Chapter - 34
I placed the phone down on the nightstand after the call ended and remained seated on the edge of the bed for a few seconds. I had already known she had reached safely hours ago because the security officer who had accompanied her had informed me the moment they arrived.
She had said she would call as well, but when no call came, I had assumed she had forgotten.
So when my phone rang late at night and her name appeared on the screen, it had caught me off guard.
What surprised me even more was that she hung up the very second the call connected, and before I could stop myself, a smile had already formed on my face as I called her back.
The woman could begin with one topic and somehow reach five others before she was done. Tonight she had called to tell me she had reached safely. Somewhere between that and saying goodnight, we had discussed her book, leave application and my habit of analysing everything.
A small breath left me as I stood up and reached for the glass of water beside the bed.
My gaze landed on the book lying on her side almost immediately.
I picked it up and turned it over once in my hand before opening it.
Within seconds I found folded corners on multiple pages.
There were lines underlined in pencil and even a small note written in the margin beside one paragraph.
I stared at it for a moment before shaking my head.
For somebody who claimed to love books as much as she did, she certainly had an interesting way of showing it.
I closed it and placed it back on the nightstand, already knowing she would have an entire argument prepared if I brought it up later.
A loud knock sounded against the door before it was pushed open and Ishaan came running into the room at a speed that suggested somebody was either chasing him or about to.
Knowing Ishaan, both were equally possible.
I barely had enough time to straighten before he launched himself onto the bed beside me, his hair still damp from his bath and his cheeks pink from where traces of Holi colour refused to leave despite several attempts.
"Bade Papa, save me." he announced dramatically.
I looked at him.
Then at the open door.
Then back at him.
"What have you done?"
His expression immediately turned offended.
"Why do you always assume I have done something?"
"Experience."
That answer seemed to satisfy him because he nodded thoughtfully before grabbing one of the pillows and hugging it to his chest.
A second later Yuvaan appeared at the door.
"I knew the little rascal would be here." he said the moment he spotted his son on my bed.
"You say that like I am difficult to find." Ishaan complained.
"You are not difficult to find. You leave evidence behind wherever you go."
I watched Ishaan narrow his eyes suspiciously at his father before deciding he did not understand the insult and moving on.
Yuvaan walked further inside and dropped into the chair near the window with the familiarity of somebody who had been entering this room for most of his life.
Neither of us spoke for a few seconds. Then Yuvaan shook his head.
"I still cannot believe what happened today." he was amused and I knew exactly what he was talking about, the entire palace knew.
"Neither can I." I admitted.
Because if somebody had told me a few months ago that Ishaan would spend Holi attacking guards with water guns, that Baba would sit in the lawn watching everyone play colours and that Dadisaa would allow it to happen inside the palace without getting angry, I would have questioned their sanity.
And yet all of it had happened in a single day because one woman had decided that everybody was celebrating whether they wanted to or not.
A laugh escaped Yuvaan as if he had followed the same line of thought.
"Bhabhi is dangerous." he declared and I found myself agreeing with him.
Ishaan immediately sat up straighter.
"No, Pri is not." he folded his little arms, looking mad.
"She absolutely is." Yuvaan argued. "Do you know she spent twenty minutes convincing me that Holi without colours was practically a crime?"
I felt the corner of my mouth twitch because that sounded exactly like something Parthvi would do.
"Pri says traditions should make people happy." Ishaan informed us very seriously. "Otherwise there is no point."
The strange thing was that I could hear her voice while he repeated the words. I could practically picture the expression she would have worn while explaining it to him, complete confidence in a statement she had probably created on the spot.
Yuvaan leaned back further into the chair.
"You know what surprised me the most today?" he added.
"What?" I asked as he was quiet for a second.
"Baba."
That made me nod at him.
"He was happy today, Bhai." he said after a moment. "Genuinely happy."
I looked away for a second, my gaze settling on the book still lying on the nightstand.
Because he was right.
I had seen it too.
Baba had spent years watching life happen around him. Most days his reactions were small, limited to a blink, a twitch of his lips, a movement of his fingers if we were lucky.
