Falling In Love With You

Chapter - 22

The late night cold breeze drifted into the living room through the floor length windows causing the hair on Vasudha's skin to stand on end. A shiver ran up her spine but she couldn't determine whether it was due to the cold air or due to what happened between her and her husband a mere minutes before. She remained frozen in her place not knowing what to do and how to come in terms with her conflicting emotions towards her husband. She raised her hand to touch the spot where her husband's lips touched her cheek , her skin tingled from the memory of his kiss and even after his departure she could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin , his voice when he called her 'Ammadi' and without she even realising it , heat crept up her face making her blush with a smile that curved up her lips. But then suddenly she remembered her husband's face , the strong set of his jaw, the anger that she witnessed in his eyes upon seeing her hand , the compassion she sensed in his voice and the hurt in his voice when she tried to shut him out by going away from him, stirred something deep in her heart... Something that she suppressed so deep in her heart so that it wouldn't have a chance to resurface , something that she tried desperately to forget but failed miserably for many years. But then again she forced down those brimming memories to spill out from her heart . She remained rooted in her place like a statue for a few minutes elapsing to a state of numbness towards her surroundings.
Never in her life did Vasudha think that there would come a day where someone would come to know of her pain. She didn't like herself when she pleaded desperately in front of someone whom she never in the life of her wanted to see her bruises. Vasudha couldn't forgive herself for letting the other person know of her emotional state or of her physical injuries. She chided herself mentally for being a weakling in front of her husband , of all the people in the world .
   ' Yeh kya kardi tumne Vasudha? Itni si dard seh nahi sakti tum? Bas dard se chillana hi bakhi reh gayi thi ! Unhe pata chala hoga ki tum ek tootee hui aurat ho ...Kam se kam apne shakl toh seedha rakhti ,tab unhe pata bhi nahi hota ki tera sath kya hua hai...! Par nahi tujhe toh dimaag bhi kaam karna bandh kar dega jab tum unke samne kadi hoti! Pagal ho tum Vasudha, jo tumne inse shaadi karne ke liye raazi hui! (What have you done , Vasudha?! Why couldn't you endure even this small pain? Only screaming on top of your lungs remained left out! He would have realised that you're a broken woman ... You should have kept your face stoic ,atleast then he couldn't have come to know of what happened to you. But no .... You wouldn't do anything because your damn mind doesn't work when you are with him! You know what ...You are stupid! You are truly an idiot ,for you accepted to get married to him out of all other guys in the world.) Vasudha chided herself .
          Thinking about everything that happened between them in the past forty eight hours , especially those moments that transpired between them a few minutes ago , Vasudha exhaled a long breath and slowly walked towards her bedroom. She went straight to her bathroom and splashed a few handfuls of cold water on her face. Taking the dry towel from the bathroom hanger , she wiped her face and came out into her bedroom. The french windows in her room were open , the midnight breeze that gently drifted into the room caused the window curtains to sway to its rhythm. Vasudha neared her dressing table and sat in the chair placed in front of the dressing table mirror , for a few seconds she simply sat in her chair and stared at herself in the mirror . Although her eyes were focussed on the mirror her mind fought with herself whether to do the one thing that her heart desperately wanted to do , atlast her heart won and with great hesitancy she lifted her sleeve with her trembling hand and saw what Pallavan had seen on her arm. For the last few months she had observed the various stages of her wound, starting from its gaping flesh with the blood crusted around the edges and the infection that made it even worse and the pain it gave her. And then over the months the infection subsided slowly with the wound turning bright red with a grainy appearance forming over the gaping wound. Even though the wound almost got healed, now looking through Pallavan's eyes , the bruise that stared back at her terrified her to say the least. The bluish black blemish was in stark contrast to her fair skin , the blood clot beneath the thin layer of her skin around the edges of each of the thin lacerations now seemed sickening even to herself.
However Vasudha let go of her sleeve , she raised both her hands to unbraid her hair mechanically ,while her mind thought back to the days when her Amma would oil her hair , braid it and tell her how beautiful she looked even with a simple braid. She caressed her now unbraided thick mane that fell on her lap and untangled the few knotted strands of her hair , slowly with her fingers. She brushed her hair gently , her hair neither belonged to the straight category nor did it belong to the curly hair category but belonged in between the two. She had always complained about this to her Amma when she was a little girl but her Amma had always said that she was beautiful the way she was.
Thinking back to those years , when she didn't know anything about grief , despair , pain and when she didn't even know the agony that a heartbreak could cause , brought tears to her eyes. She started to tremble viscerally , a whimper escaped from the depths of her throat and that transformed into uncontrollable sobs , tears flowed down her cheeks and drenched her T-shirt. Vasudha gasped for air and she started hiccuping due to the vigorous cries , she covered her mouth with both her hands and tamped down her sobs forcefully. After a few minutes of fighting desperately for control , Vasudha barely reached her normal self , she gazed at herself in the vanity mirror and the woman who stared back at her from the mirror was not the self-assured and emotionally stable person she prided herself in , but a woman who was an emotional mess with a tear stricken face.
          Vasudha hated the fact that she could break so easily just by his words , from his mere presence. She sat up straight in her chair and wiped down her tears fiercely , exhaled a long breath , gazed into her eyes through the mirror and made a promise to herself , ' Gather yourself Vasudha ! This is not the woman you tried so hard to build to face the world ... This is not you ... Don't you dare let yourself break in front of him ! Don't you dare fall for his comforting words and sweet gestures , it will hurt you the day when you'll go away leaving everything behind. Just a few months , put on a good face , behave politely with him , when the time comes be ready to fly away from this place and don't dare do the mistake you did today.'
      Clearing up her mind completely , Vasudha raised up from her chair but suddenly she heard a voice very similar to her own resounding in her mind ,
' You are gonna hurt him , Vasudha!' Her conscience accused her of the pain she would inflict on him when she goes away leaving this life behind. She turned again towards the mirror and said to herself ' Yes , it will hurt him immensely when this marriage comes to an end. Being a man ,I know how much it will hurt his ego , destroy his pride and respect in the society once this charade of a marriage comes to an end , that's the reason why I've decided to keep this marriage a secret until I'm off to where I want to be. In regards to heart , I don't think, me going away will hurt him as much as it did for him when She went away... However , being a close friend of my brother and because...only because he became my husband he would come to atleast care for me , he does care for me if today's incident was any indication , so... So as to save him from getting attached to me , I'm gonna do exactly what he asked me not to do... I'm gonna shut him out... I'm gonna stay away from him as far as I could , ofcourse I'll be polite with him , as I'm living in his house and so in this way I could save him from getting hurt and save my heart too ...'! Saying this to herself and praying desperately that her wayward heart would follow her mind's vow , Vasudha climbed on to her bed so as to get some well needed sleep to face her complicated life the next day.