Temporary Husband

Chapter 19: Childhood.

………………………………….........……………………………………….Kaira……………………………………………………………………………….....

There are simply no words to express how he makes me feel. For the first time living in this hell, I cried in his arms like a baby… He didn’t say anything nor did he ask. He simply rubbed my back and let me cry my eyes out…

All I wanted was love. But my parents failed to give me that. At times I wondered, if my real mother was alive would she have loved me? But that question continued to remain as a question…

My vision was blurry due to the tears that I shed. I looked at his mysterious dark blue eyes. For some reason he reminds me of someone who I have forgotten for a long time now… He looked at me with his blue eyes filled with worry and concern. I am sure he wanted to know what made me like this… But I could feel that he was holding himself back from asking anything…

“Ask me the things running in your head now. I will tell you…” My voice was shaky and a little rough from all that crying. He was surprised by my words that for almost half a minute he didn’t say anything. He finally opened his mouth. But I could still feel that he was hesitant. I forced a half smile to make him relax and let him know that I am okay… He sighed deeply before he asked me.

“Then…. Can you tell me about your childhood?” My childhood? Is that what he wanted to know? I was a little surprised that unknowingly I let out a small giggle. I was still on his lap with his hands around my waist. I positioned myself comfortably before I spoke... I took a deep breath as I closed my eyes and finally started…

“My childhood was not something good. Even as a child, I was always lonely … As you know already, I am the illegitimate daughter of Mr. Agarwal.” I looked up at him. The atmosphere around us turned serious. He was visibly stiff in front of me. I gulped down on my own saliva before I continued.

“My mother died giving birth to me. I don’t even know her face. The only photo of hers which I treasured was torn into pieces by my step-sister Dhiya. She always loved trampling on me. I was always jealous of Dhiya. She was loved and pampered like a real princess while I was a mere beggar. My father paid me no mind as I was a product of his hateful mistake from the past…”

“I was not treated right in that house. More like I was not even treated as human. I was less than a dog in their eyes… Dhiya always picked on me with her cousins. Sometimes they would hit me to the point that I might go out with a broken rib or two. There was a time when I was beaten so badly that I became unconscious. When I opened my eyes I was at the hospital with Ms. Thara and Mr. Dev holding both of my hands tightly with all their might. Even during that time, my supposed father didn’t come to visit me.” I scoffed as I remembered that day in the hospital.

“That was when I realized that he was not bothered about me. That man only wanted a daughter who is helpful to him, someone who is useful to him and makes him feel proud. If I wanted to survive in that house I wanted to have the support of that man more than anything. For the first time in my life I went to meet him with a request.”

I took another deep breath before I continued. How I wish I didn’t ask him that…

“I requested that man to let me learn Piano along with Dhiya. To my surprise he agreed immediately. I started learning it from the age of 6. With a few months of classes I became really good at it to the point that my teachers started to call me a prodigy. When he received a word of this he finally started to pay attention to me. The ones who beat me up and kicked me to the point that I coughed up blood dared to come near me again. Even Dhiya and her mother stopped picking on me. Her mother treated me like her own child. I felt like I was loved. But I was deceived by her sweet words…”

A little tear managed to escape from eye which he grabbed with his thumb and rubbed my cheeks tenderly. His mystic blue eyes looked at me as if I was something precious. I grabbed his hand on my cheek and kissed it softly and stared at his blue eyes that somehow managed to look so deep into my soul.

“Above all the wounds that family gave me, the wound inflected on my heart by that woman was deadly. She played the role of my mother whom I have never had in my life. I was on the cloud nine. So happy to finally feel the love of a mother. She finally grew tired of playing the role of a mother for one whole year that she decided to take me out. As foolish as I was, I blindly followed her. She took me to a beach and played with me for a while. I was really happy. By the time that we got thirsty, she asked me to wait there while she went to get us a drink. I waited and waited but no one came. The scorching sun has already started to set. I didn’t move from that place at all afraid that she might miss me. The dusk turned into night and night into morning and it continued… I lost track of how many days I had been waiting for her sitting there all alone. I was so thirsty and very hungry…  The chocolate bar that I had in my pocket was nearly finished… Finally I decided to move from that place in search of something to eat. That was when I spotted a boy who would be roughly 12 was getting beaten up badly by some bullies. I knew how much it hurt to be stomped and kicked upon and thus I decided to help him…” 

I cannot believe I am finally sharing a part of my past with someone and that someone was Krish… I cannot bring myself to push him away. From the first time I laid my eyes on him, I wanted him to be mine. I don’t know why I felt that way, but he attracted me like a butterfly attracted to a flower…