Today had been different.
Today I had watched his eyes follow Parthvi across the lawn with his eyes while she argued with Ishaan.
I had watched him smile when she attacked Yuvaan with a colour balloon and laugh silently when she decided everybody in the palace needed to participate whether they agreed or not.
Most importantly, I had watched him look alive and that was not something I could ignore.
For somebody who had only entered our lives recently and as a debt her family owed, Parthvi had managed to change far more than she realised.
The meeting lasted nearly two hours.
"Sir, if we move the launch to next quarter, we'll have more room in the budget."
"We will also lose momentum." I replied, glancing at the figures in front of me. "Keep the timeline where it is. Find the savings somewhere else."
A few seats down, someone immediately raised another concern.
"What about the vendor proposal? Their revised quote is still above the approved limit."
"Then negotiate again." I said. "If they refuse to come down, start looking at alternatives."
"Sir, should we proceed with the expansion plan as discussed?"
"Not yet. I want updated numbers before we make that decision."
By the time the meeting finally ended, the conference table was covered with marked documents and half-empty coffee cups, and everyone looked relieved to be leaving.
"Do you approve the proposal, bhaiya?" Yuvaan asked from across the table.
I glanced through the final set of papers before closing the file.
"The direction is satisfactory." I said. "Keep up the work. However, revise the implementation timeline, strengthen the risk assessment section and provide more detailed cost projections before final approval."
Several people nodded while making notes.
"Make those changes and send me the updated version by tomorrow."
With that, I stood and theroom gradually emptied as employees gathered their files and laptops.
As I walked back toward my office, my eyes shifted across the floor and stopped at Parthvi's cubicle. She had only occupied it for five days before leaving and yet it already looked completely different from every other workstation around it.
The desk was impossible to miss.
Colourful sticky notes were attached to practically every available surface.
One sat crookedly on her monitor. Another was stuck to the edge of a file tray.
A bright pink one had somehow ended up attached to the side of her pen stand.
Several coloured pens lay scattered across the desk alongside a collection of highlighters that looked excessive even from a distance.
I stared at it for a moment.
Then continued walking.
Three steps later, I stopped.
A few seconds after that, I turned around and walked back toward the cubicle.
Nobody paid much attention to me. Most employees were busy with their own work and the few who noticed probably assumed I was checking something related to one of her assignments.
The moment I reached the desk, I realised it looked even worse up close.
There were sticky notes everywhere.
Not organised sticky notes.
Random sticky notes.
One contained a reminder to call a client. Another had a meeting time scribbled across it. One simply had the word urgent written in large letters without specifying what exactly was urgent. I picked it up and immediately found myself wondering how she managed to function like this.
Her collection of highlighters were scattered across the desk.
There were six of them in six different colours.
I had spent years running businesses across multiple industries and had never once felt the need to highlight anything in purple.
Yet there it was.
Purple.
Besides pink, green, blue, orange and yellow as if she approached financial reports with the enthusiasm of somebody decorating a school project.
Then I noticed the legal pad lying open beside her keyboard and my mistake was to look at it because half the page contained actual notes related to work and the other half contained doodles of small flowers, random shapes and a cartoon face in the corner.
I stood there staring at the page longer than I should have before shaking my head. If she ever tried submitting one of these notebooks as evidence of professional competence, even I would struggle to defend her.
My attention moved across the rest of the desk because of a tiny decorative keychain that hung from one corner of the partition.
It looked like Pangong Tso in Ladakh.
"So you love the mountains, don't you?" I asked, picking the keychain up.
The entire cubicle looked less like a workspace and more like evidence that a small storm had briefly passed through the office and left stationery behind as collateral damage.
Without thinking, I reached toward the back of her chair and let my hand rest against it. For a second I simply stood there before looking down at my own hand with a frown.
What exactly was I doing? The question came immediately and I had absolutely no answer for it.
I withdrew my hand at once and straightened before taking a step back from the cubicle, suddenly aware of how absurd I must have looked standing there analysing her desk.
