Fitoor | ✓

28 | Atthayees

A/N - Honestly very proud of myself for posting within a week. I love you all very much, chakde fatte, let's rock this life!

28 | Atthayees

There's love, there's commitment and then there's marriage. The boon of existence for several people. Lekh got up feeling clueless of his feelings. He wasn't sure how he felt, he wasn't sure how he wanted to feel. Years had gone by and he had avoided connecting with people and now, in a span of weeks he was supposed to get married to the wife of his dead brother. The woman he was falling for.

There was no denying it. These feelings weren't new. Lekh knew what love felt like, it was part reason why he had spent so much time hell bent on avoiding it. That is, until now. Now he had a chance to start fresh, correct mistakes that had been made, better himself. It was a chance to be brave. A chance to renew himself in his own eyes.

Most people would be scared of a lingering happiness that was about to happen, Tara included. But Lekh was looking forward to it maybe because he had lived with his sadness so long that now when a chance to happy had presented itself, he couldn't let it go.

But it was more than that. Lekh knew it was more than that even if he would never accept it, maybe even to himself.

Tara was his escape. His marriage to her was his escape plan. When he had planned out things against Indira that day on their engagement, he wasn't so aware of his feelings for Tara. A lot of things that he did, he did for selfish reasons. With Tara he could get away from the house that was suffocating him for years. Through Tara he could get to get away from a home that was never home.

Indira came bursting in through the door abruptly interrupting his chain of thoughts. When she came, he didn't even bother to acknowledge her. What was the point, really?

"Lekh!" Indira called and in response he just raised his brows. Not bothered by her son's obvious disinterest, she continued with what she had come for.

"You are getting married tomorrow, we have to do a few more rasams today and then you can go with your friends. They came looking for you. If only Kartavya was alive, he would prepare that bachelor party that you youngers have going around." She sighed.

"If Kartavya Bhaiya was alive, I wouldn't have to get a bachelor party because his wife wouldn't be a widow."

Lekh's bluntness wasn't surprising to Indira, he had been cold to her since that day all those years ago. She had lost both her son, one way back before all the tragedy took place in Kashmir. But she also knew what she did was best for him, Lekh wouldn't understand. He was too much of an emotional fool no matter how much he pretended to be a cold hearted person. Indira made sure Lekh knew this every time he verbally jabbed her.

"Well it's not like you don't have feelings for Tara, son. So it's more or a favour to you, at least now you will have a proper wife to fall in love with and not some-"

"Get out."

"What?"

"Get out." Lekh repeated, his voice harsher than anything Indira had heard before. Maybe she sensed the disaster that the voice brought with itself because she left without a word. Indira knew when it was not her time, she always knew when to back down. That's why she was so good in the game.

After she left, Lekh was left exhausted and he had only just woken up. He hated her, he was sure now. He hated his mother more than he hated himself. Why couldn't he have a normal life, a life where a mother loved her son and bent for him. Why did he have Indira for his mother? What had he done to deserve her torture?

Lekh unclenched his fist and felt the blood finally get the space to flow freely. He dropped in his bed again, breathing heavily. It happened sometimes, he would get so angry that he'd have to lie down because he would get so exhausted and his breaths won't come easily and his head would spin.

_________

Lekh had no idea when he fell asleep again but he did. It was until Ramya came to his room and shook up him that he finally got back to reality.

"You are sweating profoundly, are you okay?" she asked when he sat up.

"Yes." He mumbled a reply. He was not going to talk about Indira, not because he didn't trust Ramya but because he wanted to avoid thinking about his mother as much as possible. Not today, not tomorrow either. Never, if possible.

Ramya eyed him with suspicion. She was tired -her kids, the wedding preparations and her mother were making her crazy and things were taking a toll on her. She could only imagine what Lekh was going through given how much their mother aggravated him. Sometimes, she wanted to tell Lekh to run away, sometimes she wanted to help him runaway. But she knew she couldn't and even if she did, Indira would eventually find him and destroy him over and over.

Lekh was so much younger to her, he was like her own child. When they were young, she took care of him and he was such a naughty kid but so jolly and he would have thought their own mother would kill his beautiful personality. That kid in him was long gone, this man today was a product of this world's worst cruelty.

Indira had haunted Ramya, she had never told this to anyone but she did. When she was first pregnant, Ramya couldn't help but fear her motherhood. What if she was a mother like Indira? What if she was a torture to her own children? Maybe that's why Ramya tried so hard to be good, she was compensating for her mother's cruel persona.

Even now, that she had two children of her own, Ramya would spend a substantial amount of her thoughts anxiously wondering if she was being a good mother to her children and even to her younger siblings and to everyone else Indira had wronged.

After a while of just staring at Lekh sweat restlessly, she poured water in a glass and have it to him.

"Just forget who you are till tomorrow." She said as he took the glass from her, gratefully. "Just live the moment and pretend our mother doesn't exist."

This is all she could offer to Lekh and in response he just gave her a nod. Nothing more, nothing less. He didn't share his worried nor did he tell her what had happened. He just sat there, with the glass in his hands, only a sip taken. His clench on the glass was so tight, Ramya thought he'd break it. But this was him, her brother- a very broken man.