Chapter 20

As they sat together in the flight Khushi remained silent for some time pretending to sleep.  "Khushi – about Akash –" Manav began tentatively, "I swear I didn’t know anything. Arnav never told me –"

"You don’t have to explain anything Manav," Khushi stopped pretending. "Why should you -- when Arnav doesn’t care?"

"Akash's wife Sia tried to commit suicide last night, " Manav told her, "that's why he had to rush back."

"What? Is she alright?" Khushi was shocked to hear that, "but why?"

"She is out of danger now but I don’t know the reason Khushi," Manav said, "for some reason Arnav doesn’t talk about Akash much and neither does Anjali. I think Akash came to Delhi with Sia couple of days ago. He was staying at the out-house, next to the farm house.

While Khushi was still trying get a handle on the news, Manav spoke, "Yesterday – I didn’t get a chance to ask you as I was in a hurry --- but why were you looking so spooked while speaking to Shyam at the office?"

"It was nothing." Khushi wasn’t sure if she should tell Manav without telling Anjali first. "You tell me how is that you showed up when you did?"

"Anjali asked me if I could come," he said, "She needed my help for something but I don’t know what. I went to the house but no one was there. So, I came to the office looking for Arnav."

Khushi was curious about something. "Why doesn’t she ask Shyamji for help?"

"I suspect all is not well in their marriage," Manav revealed, "I say that because Anjali always consults me for important decisions. But she won't talk about her marriage."

"You came all the way from US for her?" Khushi asked, "do you love her?"

Manav was quiet for several moments. "I saw her for the first time at the Raizadas' beach house in Udupi," Manav said, "she had come in a few days earlier to arrange for the housewarming party and Arnav asked me to help her out as he was busy. We got along like a house on fire. After the party, she went back to Delhi and we kept in touch."

"I was just 21 but I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her and I knew she liked me. When I finally found the courage to propose to her, she rejected me and told me she was getting engaged to Shyam. I couldn’t believe it. Arnav told me later that Shyam had seen Anjali during Akash and Sia's engagement and had insisted on marrying her. There was nothing I could do because I was still studying."

"I am so sorry to hear that Manav," Khushi said, "you don’t seem to have moved on."

"I am unable to commit myself to anyone else," he confessed, "I am still hung up on her but I will make it clear that it is one-sided. Anjali is fiercely loyal to her marriage. In fact, I get an earful from Anjali from time to time for not settling down. I think she feels guilty."

"Doesn’t Arnav know?"

"No, I could never muster the courage to tell him. But I don’t like hiding this from him either. I will tell him some day."

A few hours later, after seeing her home safely, Manav bade goodbye. Khushi went into her room and flopped on her bed, thankful for the fact that her mother was out. Questions were whirring in her head but she shut them all as sleep claimed her.

Two weeks later, Khushi stood in the door step of the farm house not quite sure what to expect. Arnav opened the door. "Khushi?" he looked positively astounded.

"Can I come in?" Khushi said even as her heartbeat quickened.

"How did you know I was here?" He stood askance. He looked like the Arnav she had first met in Tonse complete with the beard, the clothes and most importantly his cold demeanor.

"I called Anjaliji a few days ago," she said. Anjali had also told her that Arnav was no longer engaged to Lavanya but that wasn’t important right now. "How is Sia doing now?"

"Khushi!" Anjali called her from the bedroom doorway, "I think you can come in."

Khushi walked into the bedroom to see a frail woman with thinning hair, lying on the bed with an IV strapped to her wrist. A tall and lean man, stood up from and nodded his head in greeting.

"Akash, this is Khushi," Anjali introduced her, "She wanted to see Sia."

"Who is she?" Sia asked in feeble voice.

"She is my friend," Arnav replied.

Sia stared at her for long moments and then looked at Akash. "Are you going to marry her once I am dead?"

While Khushi was shocked by the blatant question, Akash replied calmly. "No Sia, she is Arnav's friend not mine. So, don't worry, alright?"

"You are lying!" she yelled at him, "you are all liars. Why won't you let me die? You can marry her then." She began to pull out her IV. Akash and Anjali rushed to side. "Arnav, take Khushi out." He pleaded.

Arnav took Khushi's hand and dragged her to the out-house a short distance away from the main house.

"First, you tell me something. How did you find out about Akash on the night of the party?" Arnav asked suddenly.

