Furore

40| Empty.

40| Empty.

"Aunty must be angry with me?" Daniya asked, keeping the tea cup on the table.

"No." I shook my head. "Why would she be?" She had come home to meet me.

"You'll be in Indore for how long now?" She asked me as I rubbed my arms. It was pretty windy and cold. We were in the terrace garden.

I smiled. "It is a long break. I'm gonna be here until I'm too bored." I had been working tirelessly since the past year so my office didn't even mind me giving a pause, moreover, it was easy to get an off from government department. I was on a much needed holdiay, I needed to rejuvenate myself.

I could feel the space between us as the moments of silence only expanded after every small conversation. I didn't know what to ask and she didn't know what to tell. It was just complicated and the two of us knew about it. The freedom we had to speak without thinking was lost and the both of us were aware of it.

"I'm sorry Sithara." She began and I felt weird. I felt the urge to stop her before she could even start properly. It was not like I had forgotten what had happened or I had won over every emotion of my heart that it did not matter me anymore but still I did not like hearing about it from anyone now.

I had made it a very personal matter to me because I knew nobody understood me the way things happened to me that why I acted or reacted in a particular way, like why I felt a certain way for Arsalan, why I was ready to marry him and why I did not. I knew nobody was empathetic enough to comprehend it, they only judged and criticized me for a fact or two and therefore I didn't want to share it for I knew it was very pious for me, for I knew how pure my choices were and how true my love was.

"I'm sorry." She repeated and I let her because somewhere looking at her face so troubled and guilty, I wanted her to get her closure too, even if that came at the expense of opening up my heart. I really wanted to set her free from all the unncesary burden because I was not mad at her, for I had met people more brutal and barbarous than what she was to me.

"I was too self-engrossed that time to think of you, I did not know I'm this selfish Sithara but I was too scared that time. I did not want to lose Hamza, you know how much I love him. Hn?" A tear rolled down her cheek.

"I'm sorry I couldn't understand that you loved Arsalan Bhai too, that love is love. I did not even hear what you had to say. It was not just me but I felt for Madhia too. I knew how it pains your heart when your husband talk of a second why, Hamza joked about it many time but in all this plight of mine, I forgot you and you were very much human too. I'm sorry."

"It is okay, Daniya." I was hurt when she did not take my stand, I was affected too much but over time, the pain I got from her had shed away in comparison to what life showed me later. It was like a greater ache had covered and buried what people did to me here to the point that I was much fine now.

"I swear I was devastated the time I got to know about your marriage and your rape, I wanted to come and see you, tell you that I was sorry but I couldn't. I did not even have the guts to call you to ask if you were okay or you want me to be there because I felt I pushed you there? Wasn't I pleading you to get married to Ranbir?"

"Ssh. Don't cry over something that was not in your hand. It was my fate, maybe God wanted me to become stronger, to take a stand and so this happened to me. Now stop it Daniya." I was only being honest, I had to accept what had happend and I had chosen to see it in a bigger picture, at least until it reached my breaking point here and there. "I told you I am all okay. Don't make me giddy."