There was absolutely no reason for me to be lingering around her workspace when I had an entire stack of pending files sitting on my desk, several emails that required responses and enough actual responsibilities to occupy every minute of the afternoon.
Standing around somebody else's cubicle inspecting sticky notes, highlighters and doodles was not only unproductive but also dangerously close to behaviour I would have criticised in anyone else.
Shaking my head once as if that alone could clear the strange distraction from my mind, I turned around and walked back toward my office, fully intending to forget the entire incident had ever happened and return my attention to matters that were important.
Unfortunately, the moment I sat down and picked up the document I had been reviewing earlier, my eyes drifted through the glass wall once again and landed exactly where it should not have.
This was ridiculous.
"You are losing your mind over Bhabhi, aren't you?" Yuvaan showed himself into my office and sat opposite to me and I pulled myself together to glare at the screen in front of me once again.
"Don't you have a meeting to attend?" I asked him. He should have been on his way to meet Commerce Minister of the State.
"It got pushed back to tomorrow. His secretary just called but that still doesn't answer my question." he shrugged and made himself comfortable.
"And what makes you think that I am here to answer all of your questions?" I raised a brow at him, only to get him to smirk like a madman.
"You know, I was the same when I fell for Pankhuri.
I would detach and avoid every time I thought of her or every time she was around.
But she called me out on my bullshit and said that if I feel something for her, I should tell her or else she will be forced to meet guys her parents were shortlisting to get her married.
However, considering that Bhabhisa and you are already married and that she will rather jump into the ocean with the sharks rather than even remotely consider the possibility that she just might like you a little bit and considering that you were the one to bring her here, I know that there is only one person who will have to take the first few steps into your relationship and I am looking at that person right now. " he blabbered.
I stared at him for a long moment after he finished speaking.
The irritating thing was that Yuvaan looked entirely too pleased with himself but the even more irritating thing was that he genuinely believed he had figured something out.
"You sound remarkably pleased with yourself for someone who has spent the last ten minutes talking nonsense." I finally said, returning my attention to the document in front of me.
" I am confident because I am right." Yuvaan declared confidently.
"You are not." I replied flatly.
"I am." he insisted with a smug grin.
I looked up from the file and he looked back without even attempting to hide the amusement in his eyes.
How was a man who spent most of his time negotiating multi-crore deals and handling complex business decisions so immature whenever he thought he had discovered something personal about me?
"I went through this entire phase myself, Bhai." Yuvaan continued knowingly, settling further into the chair. "The denial, the avoidance, the pretending that nothing was happening. I know exactly what it looks like."
"You are comparing your situation with Pankhuri to mine with Parthvi." I said incredulously.
"Yes." He replied without hesitation.
"That alone tells me this conversation has no value." I said dryly.
Yuvaan rolled his eyes dramatically.
"See? This is exactly what I mean." he said pointedly.
"No, what you mean is that because you have everything you ever wanted, you now think you are qualified to analyse everybody else's life." I retorted.
"Not everybody else's." Yuvaan replied casually.
"Mine included apparently." I said with annoyance.
"Especially yours." he said with a grin.
A laugh almost escaped him and I had to resist the urge to throw something in his direction.
The problem with younger brothers was that they spent their entire childhood learning exactly which buttons to press. The problem with Yuvaan specifically was that he enjoyed pressing them.
"Bhai, let's say for one second that I am completely wrong." He leaned forward slightly ans suggested.
"You are." I replied immediately.
"Fine. Let's say I am completely wrong. Then explain something to me." he said patiently.
I already disliked the direction of this conversation.
"What?" I asked cautiously.
"Why were you standing at her desk?" Yuvaan questioned.
I looked back down at the file.
"She works for this company." I answered calmly.
"So do twelve thousand other people." Yuvaan pointed out flatly.
"I was checking her workspace." I replied.
"Why?" he asked instantly.
The question came immediately, far too quickly for it to be casual. I knew exactly what he was doing.
"I wanted to see how much damage she had managed to cause in five days." I said with no thought.
That made him laugh.
"See? That right there." Yuvaan said between chuckles.
