SS: Dear Diary... Part 14 Upd 11/30 Pg 66

She sat down on the four-poster bed, the netted canopy drawn up and tied with a draw string, where she'd slept the night. It felt like a dream to have spent the waking hours of the day at Hoshiarpur and to have fallen asleep in Delhi, notably in a place that was as new to her as was the relationship she was in. She was Geet Singh Khurana that morning, forcefully having to leave behind the only surname she'd had all her life - after he'd gotten up from the mandap and tied the mangalsutra around her neck. And beyond that moment, even her name didn't own up to the familiarity she'd seldom noticed in the times she'd carried it. Everything had changed since then...including his life.

Now she knew he'd never been convinced to marry Channi, to start with, after that fateful kiss at the dining table. Of course it had been her parents and Daarji explaining her recklessness and confusing act to him and his Daadima, coming up with inane reasons as they often had to in her case. She'd been locked up in her room for the next five days, until the actual hour of the wedding. Nevertheless, when she'd shown up in a pink Patiala suit and heavy kundan lining her neck, he'd shot one look at her and in the next few minutes her identity as a Handa had ended forever.

Though she'd felt absolved for the heinous crime of kissing her brother-in...Well now he was her husband and no longer a favored suitor for Channi; the realization that sunk in, made her feel like brittle caramel, ready to crack with one more instigation about her having caused shame to her family, in ways beyond repair. In actuality, the need to rescue her sister had left her mind, long after she'd stared at the four walls for five continuous days, only getting a glimpse of the hallway outside bustling with marriage preparations, when Daarji himself opened the door to slide in her meals. But no one had known that when she'd entered the wedding arena, giggling and laughing mightily to the games her cousins had played on him, while she'd been locked away. How would she prove that she'd resigned to the play of fate in her sister's life?

She'd been in shock for the next few hours and he'd come to her rescue, every time her own family had raised a finger at her. It hadn't been until they'd exited the car and she'd stood at the entrance of the mansion, she could carry out instructions, without having to be told twice. She didn't know what Daadima thought of her, for she still hadn't gotten a chance to explain herself to anyone...not even to him. He'd been in the same room with her last night. In fact, they had slept on the same bed, but he'd remained withdrawn and pensive the few moments they had been alone. By the time she'd worked up the nerve to talk to him, he'd already drifted deep into his sleep. It was only expected, when he'd done her share of defending at the wedding and had maintained nothing short of it with his Daadima on their drive back to Delhi. She'd watched him sleep still as a rock beside her, with the faint sound of his breathing breaking the thick silence of a wall that lay between them.

It occurred to her, as she sat running the towel down her hair, that despite the fact he hadn't yet spoken one word to her, justifying marrying her without so much as her permission, he hadn't shown any trace of guilt in his eyes. If anything he'd plumped up the pillow next to her and laid there, without the necessary theatrics that men pulled on their newly wedded wives at such situations, which was to show up late for bed and taking the pillow and covers away to seek another sleeping arrangement, anywhere but on the same bed.

What bothered her most was what he would have made of that mindless kiss. She couldn't bear to have him attach any meaning to it. He certainly didn't come across to her as nave to assume that she'd kissed him out of a charged attraction. Oh! Babaji...what if he did? And her hand rose up to touch her lips where she felt numb suddenly; her breath caught in her lungs as she relived those seconds she'd brushed her lips against his. 

She didn't know how long she sat there, counting the repercussions of that night almost a week ago, while a few of her fingers continued to linger on her lower lip, that when she looked up from the ground, she found him leaning in the far corner of the room, studying her with an intensity that prickled her skin, once she regained her awareness.

"There was something about that kiss...wasn't it?" He said thoughtfully, making her fears come alive through his words; giving voice to them in a way that made it more real than the cold floor she jumped on.