She blinked before putting the jug on the table but her fingers stayed curled around its handle as his words unsettled her. She needed a moment to conceal that she was affected.
Ideally, she wasn't supposed to feel bad for the person who had made her feel bad about herself not once but numerous times but her heart - but her foolish heart stayed a rebel like always.
When had it listened to her before to listen to her now?
The disturbance on his face grew intense as he recalled the last conversation that he had with Dada.
"Dada…" His hesitant whisper somehow summoned the courage to escape his lips.
He stood several steps away from Dada whose back was facing him on the terrace. It was past midnight and Apurva's absence had got his heart a bit too unsettled to let him sleep.
He had walked to the terrace, hoping that standing under the sky might help him calm his distressed heart and caught Dada-Kaka's sight.
He was sure that Apurva's decision had upset Dada-Kaka. He began walking toward him and stopped when he was a couple of steps away. "Nobody seems to understand me but I am sure, you do… like always," he said but received no response from Dada-Kaka.
Dada-Kaka's silence was strangely unnerving. He hadn't expected it to knock on his door.
As anxiety seeped in, he almost rushed forward and stood beside Dada-Kaka. A strange fear had gripped his heart and all that he could desperately wish for was that it to be a false fear.
But the moment he looked at Dada-Kaka's poker face, he knew that he was losing it all. He had already lost Apurva and now… it seemed like he was losing his entire family.
"Dada… tumhala hi vaatey ki mi chukto aahe?"
"Ha prashna nirarthak aahe. Tu chukla aahes, Shashank."
"Pan Dada… Apurva -"
"Apurva kaay? Tine Netra la dhakal lay? Ti khota bolali? Kaay? Kaay Apurva kaay? Shashank, Netra la ya gharat rahu denyacha nirnay maza hota pan to nirnay mi gheu shaklo karan maza tyzyavar purna vishwas hota. Mala watla hota ki tu sagla sambhalu shakshil but paristhitina sambhalaycha sodun tu tyant adkat gelas. Baherchya lokanchya chukankade durlaksh karun aaplya mansana sambhalaycha sodun tu tya chukanvar vishwas theun swata chuka karat gelas. Shashank… aaplya bayko cha maan… tichi pratishtha japna he pratyek navryacha kartavya asta. Natyachya ya mahattvachya parikshet tu pass nahi hou shaklas. Tu Apurva la dukhvun mala dukhavla aahe aani tumchya naatyala harvun… mala harvala aahe!"
Those were the last words that he had heard from Dada-Kaka. That night, when he stared at the retreating back of Dada-Kaka, his whole body seemed to have frozen.
He couldn't move an inch. That night, he had stood on the terrace for hours.
For hours.
Recalling the awful situations that had knocked on the door of his and Apurva's relationship.
Recalling how he handled those situations.
Recalling every single word that he had ended up saying to Apurva while handling those situations.
For hours.
"Khadoos…"
Her voice brought him out of the moments that he was reliving. Confused, he raised a brow when he looked at the handkerchief that she was holding in front of him.
She gave him a long stare before she dropped the handkerchief on the bed, stepped forward and pressed her palms on his cheeks, wiping the tears that escaped his eyes with her thumbs.
It was then he realized that he had been crying. He was so consumed by the moment that he was thinking about that he had no realization when his eyes moistened and a stream of tears rolled down his cheeks.
He looked at her hands scooping his cheeks in them before he lifted his gaze at her. Her orbs held what he hadn't expected to come across. A deep anguish.
Her eyes had always been the transparent window to her heart. He wasn't quite sure if her eyes spoke to everyone the way they spoke to him.
Her heart ached to see his pain and she could not hide it from him.
She wasn't prepared to bear what he had just revealed but she had to, nonetheless. Swallowing the lump clogging her throat, she wiped his cheeks dry for yet another time before settling on the bed across him.
Picking the plate, she placed it between them. Breaking a small piece of roti, she dipped it in the dal.
She lifted the morsel to his mouth. Emotionally too exhausted to resist, he quietly had it. One after the other - she kept feeding and he kept eating like an obedient child.
"What is it?" she asked when he held her hand that was about to put yet another morsel in his mouth.
"Did you eat?"
Oh, so it was that! She gave him a nod. "What did you think? I was going to abandon food and sleep because of you? In your dreams, Khadoos! I ate and I ate a lot. Now stop thinking about stupid things and just eat, okay?"
A part of him was relieved that she had not skipped her meals.
"Appu… Appu Bala, thodasa khaun ghe na. Sakal pasun kahich khalla nahi -" Sarika's words died in the air as she reached the open door of Apurva’s room and her eyes caught the sight in her room. "Shashank," she murmured, giving him a small smile. She was quick to realize that she needed to leave and she did so, wordlessly.
Atti pan na! Apurva turned her head aside, shutting her eyes. She had been so awfully exposed that she had no idea how to escape his confronting gaze that she was sure was glaring at her at the moment.
She tried her hardest to come up with an excuse but her brain seemed too blank to think of anything.
Her chain of thoughts broke when she felt him squeezing her hand.
Now he will taunt me. She braced herself to get embarrassed at her lie that had just made her fall flat on her face in front of him.
She inhaled a deep breath before she turned to him and opened her mouth to start with her defense before he could start with his taunts but sat, absolutely taken aback, when he put a spoonful of rice mixed with sabzi in her mouth.
Her widened eyes stared at him who just gave her a small smile and spoke not a single word but chose to quietly continue feeding her while she sat too stunned to form a response.
Edited by IAdoreYou - 3 years ago
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Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
