Truly, Madly, Deeply- a Devakshi story.

The wound is the place where the light enters you

--------continued..........

However, it was one thing to pretend to be asleep and another to actually sleep. And sleep was miles away that night. She tossed and turned trying to sleep, trying to find a position that would let her be less conscious of his presence and tried to count sheep, only to find that instead of sheep she could only picture Dev in her mind. And there was the man himself, asleep without a care. As she turned again towards him, wanting to glower at his sleeping back, she was startled to find him fully awake, watching her with a mischievous smile. " Ho gayi hum dono ki play-acting poori? There is a time and place for everything," he imitated her..." Ek dusre ko bewakoof banana toh theek hai par khud ko bhi?"

He got up and carefully put pillows on his side of the bed so Suhana should not roll down the bed. And came to her side of the bed and extended his hand to her. The room was dark but lit up by moonlight from the windows. He seemed supremely confident that he was doing the right thing, only she couldn't stop the warning signals go ringing in her brain. She wanted him but still what was the future ? What if this didn't work out? What if they separated again? What if this was a one-night-stand? What if his mother got him married to Natasha? She tucked her hands away under the cover.

Dev: " Aur acting karni hai? Time and place ke bare mein sochna hai? Toh tum socho. Main guest room mein jaa raha hoon. Aise bhi tumhare saath neend toh aayegi nahin." 

And he walked off. She immediately felt bereft. "Come back you idiot, and please, please don't let me be an idiot too. Rescue me from my own silly lies and defenses," she wanted to scream. But what to do now? " Go with the flow" her mind flashed the reply. "You aren't doing anything wrong. And you had known this would happen. You had wanted this to happen. You have always used your brain to take decisions, today use your heart, don't think about what if and the gains and losses. That you have already done for five years. Once upon a time, you didn't stop and he didn't stop you, and what a price you paid for it." She got  up and  after settling Soha comfortably,   walked out of the room.

The guest room was dark. And as she locked the door behind herself, her heart pounding away, Dev put the bed-side light on. Raising himself on his elbows, he watched her gravely as she hesitantly came up to him. He was reminded of the day they had first made love after marriage, after days of frustration and quarreling. And how right it had seemed. Then too it had been her, who had tried to make the day special while he had just been too annoyed at her unilateral decision about the stupid fast.

Sona felt as if she was a new bride and not a woman who had already given birth to a child with this man. She climbed on top of the bed and sat there with her head downcast, a little scared and feeling shy. Dev knew what she was feeling because he felt it too, a little nervous, a little apprehensive. He reached out to hold her hand and pulled her down to himself. For a heart-stopping moment, she was stunned at the suddenness of the action and the sudden closeness physically and then he took a deep, deep breath, not realizing he had been holding his breath so long, since she had walked in. And finally after five long years, the life time of self-inflicted torture finally stopped, and they both clutched each other frantically, held each other, arms around each other trying to imprint themselves on the other's body. Wanting to fit in the way they had fitted into each other earlier. Wanting to feel skin against skin, no pretense. 

Because the body always knows the truth. They finally gave up the pretense that they had held on to for so long, gave up the untruths they had told themselves and everyone around them for so long--that  it didn't matter, that they could live with it, that there were larger things to life than love, that everything had ended between them, that they could forget each other, that their desires didn't matter, that they mistrusted love, that they were no longer ready for love, that they did not love each other anymore.