"What now?" I asked irritably.
"You sound fond." he replied knowingly.
I shut the file slowly. Very slowly.
"Yuvaan." I said in warning.
"Yes?" he replied innocently.
"Do you enjoy testing the limits of my patience?" I asked.
"More than I should." He admitted cheerfully.
At least he was honest.
"You miss her and we both know it. You can try and fool yourself but you are not fooling me.
I actually just came by to tell you that unlike you, I can call her whenever I feel like and so I did.
That's how I found out that is currently busy with Gangaur Pooja and will come back here today itself because her bhabhi's family are coming over in a last minute plan and she does not want them to be uncomfortable sleeping out in the hall. " he told me.
I watched him for a moment after he finished speaking. She was coming back sooner than she was supposed to and the information settled somewhere in my chest while I kept my lips pressed together.
"As fascinating as this update is," I said dryly, leaning back in my chair while fixing him with an unimpressed look, "I am struggling to understand why you felt the need to share every detail of her day with me."
Yuvaan's grin widened immediately, the expression of a man who had just received confirmation of something he already believed.
"Because you wanted to know. and I know it." Yuvaan replied confidently, crossing one ankle over the other as though he had all the time in the world.
I waved his hand to dismiss him but without a care in the world, he took out a bag of peanuts from his pocket, make himself even more comfortable on the chair and started eating them, looking at me.
All I could do was sigh and continue working.
I should have been just a little bit annoyed that I was going to have to leave today instead of tomorrow but for a few reasons known and unknown, I was not.
The first being that Ruhani Bhabhi really needed her family around. She had started with her sixth month of pregnancy and Jai bhaiya was going to be off to a business tour for the next entire month. She needs all the help she can get to get through.
The second reason was a little more complicated.
Or maybe it wasn't.
Maybe I was simply refusing to look at it too closely because the moment I did, I would have to admit certain things to myself and I was not ready for that conversation yet.
This morning began much earlier than any of us would have preferred.
Gangaur had always been an important festival in our family, and Mumma took every ritual associated with it very seriously.
By eight in the morning, she had already made sure the puja for the first day had been completed properly, supervised the preparations around the house, checked on Ruhani Bhabhi at least six times and reminded me twice that married women were supposed to participate sincerely.
I was wearing a red bandhani saree which mumma had taught me to wear and my head was covered with another red heavy dupatta during the puja.
We worshipped Bhagwan Shiv and Maa Parvati after making their idols and sowing bajra.
After that, the mehendi artist came in. Technically we were supposed to get it done last night but we played Holi so much that our hands were all pink. Bhabhi got hers done first, then mumma and then me.
"Raanisa, Ranaji ka naam likh doon aapki hatheli pe?" the artist asked me after she was almost done after an hour.
"N..nahi. Kisi ka bhi naam nahi likhna hai." I told her, shaking my head, my thoughts going back to him, my husband.
Unfortunately, bhabhi and mumma heard it.
"I thought that last night we talked about you giving your marriage an honest chance?" bhabhi asked me, raising a brow.
"And how is this connected to that?" I asked her, my cheeks turning a little red because mumma did not know this and she was now looking at me with happiness in her eyes, so much happiness.
"He is ready to really accept you as his wife too?" she asked me, a tear escaping her eye.
"Well.....he said that he wanted to try and I agreed.
I know that he took me away from all of you but I don't know what else to do mumma.
I don't know if I would be able to live my entire life in that palace as an outsider.
Will you be able to forgive me for this?
Will Papa?" I asked her, my own eyes turning glassy with tears.
"Oh, Parthvi. Of course beta. All we want is that you live happily and besides, you had to go with him because of something this family did to his, something unforgivable and despite of all that history if he is able to look at you with the feeling of wanting to accept you, that will make us nothing but happy.
" she said, walking over to me and kissed my forehead.
"Aap likh dijiye Ranaji ka naam unki Raanisa ki hatheli par." she added, addressing the artist now.
"Mumma!" I gasped immediately making her and bhabhi laugh.
