CHAPTER 30 #2
She stopped walking, turning to face him fully on the narrow bridge. The wind caught her dark hair, streaming it behind her like a banner, and the Pacific glittered diamond-bright beyond her. Ashok thought he’d never seen anything more beautiful in his life.
“I need to tell you something,” Isha said softly, seriously.
“During our wedding ceremony on the island, at that moment you came from the sea, something about all the pre-wedding rituals, everything about it felt real and I wanted to be married to you. I accepted you, Ashok, as my man the moment I stopped fighting what I felt. I said ‘I do’ to Ashok, to the man who knew me like no other, the one who knew what I wanted even before I realized it and most of all, learning to deal with me and showing me what it means to love and be loved deeply.”
Her voice became thick with emotion. “I said ‘I do’ to the man who sees me for who I am with all my tantrums and fears. Just me. Monisha. Your Isha.”
Ashok felt something crack open in his chest, something that had been carefully guarded for so long. “You undo me,” he whispered. “Completely.”
“Good.” She smiled through her tears. “Because you’ve thoroughly undone me too.”
They stood there on the swaying bridge, holding each other as the wind and waves surrounded them, two people who’d found each other through the most unlikely, painful circumstances, and truly chosen to love anyway.
“So,” Isha finally said, her voice lighter, “are you going to let me show you this lighthouse?”
“Whatever you want to do.” He let her pull him forward, following her across the bridge toward the old tower that rose against the brilliant blue sky.
As they walked, Isha looked down at her ring again, then up at Ashok, her heart so full it felt like it might burst. “You know what the best part of this is?”
“What?”
“Since Chandini knows about the proposal, I bet my aunt is already planning the wedding, I guarantee it.” She laughed and pulled out her phone. “Maybe I should send them a picture so they can get started on the preparations.
Isha took out her phone and saw the time. 11:11 in the morning.
Her heart skipped a beat. Remembering what her dear cousin had said, she looked at Ashok. “I want to be your wife forever.” It was a wish and she was now a believer that angels were watching over her and protecting her in the form of his love. “And I want a big family.”
Ashok smiled. “Whatever you want.”
Isha unlocked the lighthouse door, but before stepping inside, she turned back to him one more time. The sun was higher now, gilding everything in gold, the weathered wood of the lighthouse, the churning ocean, Ashok’s beloved face.
Isha processed what she was about to tell him what she had kept to herself for a few days, saved it to share when they were at the lighthouse. “Ashok, I want… I want more children.”
A moment of confusion later, his eyes sparkled. He pulled her lips to his. “Whatever you want, whenever you are ready.”
She didn’t hesitate. “I’m ready.”
Words hung between them, weighted with meaning.
She paused, gathering courage to share something she’d never imagined feeling.
“Every time I see you hold Vish and Vaish in your arms, something here—” she guided his hand to rest over her heart, feeling it thunder beneath his palm, then slowly moved it lower to her belly, “and here…something comes to life.”
Her voice softened, vulnerable in a way she rarely allowed herself to be.
“If it wasn’t obvious when we met, I never wanted children.
I was never a person who was good with kids, no matter how much I loved them.
” She swallowed hard, old fears threatening to surface.
“I was terrified of putting a child through what I went through when my parents passed. That fear controlled me for so long.”
His thumb traced gentle circles against her stomach, anchoring her.
“But you…” Her breath caught. “You taught me we don’t just survive loss, we learn to love harder because of it.
That having children doesn’t mean repeating the past. It means creating something beautiful despite it.
” She squeezed his hand, tears pricking her eyes.
“You taught me how to love and be loved, in ways I didn’t know were possible. ”
For a moment, he simply looked at her, just looked at her, with those glorious eyes that had always seen through every wall she’d built. Then his smile broke free, radiant and unguarded, lighting up his entire face.
“Then I suppose,” he murmured, his voice rough with emotion as he pulled her close against the lighthouse door, “we should probably get started soon.”