"I got a call from an unknown number," Khushi said, "he told me Akash and Payal had an affair and how your dad has been trying to hide all this from the world. He told me that Mr. Raizada was trying to get rid of me."

"F@$%!" Arnav couldn’t believe it. Someone knew about Akash and Payal and that person had tried to lure Khushi out of the farm house by telling her that his father would cause her harm. Had Rishabh uncovered the truth, and was he using it to get his vengeance?

He walked to her and caught her arms. "Do you know how irresponsible you were by not filing an FIR that night?" he asked her his tone laced with anger, "The b@#$%^&* is running around freely!"

"I – I am sorry" Khushi stuttered.

Arnav's brown eyes simmered as they bore into hers. And then he let her go and walked to the bar and poured himself a drink. He looked at her clad in jeans and a simple cotton top. She looked breathtaking as always. All he wanted to do was to gather her in his arms.

"Why are you here?" he asked her gruffly, "You were spitting fire before you walked away the last time you were here," he reminded her harshly.

"What would you do if you just found out that someone kept a very vital piece of information from you?" Khushi demanded.

"What changed your mind?"

"I spoke to mom," Khushi said.

"You told your mom everything?" Arnav demanded.

"Not everything because I don’t know everything." She pointed out, "my mom has joined this life coach group and had some profound things to share. For the first time, she seemed at peace. She told me when she heard about other people's problems in the group sessions, her own problem seemed trivial."

Just then there was knock on the door and Akash walked in. "Hello Khushi. We finally meet." He looked at Arnav and smiled. "I am sure he hasn’t told you anything. You can ask me whatever you want."

"Why did Sia try to kill herself?" Khushi asked the first things that came to her mind.

"Sia has cancer – last stages because she stopped taking medication some time back. On the night of the party, while I was attending the engagement, she escaped the nurse's sight and tried to slit her wrist with a kitchen knife. I rushed her to the emergency and they saved her life."

"Oh, my God!" Khushi exclaimed, "that's terrible."

"Khushi, let me start my story from the beginning," Akash said, "I saw Payal at the housewarming of the beach house and fell in love with her," he began, "we became friends but I noticed she was taken in with Arnav. When I went back to Delhi I just couldn’t forget about her. I kept messaging her but she'd only reply occasionally."

 "I told mom that I might be interested in a girl but she shot me down telling me my marriage was being fixed with Sia and that I'd better not ruin it. In a few months, I got married to Sia."

"I didn’t know you spoke to your mom about this," Arnav shook his head in exasperation.

Akash and Anjali's love stories had started on the same day but were both ill-fated.

"We started having problems right from the first day of our marriage. I just couldn’t understand her. She and mom were fighting like crazy but I thought that was normal teething problems. She wanted to move out of the house within the month and when I hesitated, she walked out and went to her parents' house. My dad suggested that I go to the Bangalore office to manage operations. I think he also hoped that I'd learn some things from Arnav who was a natural at the business. When I asked her, she refused to accompany me as she had planned to go on a Europe tour with friends. I went to Bangalore by myself and stayed with Arnav.

"Payal was there for her semester holidays. When I asked to meet up, she surprisingly agreed. She was very upset about her fall out with Arnav. She told me she felt so bad about the way she had behaved with him. It looked like she didn’t have any support from friends at the time."

Rakesh's words came back to her.

Deepana and Vishakha, busy in their own love lives with Rohit and Rahul, had shut Payal out, forcing her into loneliness…

"I confided my marital problems with her and since your parents also had similar problems, she understood. She advised me to have patience with Sia and that everything would be okay with time. I fell more in love with her but we were just friends."

"Why didn’t you confide in me?" Arnav asked him, "I thought we were bonding for the first time when you came to Bangalore."

"Exactly! I didn’t want to say anything to ruin that. Then later, I just couldn’t tell you about Payal. I didn’t want you to hate me."

"F@#$!" Arnav raked a hand through his hair, "how I wish you had told me Akash."

"Anyway -- I returned to Delhi and she went back to Udupi when her semester began. I think we were both a little happier in our lives."

In the next semester, she and her roommates had patched up and everything seemed fine in our group….

"Then I discovered the truth about my wife – that she was schizophrenic."

"Sia is schizophrenic?!" Khushi couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

"Yes, since she was a young girl apparently." Arnav supplied.

