Tales of SaiRat (Completed)

The Imminent Anniversaries_A SaiRat OS

Thump!

He pushed the door open hard out of excitement.

"Sai!" he shouted, his enthusiasm quite out-of-place in the gloomy room he'd just entered.

"Sai!" he began again, "See, since it's our first marriage anniversary in a couple of weeks' time, I thought-"

Before Virat could reveal what he thought, he noticed the contrast his mood inflicted upon the room, and the sniffs and abrupt sobs that echoed around.

He scanned the room; his wife was nowhere to be seen. He got tensed. He followed the sniffs and sobs to the balcony.

There she is, he sighed in relief, but relief turned into horror within moments.

There she was, sitting on a chair, clutching a photo frame to her chest. He knew it was her father's. Her long, jet-black locks were flowing in the slight breeze, but they weren't the only ones flowing tonight as the cool air blew upon them, tears were streaming down her face; and it was at that precise moment that he realised what was wrong, her father's imminent death anniversary.

He knew it must be really very hard for her, in ways words can't express, to remember what had happened an year ago. Her father had been her entire world. With his demise, her everything had been snatched away from her; happiness, freedom, peace of mind, the unconditional love and care. What not? A merely nineteen-year-old teenager was forced to marry a stranger, by people whom she called her well-wishers, just after the death of her father, who was everything she had. Then, forced to mingle with a family who never took her in as their own, til date, except some.

She had come a long way from then, he knew it. She had been very strong in the past year for a young girl whose world had been snatched away from her, never once breaking down, except once, when she had crossed lengths he had never imagined she would. She hadn't been anything to him besides his mentor's daughter and an unwanted responsibility when he had seen her lifeless body lying across the floor, blood oozing out of the wrist she had attempted to cut; yet there was that feeling that wouldn't bother to leave him, immense worry, regret, and impotence. The possibility of losing her piercing him. Ever since then, when he had seen her lying in a hospital bed beside him, he had sworn to never leave her again on her own, until she was strong enough to stand alone in this cruel world.

But fate had other plans, he had fallen in love with her. How, when, and why? He couldn't answer, he just had. Had it been because of her kind heart, or because of the love she showered upon everyone, or because of her care for him, or because of her deeds for the greater good of his family, or because of her sometimes silly, childish behaviour? He couldn't tell. One thing was certain, though, he wouldn't let her go now, that is, if she obliges. Her happiness was above his wishes.

He looked at the girl in front of him, the strong girl he had known never to break but once, it had never occurred to him she could also be as vulnerable as anyone else.

He walked towards her and sat beside her, and held her shaking shoulders.

"Sai..." he muttered as gently as he could, putting an arm around her shoulders. She turned and looked at him, helplessly, into his eyes, the tears threatening to flow once again. He held her face in his palms and wiped her tears.

"Sai... shh, calm down, I'm with you."

Call it his reassuring voice or her strong trust in him, but she did calm down, and suddenly his chest felt simultaneously heavy and light, respectively physically and figuratively. She had hugged him tight, crying away into his uniform. He wrapped his one arm around her, the other sliding past her hair.