Everything Hits Home
Tere Dukh Ab Mere, Mere Sukh Ab Tere
Tere Ye Do Naina, Chand Aur Suraj Mere
- Tere Mere Sapne, Guide
He reaches home after battling the worst of traffic. It is one of the heaviest rains of the season and coupled with Delhi' crazy traffic jams it has made his already foul mood even worse. Mihir, Neil and Romi are at his side and have been at the receiving end of their brother' barbed comments.
They take it all silently though, know he is overflowing with tension because of the work but it is Ishita he is the most worried about.
The woman they admire is in trouble, deep trouble and nothing could have spelled the love their brother feels for them like his anger does these days; knowing him like they do, they are well aware Raman would not easily admit it in the plainest of words how he feels for Ishita, but they see it, see it all. His concern, his care, his anger all of it - their brother may not admit it to them or perhaps even himself or their Bhabhi but they see he has fallen hard - hook, line and sinker for their bhabhi.
It does not take a genius to figure out he is crazy about her.
And they know this time, the woman on the receiving end of their brother' affections more than deserves being the apple of their brother' eye. They have seen Raman be head over heels in love with a woman who never understood or cared for his love; and when betrayed they have seen how it shattered him. That woman though was never worthy of any love, least of all adoration - but Ishita, they know she is what their brother needed. The change in his life, the way he has become a happier, relaxed person after their marriage, it is all due to her, her presence.
They know they owe the happiness of a brother they worship to a woman they barely got acquainted with a few months ago and in her hour of need, they are standing tall with her.
Having finally discarded his drenched coat they see their brother head to his bedroom as Neelu brings them towels to dry themselves when Raman barges out of the room again heading straight towards his mother,
"Maa where is Ishita?"
"She must be at her mother' beta, Ruhi went there to play with Shravan she must have gone to them. Do you need anything; I can get it for you."
"No Maa, its ok I need to talk to Ishita that's all."
"Change your clothes Raman you are soaked."
"I'll be back in a minute Maa."
He does not stand to talk any further and heads straight to his in-laws to see his wife. She is tensed and the last time he called her two hours ago, her mood had not improved in any way. They have learned it is Ashok and his brother who have unceremoniously targeted her; Suraj' arrogance has been fueled by Ashok' hatred for him. His wife unnecessarily became the part of a war that was never hers to begin with.
He is trying his best to help her but knows with each day Ishita is losing her morale more and more.
She is the strongest, most patient, kindest and loving person he has known and it kills him to see her in despair. He cannot regret defending her that day at the clinic but he so wishes he could change things now, if not for them she would never have been in this pain, in this trouble in the first place.
He walks in to see Amma crying, Appa, Bala, Vandita and Mihika trying their best to console her. Ruhi and Shravan in their blissful childhood ignorance are playing in the next room and he hears Ruhi yelling she won.
His eager eyes scour for his wife but do not find her anywhere; something has been bothering him since the evening. He cannot put it into words but he has been anxious to get a glimpse of Ishita, he wanted to have a look at her to calm his raging mind and restless heart.
"Bala where is Ishita?" He finally voices when he cannot help himself.
The gathered party notices him for the first time and his brother -in-law answers.
"Raman, when did you come and Ishu... she, she has been gone for a while now isn't she at your home?"
"No, she isn't that's why I came here."
"Muruga, Ishu my Ishu... oh god..."Amma pipes in.
He marches towards his frightened mother-in-law and lays a comforting hand on her shoulder,
"Amma relax, she might have went to get something don't worry."
Taking his cell phone out of his pocket, he dials his wife' number only the call goes answered.
Everyone looks apprehensively at him and his panic cannot get the best of him, he cannot let Amma, who recently suffered from a major accident get any stress. He is thinking how to answer why Ishita is not picking up his phone when his mother walks in.
"Raman, Ishita has left her phone at home."
He swallows a gulp and turns to his in-laws, shaking his head he replies with a smile,
"Your daughter Appa I tell you, when she will learn a phone is meant to be used; a mobile to be carried on you always. Don't worry Amma the moment she comes back I would send her to you for a sound scolding."
He leaves the room and is out of the home, immediately shadowed by Mihir, Romi, Neil and Bala. The five assemble in the staircase when he stops and turns around to address them.
"We have to look for Ishita, she is so disturbed." He orders them.
"Bhai you think Bhabhi..." Romi innocently pipes in but never gets a chance to finish his sentence.
"Shut up, she is alright. Ishita would not ever dare do something, anything like that. She is a fighter, I know my wife."
"Sorry bhai." His brother apologizes sheepishly.
