The Abyss Called Love

Part 22

"You used my daughter, you shameless idiot! And now you seek to find her? Not possible," rebuked Kriti's father, Adityesh.

The choice of words had torn apart his conscience, more so because he was a father to a daughter, too, and he could not bear to imagine someone doing the same with his daughter, who had once laid cocooned in his arms. Redemption of ever-increasing magnitude struck him in the manner he had never imagined.

He knew the Kriti who knew how to love without bounds, but how had he forgotten that she was someone's daughter and someone's friend, someone who had emotions like he did?

He wanted one chance to make up for every mistake of his, both towards Ashna and Kriti - the women who knew how to love in the truest manner and he was the ignorant one who had misjudged his lust - for power, for a woman's tender touch to soothe his ego - and his mania to accomplish his dream as love.

Both had showed him that innumerable hues splayed across love, but the most profound hue was pain which neither faded nor ever relinquished the excruciating hold over the body, heart and soul.

"So, that's it? You don't want to listen to me or have another chance to work on our marriage, do you?" asked Aniket. Ashna had stiffened when he had walked across the foyer towards her before the final hearing of their divorce.

A wry chuckle escaped her twisted lips. "I wanted another when I thought you stopped being the man I loved because I believed you could be that man again. But when I learned you were never that man, there's nothing left to fight for."

Aniket's hands shot towards the forlorn woman, but the way she flinched and stepped away from him caused the creases over his forehead to deepen. "Why do you say that, Ashna? What-"

"Drop the facade, Aniket. You had it for fourteen long years now," she spat. His lips parted in a confused frown and the edges of his eyes tightened. "Oh, please. I know you morphed my pictures in highschool to enamor me."

Aniket's heart sunk into an abyss of unfathomable depth. The secret he had sworn to take to his pyre was out. His sin was out in the open, for the woman entangled in the web of his lies to see. The revulsion in her stance, the gleam of animosity in her eyes, and the derisive edge of her voice had startled. But not anymore. Not when he realized she had learned the truth.

"Ashna, please let me-"

"No, Aniket. Please!" she said, joining her palms together while averting her eyes from. Her chest heaved as it housed a storm behind the ribcage. "If you ever cared for me, don't justify or explain why you did what you did. Please! I don't want to hear it. I can't bear to hear it!"

Aniket stepped closer to her, but the glimmer of absolute disdain and disgust made him stumble backwards. "Ashna, you have to understand it was- "

"No!" she yelled, the heaving of her chest more erratic than a few moments ago. The quiver of her lower lip, her arms crossed in front of her in an almost defensive stance - she was not just disgusted with him, his presence terrified her. And he did not know which was worse.

"I don't have to, Aniket. I am done understanding things. Done with holding onto a relationship which did not matter to you." Aniket shook his head, to no avail. "I'm done with you and this relationship, Aniket. Please, don't make this anymore difficult. Just... free me!"

The sheer desperation in her voice had defeated his urge clamoring for respite from the void in his heart. When she had walked away from him in the hospital, even with the little one, symbolic of the realized dreams and his triumph, she had taken a part of him with her.

The part of him which attached value to everything else. The one without which nothing else would matter. His repose. With the tranquility and stability abandoning him, the tumultuous ocean of thoughts engulfed and dragged him to the depths of vulnerability.

And with her eyes peering at him with despaired and derisive desperation, he realized trying to besiege her would only push him deeper into the bottomless ocean of perturbation. "So be it!"

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Nothing could have prepared Aniket Rawat to open the door to reveal a stern Kriti waiting at the threshold. His eyes searched for any signs of his little angel, but his fortunes had not shined that day. "Kriti?!"

"Mr. Rawat, may I come in?" she asked, in an indifferent and formal tone that made his heart ache. There was no disappointment in her eyes. No disdain. Her almond-shaped eyes held a nonchalance that twisted a dagger so deep that no distaste ever could.

He moved aside, disbelief making his jaw drop. She moved inside and turned around on her heel to face him with a stoic face with fierce determination in her eyes. "H-How's she?"

Her features softened for the slightest of moments before she stoned her features. "She is well."

Kriti straightened the hem of her pressed black dress that reached to the mid of her calves. "I came here to warn you that if you have any intention of pursuing legal action against me, I will challenge it in the court. Many lawyers scoured your sham of a contract and it is without a legal basis. So, you better drop the idea!"

Incredulity shone in Aniket's narrowed eyes. "Do you really believe I would take this to court, Kriti? Was it the reason you fled?" he asked with an abrasive edge to his tone that made rage dance on her features.

"That's far from the only reason, Mr. Rawat. If you had asked me to stay in unrequited love for eternity, I would have obliged with no qualms. If being the surrogate of your child was your wish, I would have swallowed my complaints and conceded. But you wanted me to be your backup plan and instrument in the petty game of revenge you were playing, and I could never accept that."

Aniket's eyes remained downcast, and he swallowed the saliva clogging the back of throat and constricted his chest in an excruciating hold. "Then why did you come back now?"

"While I was not sure if you deserved a chance to prove yourself as a father, I was sure my daughter deserves to have her father in her life. I'm willing to risk it for her," she said with a stiff upper lip.

His heart almost burst out of his chest at the implication of Kriti's words. "Kriti, that... I-I'm- "

"Only if you sign an affidavit, quashing our previous contract and vowing to never fight for her custody. Not that the Court would handover a female child's custody to a single man, but- "

"I will never put her through it, and I will do anything to meet my daughter! Send the affidavit!" he exclaimed. His voice rang with an excitement that he had lost over the past five months since the fateful day at the hospital. His eyes brimmed with ecstatic tears.

"Okay. We will workout the visitation after you sign the affidavit," said Kriti, walking past Aniket, who was too engrossed in his joy to notice her exit. Aniket pulled out his phone to stare at his wallpaper, which was the picture Kriti had sent of the first ultrasound of their daughter.

The wallpaper was set to change, and so were his fortunes. With a kiss to his screen, Aniket embraced the tranquility, which appeared within reach after weeks of restlessness.

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The story will end in 3 parts and an epilogue. What do you think of the current dynamics of the trio, and how do you think they will end up?