The artist waisted no time and wrote Rudra in Hindi near the ring finger of my left hand.
Just as I was done, Bhabhi's family rang the doorbell.
I stood up and walked out, greeting everyone and mostly them being extremely awkward around me now, considering I was the queen and all.
I tried my best to put them at ease but none of it was helping and they were so damn conscious around me so I decided to excuse myself and took mumma, papa and Jai bhaiya away for a minute, telling them that I should get going or it will be really late at night by the time I reach the palace.
As always, they hated that I had to leave, I did too but it was not as painful as earlier because I knew that I could come back and see them anytime I really wanted to without any problem.
Ranaji had given me his word and stood by it.
"I want you here next month for Ruhani's Godh Bharai Parthvi and I mean it." Mumma said, pulling me into a hug and I nodded.
"Of course mumma. I was never going to miss it in the first place." I told her.
"On the last day of Gangaur, decorate the palace and pray well, Parthvi. Pray for your marital life and bliss. I will too. Stay happy, my doll." he said with a sad smile.
I hugged Papa too and he didn't let me go for a while and then Jai bhaiya escorted me out of the house towards the car with my bag in his hand.
"You sure you shouldn't be removing your mehendi before sitting in the car?" he asked looking at my hand and then at me.
"Tried to, mumma threatened to hit my head." I told him and he rolled his eyes, opening the door for me.
"Chaliye Kaka." I said with a smile to the driver and waived bhaiya a goodbye.
He waited until the car had pulled out of the gates before finally turning back toward the house.
I watched him disappear from sight through the rear window and then settled back against the seat with a small sigh.
The mehendi on my hands had dried considerably during the afternoon and now I had to sit carefully to avoid smudging it against anything. The smell of henna filled the car faintly and every time I looked down at my palms, my eyes automatically found his name, making me look away immediately.
I shifted slightly, careful of my hands, and rested my head against the window.
Just for a minute.
Only a minute.
The next thing I knew, somebody was saying my name.
"Parthvi." The voice was deep and familiar and for a moment, I frowned slightly without opening my eyes. I was warm, comfortable and completely unwilling to move.
"Parthvi." The voice came again, this time a little closer.
Slowly, I opened my eyes.
For a second, everything looked blurry. The lights outside the car appeared too bright and my neck ached from sleeping in an awkward position for what was clearly much longer than a minute.
Then my vision focused.
And the first thing I saw was Ranaji standing outside the open car door.
He had one hand resting against the top of the door and the other tucked behind his back. The lights from the palace entrance fell across his face and for a moment I simply stared at him, still trying to wake up properly.
A small smile appeared at the corner of his mouth when he realised I was finally awake and when my eyes widened at the sight of the palace outside, I looked from him to the entrance and back again before asking sleepily, "Did I reach?" my blinked a few times, the question directed at myself.
"I would certainly hope so." he replied while stepping back to give me space. "You have been parked outside the entrance for the last five minutes before I was told that you are here."
I sat up so quickly that my neck immediately protested and a groan escaped me before I could stop it and I reached up instinctively before remembering my mehendi-covered hands halfway through the movement.
Ranaji watched the entire thing happen in silence before shaking his head slightly.
"You slept in a moving vehicle for three hours. What exactly were you expecting?" he asked, his voice calm as he stepped aside to allow me room to get out.
"That's just cruel. You should not be making fun of a person who is already in pain." Ranaji watched the entire thing happen in silence before shaking his head slightly.
I muttered under my breath, trying very hard not to move too quickly.
"I was not aware that stating facts qualified as cruelty." he replied with a hint of amusement.
"It does when the facts are being used against me." I shot back with a frown.
"I'll keep that in mind." he said solemnly and the man sounded completely serious.
I narrowed my eyes at him while carefully moving towards the edge of the seat. The problem was that I genuinely could not move properly. My neck hurt, my shoulder hurt and the mehendi on my hands had turned something as simple as getting out of a car into a logistical challenge.
"You know what Ranaji, your car is so damn comfortable that I plan on sleeping right in here. Just ask kaka to turn the AC on and I'll be set for the night." I announced, leaning back once again, against the backrest.
