with that."

Sanjana and Surya go back to their home much to Garima's displeasure. "He is sorry for getting caught Sanjana, not for the affair." To which Sanjana had responded - We will figure it out.

Garima had given up trying to understand Surya's philandering ways and Sanjana's It will all get better mentality.

A year later Garima was holding her god children in her arms. The twins - Arnav and Anjali as the new parents Sanjana and Surya proudly looked on.