Discordance

Chapter Seventy-Eight

"Abhimanyu I'm going to kill you" Akshara shrieked into the phone as she paced the hotel room floor where she was currently staying. Waving her hands around in frustration before finally pinching the bridge of her nose she eased down on her anger and tried to even out her voice "what has gotten into you? You just left yesterday, Sona." All she heard was Abhimanyu's frustrated sigh from the other end and her shoulder slumped as she sat down with a thud on the bed.

Akshara had to go to Jaipur to get Seva's Jaipur chapter off the ground or at least get the logistics sorted and the paperwork signed and while she had admittedly been here for over two weeks, Abhimanyu had flown in twice in the short period to be with her and the way he had been acting was downright bizarre because he had been so clingy almost to the point of being overwhelming and while she loved to be wanted like this by him, something wasn't right and more than her tolerance, she was worried about his mental wellbeing because he refused to tell her what was bothering him. Once he had to go back to Udaipur, he had called and texted her so many times that she almost considered turning her phone off, but if she had the gall to do that, he would have probably left some poor soul mid-surgery and flown down to reprimand her.

Funnily enough, despite his claims that he didn't care about their anniversary and it wasn't even real anyway, he had found time to be in Jaipur for the very day but Akshara had been too nervous and afraid to say anything so she had pretended it was a normal day but both of them knew that Abhimanyu would never forget something this important but she was too exhausted from work to actually get into a fight with him over it so she let him hold her to him and let him take her out for a nice dinner where they talked about anything and everything under the sun except the importance or lack thereof of the day for both of them.

"You have to ease up a little Abhimanyu,please." She pleaded but all she heard was another whine from the other end of the line.

"You don't miss me?" he asked and hundreds of kilometers away, Akshara could almost see the pout on his face and a smile overtook her face despite the melancholy hanging over their heads.

"You left less than 24 hours back Abhimanyu, at least give me time to miss you." She teased but when he grumbled something unintelligible, she had to be the adult between the two of them and beg him to go back to his job instead of worrying about her. "I'll be home soon, now please let me sleep." As much as she loved him, she was exhausted and just needed to get under the covers and sleep. He had practically bullied her into staying at a nice hotel, despite her claims that she couldn't because of the glaring disparity between the place she worked at and her obvious wealth but Abhimanyu and pouted and even angrily shaken his head until she had relented because he had said it would ease his mind. Despite her protests, she had to admit that the bed was so cozy and a far cry better than the government lodging they were putting Akshara up at.

The heat was driving her crazy and the constant back and forth between sites and the million questions people were asking her and now Abhimanyu's petulance, no wonder she felt slightly wonky. Snuggling deep into the covers she mumbled a soft "I love you" into the phone a smile plastered on her face as she heard his "love you too monkey" back. He drove her crazy but she wouldn't want it any other way.

Despite all her claims, she of course missed her stupid husband but if she told him that he would fly down again or probably force her to come back leaving her job hanging and Akshara was having the time of her life seeing her hard work pay off and to see another city benefit from her program that had helped Udaipur so much. If she could change even a single woman's or a child's life here in Jaipur it would all be worth it and that's why she persevered, despite missing her family. She had expected Manjari to keep Abhimanyu under control but she was somehow worse than her son because she fretted so much about Akshara that she had to threaten to block both her and her son. The family group chat was always buzzing where everyone constantly fussed over her and deep in her heart Akshara felt giddy, even if she pretended to be exasperated.