Discordance

Chapter Twenty -One

She had gone through so much in life already and all he had done was make it harder for her. Abhimanyu's guilt had been keeping him up at night and he couldn't comprehend how he would ever be completely free from it. Every time he began to apologize she would groan exasperatedly and push him away but he wasn't sure what else he could do to come to terms with it?

He felt like a loser for the only thing that had gone awry in his life was the relationship with Ishika which he had thought to be the end of the world, but here was his brilliant wife who did so much for the community, worked herself to the bone, took on everyone's hatred and disses like a champ and emerged a victor with her sanity still intact. He had offered to pay her out and set her free but the offer while for her liberation, if accepted, would have killed him, he realized.

Their relationship had gone back to a weird dynamic where they were very polite to each other but didn't get into the heat of things. Akshara had tried initially but Abhimanyu had been so heartbroken that he couldn't even look at her in the eyes or otherwise. His barbs at her for ruining his life kept running on loop in his mind and he felt like the world's biggest asshole. He was the one who had ruined her life.

He was staring morosely into his plate at the dinner table that night when she walked in rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she had been dead tired  the whole day for some reason and when he had  gotten back from work, he had found her sleeping on the couch already dressed for bed. He had about 5 seconds to give her a once over as she walked to her seat next to his, before he had to steal his eyes away for the fear of being caught. Those 5 seconds were not enough at all because Akshara in her sleep mussed state, grumbly from sleep made such a cute picture that he wanted to pull her into his lap and hold her tight, never letting go.

"hi" she mumbled before taking her seat as the staff brought out some food for her, he could only nod in her direction before taking a huge bite of his food and fidgeting his leg nervously. He wanted to never leave her side but also to escape as soon as possible, a conundrum with no solution. Thankfully, Akshara was eating well for now, probably her state of sleep helping in easing her nervousness as the rest of the family filtered in.

Everyone was making small talk at the table while Akshara kept eating, her head down. Despite his numerous attempts to reassure her since that fateful day of the pooja, she still kept a polite distance with his family. Even after their heart to heart the other night, she still believed that they hated her. He could see his mom was distraught at this and she too had tried to ease Akshara's worries but his wife was a stubborn stubborn cat.

As everyone was wrapping up their meal, Akshara cleared her throat and in the smallest voice possible asked Manjari if she could talk to her. When his mother nodded, she whispered softly "Umm some people I work with were going out some time this week and umm they asked if I could go with them?" she was nervously fidgeting with her pajama top and he had to smile at the sight. She was so damn adorable, asking permission for going out!

"You don't have to ask permission from me beta, of course you can go. Have fun and don't come back too early. You deserve this!" she said and Akshara grinned thankfully at her before looking down.

"Plus the more you stay away from this house and Abhi bhai the better" Anisha said from across the table snarkily and the small smile from Akshara's face dropped instantly, making Abhimanyu see red.

Grabbing her hand to stop it from curling into a fist, he turned and narrowed his eyes at Anisha,

"I understand you are protective of me but let me make it very clear that Akshara is not your punching bag. If you talk to her or about her like this again you and I will have a problem." He said in a firm tone, laced with animosity. No, he wouldn't let anyone talk to her or make her feel like this ever again in her life. When Anisha opened her mouth to answer back, her eyes flashing with hurt, Abhimanyu raised a palm out effectively stopping her.