Love knocks again - Completed

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Annika was lying on her bed playing with strands of her hair absentminded. She had an early dinner of instant noodles with egg that day. Though sleep has eluded her, much like other nights of the week, she found herself lying on the bed ideally rather than surfing through the internet for best PG programs.

Annika wondered how this night would have been spent in the hypothetical universe where her courtship week with Shivay was not cut short by his mother falling ill suddenly. Shivay didn't seem the romantic type and Annika was only more concerned about making memories rather that how they made it. So perhaps they must have ended up in a restaurant or Annika could have even cooked for him at his place. Would they have returned from the impromptu drive and stay at a hotel already? It was still Sunday after all. Could they have spent two more nights in each other's proximity and not broke the no sleeping together rule?

Annika has been celibate ever since she found out that she was pregnant. Her life was thrown with one challenge after another that she never really had time to think of pleasures of the body. Even now Annika didn't think about it with vivid eagerness. It was more a fleeting thought whenever images of kiss on the hand played in her mind.

Does it make her a s!ut if she conjures images of her and Shivay in the throes of passion?

It was easier when she was a teenager with less morals and even less ethics. God knows she was one curious rat when it came to sex. After all the complications that balled up her life, sex seemed like the most over hyped phenomena. Few months ago, she couldn't think about sex without scrunching her nose in distaste because of all the suggestive eyes and leering words that was carelessly thrown at her only because she was a young, single mother. Even few days ago, nothing she felt for Shivay seemed remotely close to lustful. Yes, he was attractive and she experienced the butterfly in stomach moments like a naiveté. But, nothing really felt sexual. Now, however, Annika couldn't stop imagining the look or feel of his lips. Then there was this one dream that she had unexpectedly when she was taking a nap in the afternoon.

It was not explicit enough to unnerve Annika. She might even call it sweet. The scene was hazy as if someone has applied a photo filter to her dreams. She was lying on the bed on her side with Shivay's arm thrown over her waist carelessly. Her dream brain knows that it was wee hours of the morning after an exhausting night of passion and they both were naked under the sheets. It was as if some parts of dream were fast forwarded, because next thing Annika saw was Shivay hovering over her kissing her throat while she was glowing with a smile on her face. The dream didn't visualize the part where his hand was on her bare waist, but her dream brain knew what he was doing. Annika saw a naughty glint in his eyes and knowing smirk, something she has never seen in Shivay's face in real life. A complete product of her imagination, but it felt so apt. There was a feeling of his hands going south from her waist. That is when Annika woke up startled. Breathing heavily with quick heartbeats and throbbing in that part of the body that she has almost declared apathetic, Annika realized that she was deeper in her feelings for Shivay than she realized.

Annika kept staring at the wall for hours together thinking about everything and nothing that involved Shivay and her. She was thankful that Vihaan wasn't here to see this disoriented side of his mother.

Initially Annika was sold to the idea that Karma was the reason why her week with Shivay was spoiled. She became a selfish mother by sending Vihaan away for a week to spend time with Shivay and it was God's way of reprimanding her for it. Thankfully her everyday phone call with Vihaan and his 'I am having best time of my life' sentence managed to lessen the guilt.

Annika turned in her bed and moved closer to the window to look how the moonless night was illuminated with the artificial lights. How will this night change if Shivay was by her side?