Chapter - 26
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By the time I left our room, it was almost evening.
I walked into my office, loosened my tie and placed my phone on the desk before sitting down, opening the first file that had been waiting for me since morning, except my mind refused to stay where it should have been, slipping back instead to a conversation I had no intention of replaying this soon.
Parthvi's words had been clear. I had understood them the first time.
I cannot accept you for what you are to me right now, either. My heart does not accept you as my husband but you still are, on paper. I just don't know what to do.
These were her exact words.
I leaned back in my chair and let out a breath, my eyes fixed on the file in front of me without really seeing the words printed on it because no matter how many times I reminded myself that this marriage had been a decision taken after careful thought and the law, after weighing consequences and responsibilities, it did not change the fact that the weight of it had fallen unevenly.
She had been clear about that too, even if she had not said it aloud.
Parthvi had not asked for this life. She had not asked to be moved away from her home, her routines, her sense of safety and placed into a world where everything was a consequence of something she had not done in the first place.
I had told myself that she would adapt, that time would soften the hatred, that stability would come with routine but sitting here and replaying the look in her eyes when she spoke, I knew that revenge often comes at a cost people like me rarely have to pay.
And she had already paid with everything she had.
Everything was so complicated here and there was no escape for the either of us.
I straightened in my chair and reached for another file, forcing myself to read this time. It did not last.
Even since I had brought Parthvi here, I had hardly worked, hardly focused on anything that was not her and this was an unsettling realisation because I had built my entire life on discipline and distance, on the ability to separate personal from professional, emotion from duty and now that separation seemed thinner than it had ever been.
I closed the file and let my hand rest on it to anchor myself because this was not how things were supposed to be for someone in my position, not for someone who had learned early that hesitation was a luxury and second thoughts were a weakness you could not afford to show.
Yet here I was, thinking about the way she sits in our room hardly saying a word without a reason, about how she had tried to argue even when her body was clearly giving up on her and about the way she refused help not out of pride alone but out of hopelessness.
I pushed my chair back and stood, walking to the window without really knowing why, looking out at the grounds below where everything was orderly and quiet.
I wondered when I had started noticing such small details about her, the way her eyes softened when she spoke to the staff, the care with which she moved around Ishaan, the gentleness she carried with herself despite having every reason to be angry.
"Bhaiya." Yuvaan called for me and I turned around to see him standing at the door.
"Come on in." I said and he closed the door behind him.
"Bhabhisa's college called just a while ago.
They wanted to let her know that she had scored the highest GPA in the batch and that her mark transcripts and degree certificate were being sent here to the palace since she could not attend her convocation.
They were not even sure if she knows that the results are out since the did not notice any login into her student portal for months. " He told me.
For a moment, I did not say anything, just stood there looking at Yuvaan who was looking at me, with guilt.
Between everything, I had forgotten that there was a version of Parthvi that existed outside these walls.
"Highest GPA." I repeated more to myself than to him.
Yuvaan nodded. "They sounded very proud of her."
I had taken a woman who was moving forward and forced her to stand still.
I sat down and leaned back in my chair, fingers lacing together and Yuvaan sat right opposite.
"She will not be able to work outside without grabbing too much attention and all for reasons she had nothing to do with and not without questions she should not have to answer." I spoke up after sometime.
Yuvaan nodded.
"That does not mean she shouldn't work at all." I continued.
He looked at me then, sharp and curious. "You are saying what I think you are saying Bhaiya?"
"We have enough internal divisions here that would give her a chance to showcase her skillset." I replied.
"Absolutely. People from all over the country look for one entry point here for years and not to mention we are a Fortune 500 company after all." he nodded his head, leaning back.
"She studied for years and that effort should not be rendered meaningless because of something she did not do or choose. This is the least I can do." I said.
"But she won't take it easily." he said after a while, not questioning the idea but the process.
"I will try to convince her with everything I can." I replied, my tone even.
"She won't say yes immediately." he said. "You know that."
"I do." I replied, because that part was obvious. Parthvi never took the easier path, not when it came to herself, not when anything that comes from me felt like it came with invisible strings attached.