He is about to give a sound scolding for even thinking something on those lines to Romi when Bala keeps a hand on his shoulder and he notices his mother, Vandita and Mihika standing in the corridor.
"Jiju Akka wouldn't be in any trouble, we should find her soon though, I'll come with you."
"Mihika no, let us leave Amma would get suspicious if all of us disappear and we can't have her tensed. You and Vandita head back, the five of us would look for Ishita, tell Amma I took Bala with me to discuss something about Adi and his exams for a while."
He can see his feisty sister-in-law wants to protest when Vandita calmly agrees with him in a nod and signals her younger sister to do as asked as they head back.
They are soon in the parking area of their building' complex and have locations to scour assigned to them by Raman.
An hour later, none of them has still located Ishita and he is panicking by the second when he finally has an epiphany.
He heads down the street towards a park she frequents with Ruhi and calls the others to inform them of the same.
He finally spots a lone figure in the dark sitting alone in the middle of a torrential downpour on the swing set.
He might not be able to see her clearly but he recognizes the hunched figure of his wife in the dark. The outlines of her soaking form as she sits still, so still head resting against the chain holding up one end of the swing as her hand coiled around it.
Unable to contain his relief but powerless to hold back his anger he marches towards her two steps at a time, when he is finally in front of her he stops and roars,
"Are you crazy? Have you any idea how scared everyone has been? We have been looking for you for almost an hour now, an hour Ishita."
His wife snaps out of her reverie at the sudden arrival and outburst of her husband.
"Raman..."
She looks dazed at best as she gets up from the swings.
"What are you talking about Raman?"
"Do you even realize how long you have been gone?" He asks her still infuriated.
She looks around still dazed unable to think anything.
"I have been looking for an hour for you now and you have been gone longer you stupid woman, everyone is out there looking for you."
"I didn't realize..." She says in a small voice.
Over the roar of the thunder, he is unable to hear her though,
"What?"
"I said... I didn't realize how long I had been gone."
"You seriously are so foolish; here we all have been going stir-crazy looking for you all over Delhi, Mihir, Romi, Bala, Neil all of them have been scouring the streets of Delhi with me for so long now."
"I didn't mean to harass anyone."
"Then what was the idea of coming here in the middle of such a heavy rain? Why did you leave home at all? If you were the least bit bothered about everyone you would have at least informed someone, anyone at home you are leaving, where you are going, how long you will be gone but all you were thinking about is yourself. Did you not think for a moment that everyone will be so scared to find you gone and your mobile left at home?"
"I just wanted to get away for a while!" She exclaims finally, her anger, her frustration bursting forth at last... things she has been holding back for days on end now.
"You could have gone anywhere for all I care but you shouldn't have left without informing."
"I know you don't care okay, and I am fine with it... I wasn't thinking when I left."
"When do you ever think?"
"These days I don't, my mind has stopped working okay?"
"Was it ever working at all in the first place?"
"Perfectly until this notice came along damn it! Do you even realize Raman my practice, my career- everything I worked for so hard in my life it all is going down a drain and here I am helpless, watching it all getting destroyed... do you know what it feels like? No you don't, so don't you dare yell at me today."
"Just because you are tensed doesn't mean you are free to behave this way Ishita." He finally says a bit calmer, understanding where his wife is coming from and realizing she needs his support and not anger now.
"Don't you think I know that? However, I needed to get away for a while Raman. Everyone is worried sick about me, all the time that is all everyone is talking about and I got tired of it... I just wanted to breathe freely for a while."
"Being careless is inexcusable Ishita!"
"I am not careless!"
It is when she yells at him that he realizes his folly. The word careless' is the bane of his wife' existence currently.
"Okay... I should not have said that. But we have been looking for you like crazy do you get that?"
"I do alright, I do...but I can't lose my practice Raman I can't."
"You won't Ishita."
"How can you know that Raman how can you be sure? Do you realize what a mess I am in, I worked so hard to get where I did, and it means everything to me. My career, my reputation, my image, all the hard work that I put in to get here would be gone in a second if I am unable to prove that man lied. Amma appa you don't know how much they have slogged to get me here, Appa worked overtime to pay my fees, Amma would take care of things for me, my studies, ensure I eat and this man would ruin it in a moment all those years that have went into making me who I became."
"I am not a doctor Ishita but I understand okay? I did not get my MBA out of thin air; I had to work hard for it too so I know what it means to work hard for your career."
She finally goes weak in the knees and sinks back on the swing set she had been sitting on before she begins,
"It is all that Raman and so much more... my work it ... how can I even explain it to you. How do I let you know what it did for me? How much I am indebted to it... you make fun of it all the time, ridicule it as a miniscule job but for me it means the world... I do not make millions with what I do Raman, but what I got from my work it is priceless to me."