"Come on, Parthvi." he said looking like he was almost done with me.
"Why are you not taking me seriously? I mean it. I am sleeping here tonight for sure." I shrugged, closing my eyes but I could still feel his eyes boring into my face and heard a faint sigh before I heard the door shut.
"Chalo, kabhi toh inhone meri baat maani." I said and adjusted myself but my peace did not last long as I heard the door of the car once again open, the seat beside me dip and then closed.
I opened an eye to see what was happening only to find him sitting right next to me.
"What are you doing?" I asked suspiciously, turning my head fully toward him as I studied his face, trying to understand why he had willingly chosen to sit inside a cramped car when an enormous palace stood only a short distance away.
Ranaji settled back comfortably against the seat as though he belonged there, crossing one arm over his chest before answering in a calm, unbothered voice, "You said you were sleeping here."
"Yes." I replied cautiously, already sensing that I was not going to like whatever came next.
"So am I." he said evenly, without the slightest hint of hesitation.
I blinked.
Once.
Then twice.
Surely I had heard him wrong.
"You are what?" I asked slowly, staring at him as though he had suddenly lost all sense.
"I am sleeping here." Ranaji repeated in the same composed tone, as if he were stating an obvious fact rather than announcing something completely absurd.
The man answered with such calm certainty that for a second I almost believed him.
Almost.
Then I narrowed my eyes.
"No." I said firmly, shaking my head.
"No?" he asked, lifting an eyebrow slightly as he looked at me with quiet amusement.
"No." I repeated with even more conviction.
"Why not?" Ranaji asked patiently, sounding genuinely curious about my objection.
I stared at him in complete disbelief.
"Because this is ridiculous!!!!" I said emphatically, gesturing toward the palace outside the windshield. "There is an entire palace behind us. A palace. Normal people do not choose to sleep in a car when they have access to that."
"It was not ridiculous when it was your idea." he pointed out calmly, his voice carrying just enough logic to make my argument weaker than I wanted it to be.
"That is different." I argued immediately.
"How?" he asked, tilting his head slightly while waiting for an explanation.
"Because..." I began confidently, opening my mouth as though I had a perfectly reasonable answer prepared.
Unfortunately, I realised halfway through the sentence that I had absolutely nothing.
I paused.
Then tried again.
"Because it just is!" I finished stubbornly, refusing to admit defeat.
His expression didn't change even slightly. There was no frustration, no confusion, no attempt to argue further, he simply looked at me with that infuriatingly calm face of his, which somehow made arguing with him even worse.
For a few moments neither of us spoke, and I watched him carefully, waiting for some sign that he was joking, but there wasn't one. He wasn't even looking at anything in particular, just sitting there like a man who genuinely intended to spend the night in a car. The idiot.
A minute passed, then another, and then, to my absolute horror, Ranaji reached into his pocket, took out his phone, and began reading something as though he had completely settled in and accepted this situation.
"Oh my God!!" I whispered in disbelief.
"What now?" he asked calmly without looking up from his phone.
"You are seriously committed to this." I said incredulously.
"You wanted to sleep here." he replied matter-of-factly.
"I meant that I wanted that for me, not for you!!" I protested.
That finally made him look at me.
Ranaji said firmly, "There is absolutely no scenario in which I allow my wife to spend the night in a car parked outside my palace while I sleep comfortably inside."
The answer came so smoothly and so matter-of-factly that I actually took a few seconds to process and by the time I did, rush rushed down my cheeks.
"Fine! Let's go inside but I will need a little help." I said, letting my hair fall on my cheeks to hide my stupid blush.
A small smile appeared at the corner of his mouth, like he knew exactly why I was suddenly avoiding looking at him but was kind enough not to mention it.
Without a word, he held his hand out toward me.
I rolled my eyes, placed my mehendi-covered fingers in his palm and let him help me out of the car.
Together, we walked toward the palace, neither of us saying anything, and for the first time since arriving in Ratangarh, I did not feel the urge to run away.