"That is fine," I continued after a pause. "I am not asking her to agree on the spot. I am asking her to consider it."
Yuvaan leaned back again, his expression thoughtful now rather than concerned. "She will want clarity of role, responsibility and she will want independence."
"She will get all of it." I said. "No special treatment or exemptions. If she works here, she works like everyone else."
That seemed to satisfy him. He stood up, adjusted his jacket and gave me a short nod before heading out and I let myself finally work for a few hours, winding up things that I had to.
By the time I left the office and walked back towards our room, the sky outside had darkened just enough for the lights to come on along the corridors.
I slowed my steps without meaning to, already preparing myself for resistance, for suspicion and for her instinctive need to protect herself from anything that had something to do with me.
When I stopped outside the door, my hand rested on the handle for a moment longer than usual because I knew that once I stepped inside, this would no longer be about what I thought was right.
It would be about whether she trusted me enough to listen to me without thinking that I was pitying on her.
______________________________
I was sitting by the window when he came in, legs pulled close to myself, the book in my hands open to the same page it had been on for the last twenty minutes because my eyes kept moving over the words without actually reading them while I was playing subway surfers on my phone.
He did not speak right away which made me glance at him and I found him standing a little away from me, not too close, not too far, his jacket gone, sleeves rolled up and his posture relaxed.
"Aap aaraam kyun nahi kar rahi hain?" he said finally, not accusing, just observing.
"Kyunki mai bore ho gayi thi aaraam karke Ranaji. Aur waise bhi, baithi hi toh hoon, kaunsa pahad tod rahi hoon?" I replied and went back to my phone.
He nodded once and moved closer, stopping near the chair opposite me instead of taking the space beside me and for some reason that small choice eased something tight in my chest.
"I was told something today." he said, and there was a pause before he continued, like he was choosing the order of his words carefully. "About your results."
My fingers tightened slightly around the edge of the phone.
"Results?" I repeated, even though a part of me already knew.
"Your college called." he said. "You stood first in your batch."
I chuckled just a little because I almost knew that. I had always been good with my studies and well, I was not modest about it all the time.
"Vikram owes me five thousand rupees." I muttered to myself, jumping over the train and getting myself the coin magnet in the game.
I looked up only after I crashed into a barrier and the game ended, my thumb hovering over the screen for a second longer before I locked the phone and finally turned my attention to him properly.
"You knew?" he asked, one eyebrow lifting slightly.
"I suspected," I shrugged. "This dude with whom I had a bit of competition, his name is Vikram and I had a bet. Top GPA gets five thousand from the other and looks like I won."
He did not smile. If anything, a muscle twitched in his jaw and a look somewhat dangerously close to guilt surfaced in his eyes before he blinked and returned to his usual self, unreadable self.
"Anyway, how does it even matter? It's all a moo point." I quoted Joey but he did not understand my reference, of course he didn't but he did not ask me to clarify either so I was good.
"It does matter." he said, not immediately, not sharply, just firmly enough to make it clear that he was not agreeing with me. "It should matter to you."
I let out a short breath that was somewhere between a laugh and a scoff. "It does not change anything, Ranaji. I got a degree, topped my batch and now what? I'm here. That's it."
"That is not it." he said, still calm, still maddeningly measured, and that was the moment something inside me snapped just a little.
I straightened, pushing my feet down from the window seat, the book slipping shut on its own. "Then tell me what it is." I said, my voice sharper now. "Because from where I'm sitting, it looks pretty clear."
He didn't rise to it. He stayed where he was, hands relaxed and eyes steady. "You did not study for years for it to end like this."
"And whose fault is that?" The words were out before I could stop them. I laughed, but there was no humour in it. "You think I don't know that, Ranaji? You think I wake up every day thrilled about how things turned out?"
He inhaled like he was reminding himself to stay calm but that did absolutely nothing to calm me down.
"I am not saying that." he replied evenly, standing up."I am saying that this should not be the end of your...."
"My what?" I cut in, my voice rising. "My life? My ambition? My patience?" I stepped away from the window, a wave of sheer raw anger coursing through me. "Because it already feels like the end of all three Ranaji."
