burning in love

episode 2

“I belong to a rich family; I would help him….” she desperately made excuses.   

“no, baby you have a rich father. Avery rich one, who definitely threw your brother out for disgracing the family on my suggestion. Well you remember I saved your brother and his beautiful wife from death by intervening I suppose. You need a reminder how your bastard brother pleaded begged for mercy, if he wanted, he would have helped him at that time accepted his wife and he wouldn’t have been ended up in this situation. And you know he will never support you from a messy divorce, would he? and without your fathers’ money how would you support him? never mind how will support yourself?”. he laughed  

 “I still don’t believe you would do this? You have some reputation to uphold. You are an honest businessman why would you destroy a small company just to prove a f*****g point. What kind of message will that give to the society?” she asked very bravely.

“that I am not anyone that anyone can touch!” he shrugged. “do you honestly think I care what people think about me, Aditi? do you think I give a damn what you think of me? I never have never done and never will sweety. You are weak. You are spoilt….”

 “shut up. I am not…” she tried to defend herself but he scoffed behind his throat and as if she didn’t utter a word he swiftly continued.

“eventually you will get this divorce of yours but before that there’s something I need to get from you first! you and your father wanted this marriage, remember? you begged me for it”

 He though for a second, and then continued “your extra ordinary wish of divorce will come with a heavy penalty attached. Your brother real brother would be doomed. His business would be shattered and his upcoming child would suffer because his aunt.”

He knew her well enough that she wouldn’t do it! He knew he had her exactly where he wanted her. There would be no divorce. Not when so much hung in the balance. But there would be changes for sure… Aditya’s done. She cannot be a doormat all over again when she finally had a hope, hope of rebelliousness. She said nothing, choosing to turn and walk away instead. He watched her go, she could feel his gaze burning into her slender back but he did not call her back. She did not return to the bedroom they were sharing since the first night of their marriage but opted to head to the library knowing that she could not sleep another wink. Not in that room of horror. Not in this library. Not anymore….

He came downstairs, hours later, for breakfast. It was a Saturday morning and he usually didn’t have any early morning meetings to rush off to on a Saturday, instead he tended to linger over his newspaper and expresso and largely ignored Aditi.  That morning was no different. as if their early morning argument hadn’t happened at all. They usually ate their casual weekend meals in the kitchen and the homey setting lent a false sense of domesticity to the scene. While Aditya’s not only uncomfortable but was feeling like she insulted herself but our Viren remained as cool as an icebox would.

Then again, that was nothing new as he rarely showed interest in showing any of his emotion apart from his lust. infect the “discussion” of that morning was the most heated she had even seen him which normal people would definitely call as cool. He kept his feeling under the covers but he always made his intention for her clear. It was in the way he refused to see her eyes; he worshipped her body but never made any affection. More than 2 years of marriage and he had never kissed on her lips. It was his way how he talked past her when he had something to tell her. And here it was Aditi who was so pure soul that she hardly was able to hide any feeling from him.

She was a hopeless teenager very eager to marry the love of the life quickly fell in love with the mate her father had chosen…. She shook herself, refusing to think about the things she could not change instead tried to focus on changing her present.  

Breakfast passed with agonising slowness; the silence prevailed. She barely ate and anguish filled insides. How could someone be so unaffected by the tension between them and their partner that they could heartily finish the meal.

“you should at least eat one chapati to keep yourself alive., “his voice suddenly growled totally unexpectedly. “look at yourself I bet you have lost a few kgs of weight for sure. You look thin” the fact that he had noticed what she would eaten, despite having hardly glanced at her over his newspaper startled her.

“I’m not that hungry…” she responded softly and placed her dishes in the sink.

“you barely eat enough to keep a hamster alive”, he lowered his paper and met her eyes for a few seconds before diverting his gaze back to the mug of his coffee on the table in front go him. The direct eye contact was so unusual, that Aditi barely restrained a gasp.

“I eat enough,” she responded unwillingly, normally she would have let it go but today at this present scenario she wanted to see if she could bring him into meeting her eyes again. Well no such luck, he merely shrugged, neatly folded his newspaper and dropped it onto the table beside his empty plate. He gulped down the last sip of his coffee before getting up from the table.

She watched as he stretched; his black t shirt lifting to reveal the toned and tanned band of flesh at his abdomen. Her mouth went dry at the sight of that dark flesh and once again she was devastated by her reaction to his physical presence. The first year of her marriage she had spent believing that he would get over his anger at being forced to marry her and that he would go back to

 Being the laughing, affectionate man she had known in the first few months after they had met. But after nearly a year she had been forced to face the reality, he truly hated her. He hated her to the core, he despised her so much that he couldn’t bring himself to speak to her to kiss her touch her outside o the bed or even look at her.

Aditi had finally realised that there would be no thaw: their marriage was a perpetual winter wasteland and if she ever wanted to feel warmth of the sun on her face again, she had to get out of it. Unfortunately, she now knew that escaping would be trashier than she had thought. She would have to find a way out that would not include hurting her brother. Aditya and Nafisa are expecting their first baby and while Nafisa are having fairly easy time of it, Aditi was concerned that anything that would upset her could be potentially harmful to her or the baby. Also, while Nafisa’s textile company was fairly successful, while Aditya’s online website is going through major ups and downs. And if Viren puts back his support that could put too much strain to their relationship and Aditi didn’t want that on her conscience!

She sighed heavily and started to do the dishes. She liked to do little household tasks despite the fact that Viren, who was the CEO of the leading cosmetic company “Sitara”, “had more money than god” as her father had once quoted. Aditi even insists on cooking herself. They employed the house cleaning staff as was practical since they live in a ten-bedroom, five bathroom monster of a house but on Saturday the staff had a day off and Aditi liked to pick up after herself and Viren instead of letting the staff get to it when they returned. Viren didn’t pretend to understand her need to have a hand in the everyday running the house and had mockingly accused her of playing house once, shortly after their wedding. He had never seemed to notice it again after that. She stared down at the dishes she had ready to be placed in the dishwasher and quite abruptly abandoned the task halfway through before heading upstairs and leaving Viren still in the kitchen.

She changed her clothes from saree to jeans and t-shirt, dragging her long black hairs into a ponytail. And tugging a denim jacket to ward off the early winter chill. She passed by the den where he had retreated with his laptop, probably get some work done on her way to the front door.

“I’m going out,” she casually called through the open door and his head jerked up while his eyes flared with some indefinable emotion.

“where” he began

“I don’t know how long It will take. I’ll be gone for a while” she dashed out before he could utter another syllable, grabbing her shoulder bag and car keys on the way out. She had her reliable little silver Hyundai creta fired up by the time he eventually made it down to the front door. With a cheery little wave that she knew had to grate she reversed out of the driveaway and headed out. She had no clue where she was going and knew that there would be hell to pay when she got back but it felt good just to do something so defiantly out of character. Her cell phone started ringing shortly after and when she stopped at red light, she switched it off and tossed it to the street dustbin.

Ohh did she do that? that was insane!!

It was still early, barely nine and because it was Saturday the roads were a bit of congested. Still she felt free and headed from the Malabar beach one of the wealthiest beaches of India towards the city. Usually she would go to Goregaon and spend the day with Aditya and Nafisa but she knew that it was the first place Viren would look so she chose the destination carefully and the most dangerous and unexpected one…. To be continued