Isha pressed against him, her body fitting perfectly against his as if they’d been designed for this exact moment. She tilted her face up, lips parting in invitation. “I’m ready. Anytime.”
The last word barely left her mouth before he captured it with his own.
The kiss started tender, a soft press of lips, a shared breath, slow and sweet. But then his hand slid into her hair, tilting her head back to deepen the connection, and everything ignited. Her fingers clutched at his shirt, desperate for something to hold onto as the world spun away.
He kissed her like she was oxygen after drowning, like she was every answer he’d been searching for.
His other hand splayed across the small of her back, pressing her impossibly closer until there was no space left between them, only heat and want and this overwhelming tenderness that made her chest ache for him.
She melted into him, a soft sound escaping her throat that made him groan against her lips.
The kiss turned hungry, passionate, his tongue sliding against hers in a dance they’d perfected but that still felt new every single time.
Her toes literally curled in her shoes as he backed her against the lighthouse door, the cool wood contrasting with the fire spreading through her veins.
Amidst the kisses, she managed to say, “I got the birth control taken out when I went to see the doctor a couple of days ago.”
He groaned, deepening the kiss as his hand traced to her belly before his fingers slipped past the waist band of her track pants. She moaned when his fingers found her epicenter.
“My beautiful wife.”
The words were primal and resonated deep inside her. She knew now, it was another way for Ashok to say how much he loved her. She thought about how they both went from fighting what was a bodily pull, attraction fueled by proximity, only to be proven all wrong.
She gasped his name as he started to stroke her core and a peak was building up quickly. The cold air from the Pacific ocean was no match to the inferno within. It was a massive peak that was building up and she pulled back and said, “Let’s make a baby.”
In her wildest dreams, she never imagined this moment, never imagined she could feel this much, want something so fiercely, loved being reckless in love.
For years, she’d been a fortress. Guarded. Shut down. Every emotion locked behind walls she’d built brick by careful brick, convinced that safety meant stillness, that control meant silence.
But being there, right in the middle of the vast Pacific ocean with nothing but endless blue stretching to the horizon and the man she loved standing before her, those walls didn’t stand a chance.
The ocean wind whipped her hair around her face as she let him devour her, her hands trembling not with fear but with the sheer magnitude of what she felt in the moment. Every touch was a revelation, every breath a confession she’d kept buried for too long.
The waves crashed against the cliff down below, the world reduced to saltwater and sunlight and the thundering of her heart as she showed him, with every kiss, every whispered word, every desperate press of her body against his, exactly how much she loved him.
When he united them with a hard drive, she came undone. She was a new person.
Wild. Unguarded. Explosive.
Everything she’d taught herself not to be.
And it felt like it was just the beginning and she could do anything, with him by her side, with him being her strength, the unwanted husband she loved with all her heart and more.
When they finally surfaced from the intense moments, they were both breathing hard, foreheads pressed together, his thumb brushing her swollen bottom lip.
“I love you,” he whispered against her mouth, the words a vow. “Isha, I love you so much it terrifies me.”
She smiled through the tears now sliding down her cheeks. “Good. Because you’re stuck with me forever.”
“Forever it is,” he breathed, and kissed her again, softer this time, sweeter, a promise sealed against her lips under the lighthouse that had witnessed their journey from strangers to eternal love.
“I love you,” she said simply. “Just Ashok. I love you.”
He smiled and that was all she needed and they adjusted their clothes and hair before they stepped out of the lighthouse together. They stood hand in hand, ring glinting on her finger, looking at each other and they both knew these moments would be with them forever.
What started as a proposal was a promise. A beginning. A choice they would make every day for the rest of their lives. To love each other deeply.
The ocean kept its eternal rhythm far below, but up by the lighthouse, suspended between sea and sky, Ashok and Isha had found something even more enduring.
They’d found each other, forever.