He took just a small step towards me and I hated how composed he looked while I felt like something was clawing its way out of my chest.
"You were the one who told me to not think of this situation as a temporary one.
" I went on, words spilling faster now. "To not treat this as a phase that will pass if I just sit quietly and behave.
You were the one who told me that this is my reality now, Ranaji.
I wake up here. I sleep here. I breathe here and every single thing I was building before this," I gestured vaguely around us, "is just erased.
I don't even know which. Don't think or try to care about my ambitions now. "
He opened his mouth to say something and then stopped, like the thought died halfway there, and for the first time since I had known him he did not look like a man in control of the room but like someone who had miscalculated and finally realised it.
That felt like a little victory.
"And now," I continued, voice rising again, "you stand here telling me that my results matter, that my hard work matters like that is supposed to fix my life?"
"I am not trying to fix your life Parthvi." he said, just as quietly.
"Then what are you trying to do?" I demanded.
He hesitated.
"I don't need you to comfort me. Fuck that is literally the last thing I want." I said, cutting in before he could speak again. "I don't need your reassurance. I don't need you suddenly noticing that I had a life before this. I needed that acknowledgement before you took it away, not now."
"I hate being angry, I hate screaming like this.
I hate it but sometimes I cannot control myself Ranaji so if you think that I am disrespecting you or your authority, you are free to leave me alone.
I promise that the next time you come back to your room, I will be perfectly composed again.
" I told him, all my anger threatening to spill in form of my tears and I turned myself away from him, biting my lower lip to not cry.
He did not leave.
That was the first thing I realised when a few seconds passed and the door did not open and when there were no footsteps moving away.
I kept my back to him, shoulders tight, breathing shallow, my hands clenched so hard that my nails bit into my palms because if I loosened even a little I knew I would cry and I refused to let that happen in front of him, not now, not after everything I had just said.
I felt him move before I heard him and his hand came to my arm first, his fingers barely closing as if he was asking permission without words and when I did not pull away he turned me slowly until I was facing him.
I didn't look up at his face.
I couldn't.
My lips trembled and my vision blurred.
He stepped closer then, close enough that the space between us disappeared, close enough that my forehead brushed the centre of his chest, and then his arms came around me, one hand settling at my upper back, the other resting lower like he was anchoring me in place.
I hated how small I felt right then and how my head turned on its own and pressed against his shoulder without an ounce of resistance.
That was when I lost it.
The tears came fast and ugly, soaking into his shirt as my hands fisted into the fabric at his sides, my breath hitching and breaking.
He lowered his head slightly, just enough that his cheek rested against my hair, and one of his hands moved up slowly, brushing down my back.
"I'm sorry Parthvi." he said, so quietly that if I hadn't been pressed against him I might not have heard it at all.
My shoulders shook harder at that, my fingers curling even tighter into his shirt.
"I am sorry." he said again, slower this time, like he needed me to hear it properly, like he needed himself to say it properly. "I'm so sorry."
I cried harder, my forehead pushing into him, my breath coming out in broken gasps, and he didn't pull back or hesitate, didn't loosen his hold even when my tears soaked through his shirt completely.
"I should have seen you as a human being before anything else." he murmured, his cheek still resting against my hair, his hand steady on my back. "I should have understood what I was taking from you."
Another apology followed, and then another, the words uneven, imperfect, nothing rehearsed about them.
"I am sorry." he said again, and this time his hand pressed a little more firmly at my back, not trapping me, just holding me there like he was afraid I might collapse if he let go. "I am sorry for the anger, for the silence and for the way you were made to carry everything alone."
I didn't answer him.
All I could do was cry into his shoulder, my body shaking with it, my chest hurting as everything I had swallowed down finally came up and he stayed exactly where he was.
"I am sorry." he whispered again and again, the words threading through my sobs, not trying to stop them, not asking me to calm down, just letting them exist.
At some point my crying slowed, not because it was over but because I was exhausted, my grip loosening slightly, my breath still uneven but no longer breaking apart completely but he didn't take that as a cue to pull away.