When Akash had asked her about the medications she was taking, Sia had told him they were vitamin pills.

"After I came back from Bangalore, Sia also returned to our house. Soon she began to pester me to buy a new house. While I was in Bangalore our accountant had called me regarding an alarmingly high activity on my credit card. Sia had been spending money like water. When I asked her about it she went ballistic with anger. She again walked out. The way she had behaved that day wasn’t normal."

When he looked at her medical file and took the prescription to the pharmacy he had discovered that they were for a schizophrenia. Then he'd visited her doctor and found out that she had been diagnosed a long time ago and was under treatment.

"What did you do?" Khushi asked him.

"I went to my father-in-law and confronted him." But Sia's parents seemed nonchalant, assuring him that she was absolutely fine with medication. Furthermore, Mr. Jha had threatened to back out from the partnership if Akash revealed the truth to his father.

"If I were in your place I would have shaken some sense into that sly foxy --" Arnav stopped himself.

"But I couldn’t do that!" Akash lamented, "I knew dad was in a real financial crunch at the time and if I did anything to ruin the partnership, dad would never forgive me. I had always felt that my dad never thought much of me because I wasn’t as smart as Arnav was. So, I kept my mouth shut."

"What the f@#$?" Arnav's face lost some color, "I didn’t know you felt that way." Arnav said.

"I was fifteen when you showed in my life – how do you think I felt?" Akash asked him, "not only that -- but you were so brilliant that you were given a double promotion. Then to make it worse my mom made sure you were pulled out of that good school. First I was feeling jealous and then I was ridden with guilt!"

"Akash –"

Akash raised his hand. "I am digressing. After I spoke to my father-in-law, he suggested that I move to another city for a little while -- to take a break from Sia. I chose to go to Mangalore."

He didn’t have to add that it was because of Payal.

"When Payal found out I was staying in the beach house she came to meet me. She saw what a wreck I was and took care of me. She encouraged me to take up my childhood hobby of painting. After a couple of months, I gathered up the courage to tell her that I had fallen in love with her at first sight at very same beach house. When she told me that she loved me as well, I couldn’t believe my luck. We were like two kindred spirits who had found their soul mates."

"Until I ruined it all!" Arnav said.

"No Arnav you did nothing wrong!" Akash exclaimed.

"I had stayed away from Udupi after Rashmi stopped picking up my calls," Arnav continued. "But when Akash had become unreachable for days -- my father was worried and sent me to talk to him. I drove to the beach house from Bangalore and reached at midnight. I couldn’t find the spare key in the usual place – so I went around to the sliding doors so I could get in. I saw him with Payal.

"I went back to my apartment in Udupi and the next morning, I confronted him when he was alone. I told him to break it off with her – I threatened him that I would get dad involved –"

"We fought bitterly that day!" Akash reminisced.

"I was also thinking about Payal. She got involved with Akash because she was my friend. I felt responsible."

Khushi could only imagine what might have been going on in Arnav's mind at the time.

"On the night of the farewell party -- when Payal came up to me and asked me about Akash, I told her to forget about him. We argued. That's what her friends saw."

What were you thinking Payal?

It's not like that Arnav – try to understand

Do you understand that he is married?

For the sake of our friendship --Please listen to me--

You are not my friend! --  stay out of his life!

Akash looked at Khushi. "After Arnav found out I left Udupi and tried to break if off Payal but I couldn’t. I came to meet her on the night of the farewell party. I had no idea Arnav would be there that night to meet Rashmi.

"When I saw him there I hid until he left the resort. Then much later that night, I found her and we went into a room that I had booked under a false name. Payal had a lot to drink so she needed a place to crash."

Akash was the one Rakesh saw that night. Since the brothers were almost the same height, it was easy to mistake him for Arnav.

"Payal and I woke up after a few hours. We knew we didn’t go want to go back to our old lives – so we decided to elope," Akash said, "So around 4 AM in the morning we sneaked out of the resort. I had brought Arnav's Royal Enfield with me and we rode on this road along Malpe. After thirty minutes, away from Udupi, somewhere near the town of Brahmavara, we met with an accident with another vehicle and I fell unconscious. That was the last time I saw Payal." He fell silent as tears streamed down his cheeks.

Khushi was shocked to know that her quiet and soft sister would have the courage to take such a bold and brash decision. So much had happened with her sister and she didn’t know about it. She was too dazed to comprehend all this.

