Bombay Romance ♡ COMPLETED

[ 59 ] The Taste of Blood ■

Rukmini wakes up at her usual time; half-past-five in the morning. The sky is still a dark shade of blue, waiting for the sun to grace it with brilliant hues of red, orange, and yellow. Murali sleeps flat on his stomach, arm thrown lazily over her waist. She carefully moves his hand away and sits up to wear her clothes.

'Don't ... ' Murali says sleepily.

She picks up his shirt lying at the foot of the bed and tosses it at his face.

'Accha?' he demands in a muffled voice from beneath the shirt, blocking his view. 'You don't want me to look? You remember what happened last night, right?'

Rukmini does. She even suspects their bed creaked at one point in time. And each time he does those things to her, she feels their room is set on fire. Sometimes, it makes her wonder if her vocal cords would magically burst out as she gasps for breath in pleasure.

Murali moves the shirt away. But Rukmini has already worn her salwar kameez and is smoothening the bedspread on her side of the bed.

'Come here ... ' he sways his hand, trying to catch her wrist. She steps back, tying her long hair into a quick bun and rushes out of the room.

Off late, Rukmini is the happiest she's ever been in all the twenty-one years of her life. The other ladies in the police quarters have commented that she's even gained a few extra kilos- as every girl does after a happy marriage- and looks even prettier now.

She's one of the youngest married women in the quarters and is pampered by the other ladies. They teach her new cooking recipes, cross-stitch embroidery techniques and ways to tend potted plants. They gather to chat in the late afternoons, sometimes even late into the night, and Rukmini is always invited. Unlike the conversations she listened to in the chawl, which mostly involved fake pity and taunts, these talks are good-natured. They even tease her, demanding she give good news by this time, next year. It makes her blush every time.

Many nights are spent alone, a few in silence as Murali would come home late, fully exhausted. But the few others are nothing less of heaven. Rukmini had an idea of what transpires on a marriage bed. But she hadn't even fathomed all the other things a man and a woman could do. And that it would make her feel so unexplainably good.

In the beginning, she would worry and worry when Murali wouldn't return even after eleven at night. But slowly, she got used to it, learning that odd timings are common in this job.

Gauri wasn't too happy about Rukmini resigning from her typist job. Honestly, Rukmini was doing that job because the salary would help her family and she'd get a few hours of respite from her Kaki's harsh taunts.

But now, though Murali is fine with continuing to work, he has strictly warned that not a paise of it should go to her Kaki's house. And Rukmini doesn't like to go against his words.

When Rukmini was residing at her Kaki's house, there was always work late until midnight and she hardly had time to breathe. Now, she likes having time for herself to read a book, embroider, or tend to the plants on their small balcony. 

Now, Rukmini switches the bathroom boiler on. She climbs down the stairs to collect a few flowers from the large jasmine plant that everyone uses. She comes back and sweeps the frontage of the main door.

After a bath, she lights up the lamps in front of the LakshmiNarasimhji photo placed on the wooden plank jutting out of the wall. She offers the flowers, praying for Murali's safety, like she does everyday. Then, she quickly chops onions, tomatoes, and green chillies, and makes poha for breakfast.