Barristerbabu: Bondita's denial to fulfill "their" dream

Chp 16 - Batuk's Grey character

Anirudh was dumbfounded to see Batuk standing at the doorstep. He took a few moments to react. Upon seeing Anirudh's shocked expression, Batuk spoke " Dada, would you make your little brother stand outside itself? Wouldn't you call me in your home?" Anirudh still in shock replied in a low tone "Uhh yeaah Batuk, come in." As he entered, Anirudh questioned " How come you are here Batuk? All of a sudden you arrived, without informing." As he spoke, Bondita too heard their voice and came towards the entrance of the house. Batuk responded in a worried tone " How could I not come dada? Boudi told me that you are not well, I came to see you. What happened dada, how are you feeling? What happened to your health all of a sudden?"

Anirudh responded " I'm fine Batuk. I was just feeling slightly cold this morning due to..." he stopped midway as he didn't wanted to inform Batuk about the conversations between him and Bondita and Anirudh's state of mind. He continued in a diplomatic tone " It was just common cold due to the weather. It was too cold this morning. Nothing serious as such." Batuk sighed in relief " Thank god dada. I was so worried, if you were fine. When Boudi told on telephone that you are unwell and she disconnected my call, I couldn't stop myself from coming here." Batuk looked towards Bondita with his lips curved which formed a wide smile. While Anirudh observed Batuk, he thought " Did Batuk really come here as he was worried about me or....?" His thoughts were broken when Batuk spoke in an excited tone opening his arms wide " Common, are you both not going to hug me? " Anirudh and Bondita looked at each other while Batuk pulled both of them towards him in a Bone crushing hug. While embracing them tightly, Batuk closed his eyes saying " Ohh how much I missed you." Bondita and Anirudh were on either sides of Batuk shoulders. They looked at each other feeling Batuk's tight grip on their bodies. Feeling a little pain, Bondita whined " Ahh Batuk, leave, it is hurting." Listening to Bondita's complaint, Anirudh moved away, breaking the group hug. However, Batuk replied to Bondita in a serious tone, " You have no authority to deny me." His eyes were fixed on Bondita, while both Anirudh and Bondita were startled to see his face turn red in darkness. However within the next second, Batuk laughed out saying " I was joking common, look at both of your faces." Bondita smiled, hitting Batuk on his shoulder and spoke " You and your jokes Batuk. I'm sure this dialogue is again from some cinema(chal chitra) isn't it?" While Anirudh was still puzzled, Bondita turned towards Anirudh and spoke " Patibabu, Batuk has this habit of quoting dialogues from various cinemas and fooling around. He never misses a single cinema. As you know, the screening of chal chitra takes place in very few places, however Batuk always manages to go there. He used to always go to watch the chal citra and used to force me in lieing to Sasurji that Batuk is busy studying. " While Anirudh gave a pathetic look, she continued " Not only that, he always insisted on buying only the shirts which the Heroes/Lead characters used to wear." Pointing to Batuk's shirt she asked Batuk " Even this shirt also , you brought it as it has the same design that was worn by someone in a cinema right?" 

While Bondita and Batuk were lost in their conversation, Anirudh observed that Bondita was smiling, being Jovial and chirpy. She was not that Jovial as her childhood, however she was far better than what he had seen in the past few days. He felt his heart wrench while he thought " Indeed Bondita and Batuk are close friends. They have spent the last 4 years together. No wonder, Bondita didn't believe me that Batuk was lieing. There was a time while Bondita used to share things and Joke around me like this but now, I find it hard to even find her smile at me. Did I miss an important growing phase of Bondita's life? The teenage phase when people usually find and make friends and such friends stay forever. She had told me earlier that she has only one friend Batuk. Did I miss the chance of befriending her by not being present with her during this phase of her life? " Holding back tears in his eyes, he spoke " Ok ok both of you continue talking later, Batuk go freshen up. You may be tired after the long Journey. Go take a shower and then we can talk." 

