The Bet is On (Completed☑️)

22. No Complaints in Love

(Was listening to the above Qawali while writing the Chapter. I swear if its a REAL ISHQ, Insaan khud ko Bhula Skta hai mgr Mehboob ko Nahi)

Chapter 22

Arnav sought possibility of a civil conversation throughout the journey back to home from Hamdani House but at each attempt, incinerating guilt had him spell bounded. He has brought her to a situation where she continuously sheds tears and wipes them, drowning more in inferiority complex. This is not how he had planned to keep her.

"Khush." He finally assembles courage, making way inside bedroom after a healthy lunch with family where everyone tried to cheer her puffy eyes. He cannot thank his family much to shower her with love when he cannot.

Instead of heeding his voice, she prefers to curl herself to sleep, thinning the tension in nap. Though her real motive was to avoid leashing out at him, Arnav perceives it as ignorance and it peeves him. He hits his head on wall in provocation and switches off lights before crashing on sofa with her laptop to crack down the slow working interface since she prepared first draft of finally submitted thesis. Some virus, for sure. She had asked him numerous times but he was busy in shipping orders across seas.

Ashamed, he lingers her concealed figure under coverlet, admiring the soft snores. It impulses, somewhere deep in him, to draw a romantic plan to woo her and break the deafening silence. He is fond of her chirpiness, redden cheeks, shy eyes and sultry touches. This is not his Khushi. Hell, what has he transformed herself into? What has his ego done to her glowing face?

"Is Khushi beta up?" Dadi Jaan enquiries from maid, noting her coming out of her middle grandchild's room.

"Yes, Dadi Ji. She has also asked for the cheesy finger rolls in tea-time." She informs and takes her way to kitchen for performing her assigned duties.

Mrs. Meer takes slow steps, perfecting the border of shawl on her shoulder. Reaching outside the room of her grandchildren, she opts to knock rather barging in a newly married couple's room and earning embarrassment.

"Who is at the door?" Arnav asks in a louder voice and himself comes to receive his granny from door. "You could have summoned me." He humbly says, giving her a wanted seat on bed near Khushi who was stretching inside comforter.

"Why? I have legs working." Dadi Jan replies, displeasingly and Arnav places a sweet kiss on the side of her cheek.

"I am here to talk with my sweetheart." She caresses Khushi's hand.

Longing for affection, Khushi discourages tears and settles her head in the elderly lap. "I am all yours to talk, gorgeous granny." Khushi flatters and granny only chuckles in acknowledgement.

Her face, however, goes blank as she notices Arnav covering her with comforter, earning appreciation from grandmother.

"Its life, Khushi. People say things. You need to learn tolerate them." She hints about her wrought mood on the rebuke of teacher. Deep, she also has an idea of it being a lie. A newly married woman – if in high spirits of jocund with husband – cannot loss the jolly glow with a random rebuke of instructor.

"But, Daado Jaani, you know, I cannot bear wrong things." Khushi scrunches her nose, airing up her determination of never forgiving the misdeed of Arnav.

"Right things are accepted. It's only wrong thing we need to bear." Mrs. Rahim Meer caresses the front lush tendrils of Khushi, noting in mind to oil them next Sunday when she will be free of exams.