Saathi Rey

*What She Couldn't Say*

"You know, I wonder sometimes, how much time does it really take, hmm?" She suddenly spoke, her eyes lost in thought as she tried to sort through whatever her mind wanted to tell her.

"For what?" His eyes, black and intense, zoomed away from the papers he was scanning to peer at her face.

"Hmm?" She seemed distracted as if what her mind produced was too fast for her to keep pace with; her heart was a mere passenger as it tried to comprehend the intense depth of her soul's musings.

"Time, rani sahiba, time. You were talking about time. Something about how much time does it take?" He reiterated, a patient yet loving smile on his face, as he watched her sit there, toying with her pencil as she made her way through the numerous medical files that lay before her.

"Oh, huh, nothing! Just some random thought in my head. Sorry to disturb you. I sometimes voice out my thoughts as if I am talking to some other person, even when I am not!" She replied, sheepishly, rubbing her neck nervously.

"Ah, you are quite a dreamer, are you not, Dr. Mahajan?" He murmured, peering deeply into her eyes, as if he was trying to extract whatever that went through them, trying to extract her very being and attach it to his own.

"Wha-What do you mean?" Her heart thundered so loudly in her chest that for a moment she thought she would faint there and then, but gradually, she controlled it, taking deep discreet breaths, before speaking again, "I-I am not a dreamer, I just try to make listen to what I feel, what my mind wants to tell me and then sift through it, to understand myself better. Does that make me a dreamer? I think not! I don't daydream, or live in my dream. I just try to understand it by thinking things through, hmm?"  

"A philosopher too, hmm? Interesting indeed!" His quiet voice sent a deep chill running down her spine, but she controlled her shudder, before looking straight into his swirling orbs.

"Interesting is not what interesting looks, Khadoos Shergill, it is what it truly feels like. Interesting is how a mother feels when she deliberately neglects herself to take care of her children. It is how a young child shuts himself off, to shield his family from the cruel word. It is how people say time heals all, without mentioning the duration of that time, the true pain of it all!" A tear slipped down her cheek at the last line, but she rubbed it away vigorously, before pasting a smile so bright on her cheek that he felt blindsided. 

"So, next time you call my words interesting, Mr. Ulti Khopadi, without really understanding them, remember, it is not what they pretend to be, but what they really are, that matters."

But just as she stood up to leave, a gentle tap on her shoulder caught her off guard. Mind swirling with chaos, she waited for him to say his piece. But he did not. Not immediately at least. It was only after waiting for quite some time, when she moved forward to leave that he finally uttered his thoughts out loud.

"But how do I know what they really are, when you don't let me know you, when I don't understand you?"

*****************

How do I start this?

By apologizing? By giving explanations?

I don't know. Don't know if that would be enough. If saying sorry to my readers and this story would suffice, would wipe away that long period for which I neglected this story and its people- and not only this one but my others too.

This draft has been sitting on my Wattpad account, for the past week, and I still don't know if I would be able to press the Publish button.

But, as they say, you need to start from somewhere to reach somewhere.

Consider this my start.

Sorry, first of all, dear readers and my beloved story, you don't know how much I regret not returning to you earlier. But then, would returning earlier have been helpful? I can only wonder. My heart tells me no. And, so I would like to tell you a small story.

My love for reading was what stimulated my writing journey. As an eight-year-old, those children's stories, fairytales, and Grandma's Bag of Tales were what kept me alive. They were a part of me, in every travel journey I undertook.

And, that's where my downfall began. I turned my love for reading into an escapist strategy. Whenever something bad would happen, something I did not like, instead of crying I would just download a new book online and move on. This continued for a year. And today, ten years later, I realize how harmful it was. How much it had damaged me from the inside.

Someone asked me once, why I read, so voraciously, so vehemently, as if I would die, if I don't read. And as I pondered over it for hours, I finally realized I read just to distract myself. I wrote, just to keep the pain from erupting. While, some may think of it to be a creative outlet, for me, it began to become something stifling, which no longer made me feel free. I felt like I had been trapped in another cage. And last year, as I finally accepted this looming fact, I did not know what to do. So I did, what I always do best. I ran away, from this platform, from my stories.

But today, about 5-6 months later, as I sit here to type this out, in this month of doom, as I like to call it, I know, my explanations don't justify me. Neither do the numerous currents my family saw last year. But then, I do not want to stay hidden, afraid, and cowering all my life. This is a step, I sure hope that it is. How far the next one would be, I don't know. But, I sure as hell am willing to try. The voice in my head has started speaking again, after months of silence. And this time, I do not doubt that it is a part of me, something which makes me, who I am. So, I won't shut it out anymore, nor would I call it a distraction. We are who we believe we are. And if I am just a girl with too many voices in her head, it is better than being a coward, who suppressed them all.

This story, it was the second in a series of fanfics from the same show. I started it earnestly and continued it restlessly before finally fizzing out. But, now, I want to be back. I know it is not right on my part, and most of you would say ki iski dadagiri hai kya, but I am sorry. Meri dadagiri nahi hai, I just want to recover pieces of myself, after all, that has happened I want to see how many pieces of mine lie here and there and this story is a piece of me, just like you, dear readers. So, please, please, please, if you can give me a chance, do please. I want to rewrite, reconstruct this one, and tweak it here and there, but for all of it, I need support, even though it is selfish of me.

Can I count on that? And, trust me there is no obligation. Just, please do reply, even if you don't want me to continue. Pwease.

A journey of a thousand miles may begin with a single step. But whether, it would become a 1000-mile journey, or remain an unexplored trail forever, depends on perseverance and support. I will try my best. Will you stay with me? 

Till then, here is a quote to keep you by, a food for thought! 

Hope to hear from you all soon.

- That Lost Tara.