Dear kids,
I don't know if I'll be able to tell you someday, how I and your mother 'happened' as she puts it. The best way to communicate it seems to be through a letter.
Tonight, I came home to find your mother on the sofa, wearing her old pyjamas and watching reruns of a soap opera. Now, kids, this was unprecedented. Your mother is the acting head of Special Squad, an elite investigative agency. She is a reputed forensic expert and he conducted more autopsies than you'd care to count. Back to the issue – she was watching an English soap titled 'How I met your mother'. It's about a man who tells the story of how he met his wife, to his children.
Deepika turned to me and said nonchalantly, "You should write a letter to our children, Aaryan." Her command, is well, my command. She's the boss after all.
Long before I met you mother, I was once married to a wonderful woman. You also had a sister, Pallavi. Niharika – my wife, and Pallavi – our daughter were the centre of my universe. We were a small happy family. After a long day in Special Squad, I reached home, expecting dinner with Niharika and Pallavi, listening to her rambles and telling her a good night story that I'd promised her.
Instead, I reached home to an empty house and my dead family. I can't put the sorrow in words, kids. It destroyed me. One day, I was a normal family man who found the world in his daughter's eyes. The next day, my world had been destroyed and it turned me into the shell of a man I once was. I turned into a consummate workaholic.
They were the victims of a serial killer, who remains still at large. It is the only unsolved case in my career.
I was counseled by friends and colleagues who supported me during the worst time of my life. Special Squad became home, and the team, my family. Down the years, I started healing, but I was still a workaholic. I fell in love with someone from the team. She chose to leave Special Squad to devote more time to her son. I was back to square one.
Somewhere between falling in love with that woman and her leaving the team, I met your mother.
And what a meeting that was! There were blazing fireworks, angry, aggressive words and sulky moods – the whole team disliked her. She was an authoritarian – the likes of which we had never seen before. We were a slack lot, bent on solving cases than sticking to procedure. Deepika made rules – we found loopholes. She banned us from solving current cases – we sneaked around behind her back.
But between the evading of rules and carrying out our jobs secretly, she became my friend. She was the one who made me realize that I felt more than comradeship about the woman I eventually fell in love with. Looking back, I understand the friendship I had found was precious. No one else could read behind the lines and people's actions as good as her.
She was the only one who could truly understand me. Still is.
Your mother would never admit it, but I have 'influenced' her to throw the rulebook out of the window once in the blue moon. She'll shrug it off as 'due to Aaryan's passion' like she did then.
But I know better. She had begun to feel for me.
I can't honestly say that I too had fallen for her. In the course of our work, she had been kidnapped by a terrorist who wanted to extol his revenge on me, as I'd been involved in an operation against him long back. It was then I felt a strong stirring of protectiveness – I wasn't going to let what befell Niharika and Pallavi befall her. I had to save her at all costs.
Though my feelings towards her changed gradually from then on, I wasn't ever going to accept them. But something happened that changed our lives forever.
All your life, kids, you'll be surrounded by family, friends and acquaintances. But the ones you remember in your dire need are the ones closest to your heart.
Our team had been assigned to escort a lead witness against a notorious don, Anna Kadtus from Rajapur to Mumbai. The mission will be the story for another day, but suffice to say, we found ourselves embroiled in a furious shootout, just outside the jungles of Rajapur.
Anna Kadtus had captured Deepika and the reinforcements she'd been brining from Mumbai. Seeing your mother held hostage by Anna Kadtus awoke those dormant feelings I'd been denying for days. I don't remember much of what transpired, but your mother tells me that we shot down many gangsters, including Anna Kadtus. I however, received a bullet in my gut- my passport to heaven.
I remember lying on the grass, holding Deepika's hand. They say your entire life flashes before your eyes when you die. It's true. I saw every moment that I had cherished – with Niharika and Pallavi, with the woman I'd been in love with…and Deepika.
I spent the next week in and out of consciousness, surprised to be 'back' per say. The only question I kept asking myself was, 'Why did I hold Deepika's hand?'
