Beauty and the Beast

8

Chenchita rested in over her bed and stared into the sky and looked at the moon.

Moon had always looked the same yet, for the first time, she felt like she hated the moon. The rays emitting out of the moon almost felt like it burnt her skin.

The face didn't disappear from her mind. It kept haunting her, keeping her awake.

"Haven't slept yet?" Taranga came in.

"Couldn't sleep. You sleep. I'm sure you're tired." She insisted. Taranga smiled at her daughter.

"Since when did you start keeping things to yourself? You'd be more than excited to keep me up with a lot of talking and suddenly you'd be on your own?" Taranga chuckled, "what is bothering you?"

Chenchita took a few breaths. "It is not really something that important. Just me being a bit crazy."

"It is alright tell me."

"I just can't sleep. I don't why I feel restless."

"Most of the times, we know the answer, we just try to deny it. Maybe you know too but are just not ready to accept it."

Chenchita stayed silent. Sure, her mother was. She knew who was consuming her thoughts and mind, she just refused to accept it. It was the odd feeling that why did she feel all sorts of feelings for someone she's never before. No matter how many times she sees him, it seems like she never had enough.

Sure, she had never been taught any of the Vedas or anything. She did know that Shiva and Vishnu were said to be even above the deities they prayed to. She's come across some of their devotees.

Vishnu.

She had heard of him before. Even the curiousity filled her to find out about him. She had tried to talk about him with the people who came to forests on behalf of the King to collect forest products. Though even they didn't know much.

"What happened?" Taranga asked her, sitting next to her on the bed. "Oddly staring ahead into the sky and the moon. If I didn't know that you never really have interest in men, I'd have said you were in love..."

"Amma, you didn't know nanna before you married him then how did you grow to be so close to him?"

She chuckled. "That is how marriage works, Chenchita. They are meant to bring two unknown people together."

"But it would have taken a long time, wouldn't have? It can't be possible that in a few days you grow really close to him."

Taranga thought for a moment. "Who is to say that love takes years or months. Lucky are people who find true love quickly. Like I have. I didn't know your father before but it didn't long for us to grow close to each other."

Chenchita looked to the sky. The memory of him fighting the asuras played over in the sky. He was pretty. The human form of his which she had a small flash of. No man ever seemed so pretty before.

Just the scent which comes from him could disturb the train of his thoughts. The way he looked when he told her to wait for a few moments longer. He just kept looking at her even when she was leaving.

"Your father has been worrying about you lately, Chenchita. You've been rather off all the time. Not even eating food properly. Not really paying attention to what you're doing. You almost got attacked by the deers. That never happened before."

"It is just-" Her eyes fell on the largest winged guy appeared by the lands. Garuda. That was his name.

Chenchita took off running towards Garuda with Taranga calling her from behind. Her father, Sagar, reached there. The tribe gathered around him, pointing the spears at him.