An insomniac's dream

The Keeper

"You were like a dream,
I wish I slept longer through,
Within I felt deeper,
Than my fate would care to let you

I thought you were a keeper,
I wish I could have kept you."

It was too beautiful to be a sempiternal reality, it was too soothing to everlast the gloom that had shadowed her for years. But with every inch of hope buried in the corners of her soul, she took strides towards the edge of the world....only to realize how falling in love was never about holding on, but letting go one finger at a time. She was too fond of the beguiling mirage to integrate the deception etched to her cosmos.

Had she really reckoned herself to be fortunate enough to have received opulent acceptance and adulation from any living soul of the planet? Had she really anticipated her life to be a prism of sunlight that escaped through atrium windows? She laughed at herself, what even legitimised her to hope that her life could be anything more than the black hole that imbibes agony to the depth of pores and sucked out any warmth that came her way?

The scorching heat of the sun, felt upon her pallid body with a ferocity that matched the raid of emotions in the hollow that once felt heart, as she stood in front of a place that had echoes of the giggles and promises they shared and a wheeze of the most beautiful memories she ever created. It's been more than 48 hours since a void replaced the organ that pumped blood of betrayal with pigments of hopes. It's been 48 hours since the keeper abandoned the keys. It's been 48 hours since she would never fall in love.

With heavy breaths and a spiral of thoughts, Mishti picked the key from under the flower pot and stepped into the NGO where she got closer to him....him who was meant to be an aesthetic reality, him who was as precariously precious as meeting in an insomniac's dream....that could crumble any moment with a slightest touch. It had taken a truckload of assurance to convince Bade Papa to let her go...for one last time. To enlighten the seeds they together planned to sow. She clutched the file closer to her chest as the wind inside seemed to sympathise with the despondency that surrounded her. This place still feels home.

She knew he won't be here, once the noon had morphed into dusk. She kept the file on the table along with the case of spectacles and only if you have ever really known her you would know, how it encased a part of her existence she once cherished dearly. She looked around basking all the warmth that the place could radiate before she left for long....long that could be forever. Brushing her fingers on the folder of their dreams, she inhaled all the tenderness she felt when he shared this treasure with her "The Champaner School Project." As much as she essentially must run away, she could never be an encumbrance to his dreams. Even though she was chiseled off her desire to fulfill his dreams alongside him, she couldn't take that away. So she came back to hand it over to him.

Home is now a legend, a story where he grew happy and safe before he himself set his entire world aflame. Home was where he ran to sea, because the place he once belonged to should no longer have his name. He was a gypsy and she was the stability, she was a refuge and now that he has cruelly pushed her away, he would now be called a refugee. He would never be freed from the guilt of tearing her apart. He would never forget how her face drained the colour in scintillas of dust. He would never know what forgiveness is because he didn't deserve it anymore. He had never felt home until he met her, her unadulterated warmth had so explicitly slipped into every pore of his skin that even wandering wouldn't help him let go. All she gave was love and all she got was tremendous pain. Losing someone who looks beyond the facade is like a curse, it's like being caged even after knowing freedom, it's like wandering in darkness even after knowing light. And he lost his Mishti...his light. Abir felt caged in those huge walls and humongous space of this supposed "home" called Rajvansh Sadan, so he walked to that one place where he could breathe her essence and weep to his heart's content. With each step ahead, he stumbled three behind, for how the air reminded him that she put her life at stake and stepped out in the storm all alone while he quaked her world in most brutal possible way, how she jumped into fire heedless about her well being while he was so weak that he chose his brother over her even when he promised he won't. He became a craven, he became a fibster, he spoke lies he never wanted to, he still doesn't know what had gotten into him when he told her he didn't love her anymore, when the truth is he had never and he would never love anybody the way he loved her. Today he is not just a vagabond but an orphan too, it killed every bit of him that his mother was the one who inflicted the deepest scar on his already wounded heart. There was no love for Abir Rajvansh in a world where his Angry Chorni wasn't the single most salient person in existence. How he wished he had a choice to be moribund instead of breaking her heart!

Who would be here, at this hour? Abir discreetly trailed into the solitary place that could bestow him a pinch of solace in reveries of her eyes that could swallow stars and galaxies. No wonder he drowned irrevocably in them. There she was standing in front him and he wasn't even nonplussed to find her there, he has been hallucinating about her everywhere and every second..... except this particular illusion was dissimilar to those he has been perceiving these days. Her raven black hair weren't falling down her back, instead they were tied in a tight French braid as if tethering them from falling carefree again, her skin was coloured in the pale of smitches of sunshine that is soon distorted into twilight of storms, there were firmly prominent tear marks on her face but what caused the maximum uneasiness was the absence of spectacles on her little red nose.

As if sensing his presence, she turned around to meet his eyes....his hazel eyes that once captured sunlight in streaks of gold were now hooded with clouds of grief. How she wished she could vapourise the gloom and get sunshine again but she couldn't. He walked towards her, expecting it to fade away with his touch but her aura just felt stronger. Was she really here?

Before his hand could reach out to stroke her cheek, just to see it vanish in thin air, she stepped aside gazing everywhere but him, it would trample her all over again to find indifference in his eyes where she only found love.

'Was she really here?'

"I am sorry, I shouldn't be here. I just came to return your belongings."

Yes, she was but how?

Abir shifted his gaze towards the table to find the case of spectacles resting there.

A- Why?

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Hello readers,
Since most of you advised me to go ahead with the os, here it is but turns out, it's going to be a TS. I am really sorry, I couldn't stop myself from writing this and I didn't realize how much I wrote until my fingers started aching with the non stop typing. I was literally weeping while I wrote this.

Kindly read, vote and leave a feedback. (It really helps)

Also, feel free to criticize.

Thank you,
Niharika ☺️

My Instagram handle- trails_of_my_barefeet