"I know Ishita..."
"No you don't, you don't because you weren't there then... My work... it saved me Raman, it healed me, it became my solace, my refuge, my therapy when I was at my worst, at my lowest. You do not know how much I needed it when Subu broke our engagement. Things back then were not any different from what they are now; in fact, they were worse... Amma would cry all day because my engagement broke. Appa just got quieter and as much as I love my parents I could not stand to be around them then, all I could think was they are desolate because of me, all I could think was if it weren't for me they wouldn't be suffering so much."
The declaration takes him off-guard...he knew his wife was as much of a workaholic as he is, but...this is the first time he heard her confess what strangely reminds him of an era of his own life, his own reflection seems to be staring back at him in the words she pours out.
"You don't know what it was back then Raman, I know you may think it's not much of a work, but doing what I did, I do... I was helping people, healing them, lessening someone' pain no matter how trivial it may be according to you and that healed me. It made me feel better. Those few hours away from home I was Dr. Ishita, only Dr. Ishita and no one else, I could forget my own life, my issues, my pain everything because I had no time to focus on myself. My work, my studies they kept me sane Raman, when nothing else made sense to me... my work was the only thing I found my relief in.
Subu made me feel I wasn't good enough for him after twelve years of courtship, his betrayal made me feel I am an awful daughter because my parents suffered as I fell in love with a man who couldn't stand by me when I most needed him... I felt I ... my work was the only thing that made me feel I am good at something, that I at least have one thing in my life where I haven't failed, haven't let down anyone and here this man claims I am a negligent, careless doctor."
"Ishita..."
He says her name but his wife does not seem to have heard it, she is in some sort of trance, pouring her heart out to him.
"Until Ruhi came... my work was the only good thing in my life for so long Raman, the only good thing. I had all but figured that I would never marry, not because Subu broke my heart, but because if he could not stand by me... I figured no man would. I had decided I would work and adopt a child I would raise as my own, that's all my life had came down too... now I have Ruhi, but I still need my work. I can't be without it."
It seems she is done when she starts crying bitterly, when he finally snaps into action.
Hearing the words he has today...he sees in a new light how very much his wife has suffered, he admires her courage to battle through a phase of her life, he very well understands as well as finds his heart breaking for her.
Without realizing what he is doing, without thinking about his actions anymore he nears her and sinks to his knees in front of her as he holds her face in his hands, and makes her look him in the eye.
"Ishita, look at me... I ... I understand what you must be going through okay. I know now what your work means to you... I do, more than I can explain... my work... it means as much to me and I promise you we would fight to the end, we would not let your practice be shut."
"I am scared Raman, I am so scared." She whispers to him in the smallest of voice, something in his eyes giving her the courage to say the words that finally break free from within her heart.
He pulls her into a hug unable to see her in pain and tears and running a gentle hand over the back of her head gently assures her,
"I know ishita, I know and I promise to you it will be fine. It will all be ok."
She merely continues sobbing in her husband' arms when he asks her in the gentlest voice,
"You trust me don't you? You know I keep my promises Ishita?"
Unable to find her voice she merely nods her head in a reply.
"Then leave it all to me, I would not rest until this thing is over... I would make sure of it that man would pay for this. We would get through this Ishita, we would get through this."
"I have never been this scared Raman." She admits to him, her voice muffled by the sounds of the rain, her face still nuzzled in the crook of his neck.
"Hey, I am with you, aren't I and the strongest woman I know, come on, she can't lose that easy."
She finally laughs hiding her face in his shoulder.
Something about the moment, the fact that they are holding each other for the first time without any pretence, or sans the need to put up a show for their daughter has him acting on a whim he cannot quite understand himself as he turns around his head and gently kisses her temple.
With the act, they grow still for a while before she finally breaks herself free from his arms unable to meet his eyes.
He looks at her expecting some reaction, any for his impudence but all he can see is his wife' eyes are downcast and there is a sudden blush coloring her cheeks. The moment charged up as silence settles in between them.
She is suddenly fidgety and it makes him let out a breath as he rises to his feet and extends a hand to her,
"Come on you are shivering, and I am not getting any drier before we both get sick and our families go crazy taking care of the two of us we better get home."
Hesitantly she looks up at him as slowly she takes his hand and gets up from the swings to head back home with her husband.
They make their way home in silence unaware that their exchange had witnesses.
Amidst one of the hardest times they have faced, four men looked upon the duo they love immensely and exchange small smiles on their faces, happy for the couple that departed the park unaware of their presence, happy that they have at last found the love they both so needed and deserved in each other.
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