The Valley || ONC2023

Chapter 2

"I understand, Mia, but that still doesn't justify your behavior." 

Unfortunately, Ashutosh had found himself between a rock and a hard place and had to break his Switzerland-like stance of not taking sides; there was no way he could remain neutral in the mother-daughter argument. 

"Appa, she selected an all-girls tour!" Maithili yelled. "Do you know what that means!?"

"No, I don't. Why don't you explain it to me?" 

The girl's hazel wonders swam with contempt as she watched her mother looking down at her parathas.

They were cold now: the parathas, not the situation. 

Mia ignored her father, "Amma, I am eighteen. I stay in a girls' hostel, agreed, but there are boys in my college. You do realize I work with them for hours unsupervised, right? Till when will you try and protect me, ha? Is it them who you don't trust, or is it me?"

Bhairavi rose from the table and turned her back towards her daughter; soft tremors rocked her body. 

Ashutosh had his work cut out for him; rushing towards his wife, he engulfed her in his arms. Not long after, he had large dark green patches adorning the front of his olive green uniform: a testament to his wife's unhappiness.

A minute passed in silence and then another; Bhairavi stepped out of the circle of solace her husband had offered, "Aiooo," she muttered between sobs, "You can't wear this to work. I will bring you your emergency ones," pausing, she looked back over her shoulder, "I am sorry, Kanna, I didn't realize that it would hurt you so. Give me a moment."

She left the husband and daughter and returned with a duplicate set of olive greens and an envelope; handing it over to them, she declared, "Mia, those are your tickets and documents. All I wanted was to spend some quality time with you. I know how you feel about me, but the truth is, this trip is highly rated. The weather would be perfect there this time of the year. Even the customers are gushing over it, calling it a once-in-a-lifetime experience." 

"Amma… "

Bhairavi held up her hand, "Please, let me finish." Taking a moment to contain herself, she added, "If this is how strongly you feel about it, then I won't force you to go, but I will. I have prepared everything to make your dad's stay comfortable. It's up to you to decide what you want to do. I have realized that I am not enough for you anymore."

"Amma…"

"It's alright, I will be fine in a few minutes; one last thing, I trust you as much as I trust Shree Rama, so never think otherwise."

With that, Bhairavi wiped the last of her tears and smiled, "Colonel, will you come to see me off at noon?"

"Of course."

"Thanks, Colonel. Alright, then, that's settled. Let's eat our cold parathas and put all this behind us." Bhairavi commanded. 

One moment she was shedding tears-the size of hailstones- and the next, her face was blank like someone had wiped her face off of emotions. The whiplash the woman gave her family was real.

It was scary. 

Ya, Bhairavi was scary like that. 

Five hours later, Ashutosh dropped the mother and daughter at the airport. How his wife had guilt-tripped their daughter that morning left no doubt in the soldier's mind that their coconut-hearted daughter, hard on the outside but soft on the inside, would never let her mother go to The Valley all by herself, especially not after the stellar, oscar-worthy performance Bhairavi had blessed them with.