Then Arnav spoke. "Payal called me from a Government hospital. Luckily, some passersby had helped Akash into an autorickshaw and had taken them there. She told me that Akash  was taken in for testing. As you know -- I was in a hotel with Rashmi that night. I rushed to the hospital. When I reached there, the doctors told me I'd have to take Akash to NIMHANS in Bangalore as they had diagnosed a brain injury but they didn’t have the equipment to do a CT Scan."

Khushi wondered how Payal had handled all this. All this must have too much for her sensibilities. "Was Payal okay?"

"Yes, the doctor told me that she had miraculously survived the accident without a scratch. She tried to come up to me to enquire about Akash I was caught up so I yelled at her.

Look at Akash – I don’t even know if he will survive this!

So will you please get out of my way?

"When I tried to look for her later – she was nowhere to be found."

He stood up. "I yelled at a young girl who has just met with an accident – a girl who was my friend -- " He said emphatically. "She must have been so hurt!"

"Stop it Arnav!" Akash said loudly, "we have been through this already. If anyone is responsible for her death it is me."

Arnav walked out of the room and closed the door with a bang.

"What he didn’t explain clearly by "caught up" was that he was trying to arrange for my transfer to Bangalore by air and also dealing with the police so they wouldn’t file a FIR about the accident. They would have badgered Payal with unnecessary questions. That is why I keep telling him not to beat himself up over the incident. I was in a critical state – what could he do?

"In Bangalore when the doctors suggested a brain surgery Arnav decided it was time to tell mom and dad and he brought me to Delhi. He told mom and dad that I had met with an accident and skipped all the details about Payal.

"While I was in the hospital, he realized there was something wrong with Sia as she came to visit under the supervision of her parents and Shyam. He understood why I might have fallen for Payal. After that he began to feel guilty.

"Then Arnav got arrested for Payal's death and my father had to get involved. My dad assumed that Arnav had a relationship with Payal and Arnav didn’t bother to correct him. They fought bitterly. Shortly after Arnav was released by the police, I woke up from my coma. Arnav came to me and told me about Payal's death and told me not to say anything to dad and that it was all resolved."

Arnav had gone through so much trauma that it was unbelievable to Khushi that he had remained sane during this ordeal.

 "Nothing was resolved for me -- I was devastated. I went into a deep depression. The doctors had warned my parents that depression would be a side effect of my brain injury. Arnav decided to go to the US.

"After a year, I was slowly getting better and my father tried to get me to work with him in the business but I just couldn’t manage. I began to paint as that kept me connected to Payal. Another couple of years came to pass. By this time, even my parents came to know about Sia's problem as she was getting worse. My mom began pestering me to divorce Sia but I refused. I told them that I was leaving Delhi to go to Sikkim with Siya. My mom who had already been upset since she found out about Sia, had a nervous breakdown. Dad was so angry – with me and with Arnav for leaving that he started insulting him about his relationship Payal. I couldn’t take it anymore and I told him that it was I who was responsible. That night he had a heart attack. Then Arnav had to come back from the US."

The family had gone through so much upheaval -- much like her own family after Payal's death, or more even.

"Since Payal was alive till dawn, her death couldn’t have been accidental due to intoxication," Khushi said as it suddenly hit her, "she must have walked into the ocean consciously." Finally, she knew what had happened to her sister.

Akash's eyes filled with tears. "I have been living with that knowledge for the past eight years and so has Arnav."

"The reason Arnav couldn’t tell you all this is because after the heart attack -- my father made him promise that he wouldn’t tell anyone about my involvement with Payal. Not even Anjali as she is married to Sia's brother. But when Manav found out recently, we revealed everything to him and Anjali a few days ago."

"Your mom thinks the promise is about something else."

"Yes, her health condition was the reason behind it and she doesn’t know that -- yet."

Just then, Akash got a call. "It's from Anjali," he said, "I better get back to Sia."

"I know this is a lot to digest all at once. I am sorry Khushi. I know it will be too much to hope for forgiveness." He left the room.

Thirty minutes later Khushi found Arnav sitting on a bench near the banyan tree in the garden. They sat in silence for a while.

"Do you hate me?" He asked her.

Tears streamed down Khushi's eyes as she said, "It's too late now Arnav."