There was Neha, who's like a sister to me, Ajay and Boxer – two irascible younger brother and Shotgun the reliant, but it had to be Deepika whom I had to look my heart's fill with, when I thought I was going to die.
Would I have turned to the woman I used to love, had she been in Special Squad? I don't know. Why Deepika? - The question kept me awake thorough long nights, echoing in my morphine addled brain. The answer was so simple, yet so difficult.
The answer came to me on a pensive evening. Deeika used to visit me often after the other would've left because she had to stay back at the office to finish her work, as well as mine. Deepika had come to visit me in the hospital while I was recovering. She wheeled me outside, in the garden to catch the last rays of the disappearing sun. I sat on the wheelchair and she on a stone bench by my side. Her face looked gaunt, tired like she hadn't slept for weeks.
But when she looked at me, her face illuminated by the golden sun and her reticent eyes sparkling in their depths – so many emotions, so much pain…
It was like the dark clouds in my mind had dissipated by the sun of realization – by heavens above; I was in love with her!
The moment, I realized it; we became equals in life, partners for all eternity.
Kids, the moment you realize that you love someone, don't hesitate to tell them. It might save you a lot of pain.
The next months were some of the most beautiful in my life. Deepika visited daily and we talked for hours on, about everything under the sun. I knew each passing day; I was falling deeper into the abyss of her love.
I didn't propose. I tried a lot, but at the precise moment, words would fail and I'd lose my nerve. It was Deepika who called off the stalemate.
We had been solving a case where, I had, let's say bent some rules. Moreover, we had had a brief physical struggle with the criminal, resulting into a couple of loose shots. Deepika had given me such a hiding that my ears rang. She was literally steaming from her ears and was inexplicably angry.
As was her custom, she stalked off into the pantry, driving out the rest of the staff. Neha prodded and poked me till I stepped through the door. To this day, I'm glad that I did.
Deepika stood near a table, caressing a glass of orange juice. I reached for the coffee, but she gave me a nasty look. I tried to reason with her, (about the case, not the coffee) but she was adamant.
Casually, I said, "At max, it'd have taken a bullet or two, that's all."
Crack.
That was the first time your mother slapped me. Her eyes blazing pools of bronze, she thundered, "Never say that again Aaryan. Never."
I was left open mouthed. "But Deepika I-"
Crack.
Another slap. I watched her in bizarre fascination. She was pissed off, her hair was awry, her clothes askew and her eyes were searing with strong, unknown emotions. She'd never been this beautiful.
"I love you Aaryan Khanna and I'll not have you talking that way."
If I have to culminate my entire life into a single moment, it'd have to be that. Deepika has never ceased to surprise me. After that heated confession, she walked away as if we'd just chatted about the weather or the rising prices of onions. I'm known for my bad timing at romance, but that wasn't a moment I let my worries, fear and insecurities dictate my actions in love. I grabbed her hand and proceeded to make her mine.
Let that be a lesson for you, kids. Never let your fears dictate your actions in love.
Needless to say, we got married. I proposed this time. We'd been sitting in our cabin after a harrowing day in the office. The rest of the team had called it a day. I don't know what came over me, but I sank on my knees in front of her and said, "Marry me."
Her glass of juice went flying. The next day, the cleaners had to wipe orange juice from out glass walls.
We have been married for about two years now, as I write you this. Due to my penchant for riding in trouble, Deepika feels that this will be effective to temper me.
I hope you find someone just like I did. It may not work out the first time, but it'll in the end.
Whatever you do, be passionate about it. And always, always trust you gut. (And your heart and brain, adds Deepika.)
So when your mother turned to me earlier this evening and asked me to write this out, I was confused. I'm not known for my great writing skills, then why would she ask me to do this?
She looked at me, and then at the TV and me again. Something was different.
"We're going to have children, you know, who'd like to know how we 'happened'," she announced. I couldn't be happier at this moment. Deepika says you are still seven months away but just the knowledge of your arrival sends me into tizzies of pleasure.
Hence this whole project of 'our story'. I know I'll be telling you this all one day, but this is my pre-birth gift, just for you, so that you'll know how I and your mother 'happened'.
Your Father
(Aaryan Khanna)
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