Batuk headed out to take a shower, while Bondita was walking towards the Kitchen to prepare dinner. While she was walking, she heard Anirudh call her. Anirudh came close to Bondita, held her hand in his and spoke in a loving requesting tone " Bondita, you have given your Patibabu one promise of staying with your Patibabu forever, but your Patibabu is greedy for 2 more promises. Will you?" Bondita looked at him surprised but bluntly replied  " If you are asking me to become Barrister, sorry I cannot promise that. Anything else, I'm ready to." Anirudh's heart ached on hearing that she was again denying to become a Barrister. However, holding back his feelings, he spoke "No Bondita, I'm not asking you to promise me that you will become a Barrister. I cannot enforce anything on you if you really don't want to. I can only show you the right path, but it is you who would have to finally walk on the path you decide." 

He took a deep breath and continued " I want 2 other promises Bondita.
1. Remember you had treated me as your 'Ayna babu' right? I want you be as transparent as a mirror with me. I don't want you to hide anything from me. No matter what the circumstances be, I want you to pour out all that is within you. I want complete transparency between us.
2. Remember we had a secret symbol of lock and Key (moving his finger around his mouth horizontally and vertically),I want the conversations and matters between us to be strictly confidential. However close friends you may have to share things, you would not share the matters between us to anyone else. I want you to treat me and you as 'one' just like the lock and key.

Will you give me these two promises?" Bondita thoughtfully replied " I will promise , but I have a condition that you too need to be equally transparent with me. Even if you hate me, you are upset due to me or you want to move on in life etc, whatever it is, you are going to tell me openly. You will not hide or sacrifice things just to avoid hurting me." Anirudh nodded his head replying " Bondita I was always transparent with you in the past and will always be. I never hid anything from you." Bondita gave a questioning look as if she was not believing his words. Understanding her facial expression he spoke " I know Bondita , you feel that I was not transparent with you all these days, I have been hating you but not showing it out to you. That's definitely not the case. I assure you that I will be completely honest and transparent with you." Bondita nodded saying " Ok then I too will promise that I will be transparent with you and will keep our matters within us." Anirudh smiled saying " Thank you Bondita for giving me three precious promises."

Soon Bondita called both the men towards the dining area. She placed two wooden stools containing the dinner plates on top of them in front of Anirudh and Batuk. As Bondita bent down to serve the duo, Batuk's eyes were fixed on Bondita which didn't go unnoticed by Anirudh. Batuk spoke in a soft voice " Hey there is something different in you today. You look different." While Bondita nodded in negation , one of her hair strand got stuck to her cheek. Batuk got lost in her and said" Ahhh, your hair. Since elders are not present, you have not covered your head with pallu. That's why you look different. You look more beautiful." As he was speaking, he brought his hand forward to touch her cheek on which her hair strand was stuck. He was about to touch her cheek while his mind being lost in thoughts , he felt Anirudh's hand stop him. Batuk came back to his senses and turned towards Anirudh with an embarrassed look. Anirudh on the other hand , was looking at Batuk with a questioning expression. Batuk was able to read Anirudh's facial  expressions. Batuk bashfully spoke " Uhh I was just helping her remove the hair strand." Anirudh thought " I wonder what is running in Batuk's mind. The dream I saw this morning where Batuk was tormenting Bondita, the tight hug which Batuk gave Bondita which hurt her, Batuk's words to Bondita 'you have no authority to deny me' , all these are giving me some kind of weird vibes. I'm feeling very restless. I need to talk to Batuk."

As Batuk walked towards the living room after his dinner, he thought " I need to find out if Anirudh dada paid the fees for law college. As long as I'm here in Calcutta, I need to make sure to convince Anirudh dada to not make Bondita a Barrister. It's not going to be easy to go against Anirudh dada's fitoor and determination, but I will do everything possible. While being lost in his thoughts, he heard Anirudh's voice " Batuk, come to my study. Let's talk here." 

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