His hand continued its slow movement on my back, his other arm steady around me, and even when another small sob tore out of me, he only held me closer for a second before whispering it again, softer this time.
"I'm sorry."
Somewhere between his last apology and my slowing breath, the fog in my head lifted just enough for the awareness to hit me.
I was in his arms.
My hands were still gripping his shirt. My cheek was still against his shoulder. His warmth was still around me, solid and steady and far too real.
I stiffened instantly.
Before he could react, before my body could betray me again, I pulled back sharply, my hands dropping from him as if I had been burned, and I took two quick steps away, putting space between us.
"I......" my voice cracked and I hated it. I wiped at my face roughly, dragging my palms under my eyes, across my cheeks and anywhere to erase the proof. "I'm sorry."
"I shouldn't have....." I shook my head, sucking in a breath. "I'm sorry."
He didn't move toward me.
That somehow made it worse and better at the same time.
I kept wiping my face even though there were no tears left to wipe, my fingers trembling, my chest still tight. I felt exposed in a way I hadn't expected, like I had let him see something I had guarded fiercely even from myself.
"I didn't mean to......." I stopped, because I didn't even know what I was apologising for anymore. Crying, losing control or letting him hold me or all of them.
He stood exactly where I had left him, his arms slowly falling back to his sides, his posture careful.
For a few seconds, neither of us spoke.
Then he took a breath.
"Sit," he said gently, not as an order, not even really directed at me, more like an offering, a suggestion.
I hesitated, then sank back onto the edge of the window seat, suddenly exhausted, my legs weak, my hands clasped together tightly in my lap.
He didn't sit next to me, he handed me a glass of water.
He pulled the chair a little closer, still leaving space, and sat down, leaning forward slightly, forearms resting on his thighs and his gaze lowered to the floor for a moment before lifting back to me.
"I did not mean to push you." he said quietly after a while. "I was not trying to corner you."
I nodded once, even though I wasn't sure what exactly I was agreeing with.
"You have every right to be mad at me, to hate me." he added.
That made my throat tighten again, but this time I swallowed it down and he looked beyond me just for a second before meeting my eyes again.
"I see you sitting in this room day after day and I know that this is not what you want but this is what you have because of me." he said.
"Not just because of you, a lot of it also has to do with the fact that my father killed your mother." I don't know why, but I let myself say it.
His jaw tightened once again and he nodded once.
"Yes." he said. "That truth exists too."
"There is a position." he said carefully, changing the topic. "Within our finance team. You would be assessed like anyone else. Paid like anyone else."
I straightened after almost freezing. HOW DARE HE? "So that's what this is."
He frowned. "Parthvi...."
"No." I stood up again, my tiredness snapping cleanly into anger. "Don't."
My hands curled into fists at my sides. "You let me scream, you let me cry, you say sorry a hundred times and then you offer me a job out of pity."
"That is not what this is."
"It is exactly what this is." I shot back, my voice sharper now. "You feel guilty and this is how you fix it. Give her work. Keep her busy."
He stood up too, slower than me, calmer. "This is not pity."
"Then what is it?" I demanded. "Charity? Control?"
I laughed, bitter and short. "Do you have any idea how insulting this feels? Like I should be grateful that my husband is generous enough to employ me."
"That is not how I see you."
"But that's how it feels to me," I snapped. "I will not work for you because you feel bad. I will not sit in your company knowing every single person will think I'm there because of my marriage or your mercy."
He opened his mouth to respond but I didn't let him.
"I didn't work for years to become someone's sympathy project." I said, my chest heaving. "And I will not take anything from you that comes from guilt and then thank you for it."
The anger was back fully now and the damn room felt too suffocating for me to breathe.
"I am done." I said and didn't wait to see his reaction.
I grabbed my phone from the window seat with hands that were still shaking, pushed past the chair he had pulled closer, past him and walked straight to the door.
"Parthvi....." he started.
I didn't stop.
I didn't look back.
The door opened under my palm and I stepped out, my legs moving and I kept walking, faster than I meant to, my footsteps echoing in the corridor that literally felt endless with only one thought in my head -
HOW FUCKING DARE HE?