After All This Time

by Nikita Singh

  Lavanya got up from the bed and went to the attached bathroom. The water that she splashed on her face was freezing and made her teeth clatter. She took her time with it though, washing away her make-up, letting the chill spread over her face till it was numb and the water ceased to feel cold. The towel she used to wipe her face smelled of Shourya.

  He was right. She was selfish. She had always been. She had only thought of her own problems and tried to find a way to solve them. And running away was the only solution that had presented itself. After she had left the country, she had gone through hell. She had needed him desperately, and she knew he missed her too, but she did not want to be tied to her past any longer. She needed to move on. As did he. Lavanya had never thought she would return to India, and could not keep hurting him and herself by maintaining a friendship from thousands of miles away. She had cut him off intentionally, so he could have a life without her and the troubles she inevitably brought with her. He did not need all of her baggage bringing him down. She had stopped speaking to him so that he could move on.

  And he had. He had found Deepti and he had been happy for a time; he had loved, and been loved back.

  Maybe Shourya was right, maybe he should give Deepti another chance. Lavanya’s intense protectiveness towards him should not stop him from having a real chance at happiness . . . with Deepti.

  Lavanya wanted to cry. She was crying already, but she . . . wanted to cry. She wanted to let it all out, but she could not help but feel that no amount of tears would be able to quench the intense feeling of helplessness . . . and hopelessness within her.

  A deadly disease was on its way to killing her. Shourya might be getting back with his ex. And judging by the things he’d said, he might not even want to talk to her again. This could quite easily be the worst time to realize she was in love.

  Of course she loved Shourya. She had always loved him.

  Lavanya felt suffocated. She wanted to get out of there. Like always, she wanted to run away from her problems. As she opened the bathroom door to get out, a T-shirt hanging behind it on a hook grazed her face. It was the blue one he had been wearing the day he had come to teach her how to play the guitar. She took it down from the hook, rolled it up and shoved it into her handbag.

  There was a crowd gathered at the front gate to see off the bride, so she left through the back exit of the Kapoors’ house. Lavanya had not said her goodbyes to Shreela and Manav, but that was the least of her concerns.

  By the time she reached home, half an hour later, her feet had several cuts on them. She had tried to walk on the uneven roads for the first ten minutes, but it had proved impossible to run in five-inch pencil heels. She had given up and taken them off. People were staring at her, but at least it was still very early in the morning and there weren’t many people on the road.

  As soon as she opened the front door, Toughy jumped on her excitedly. Lavanya pulled him up to her chest and fell to her knees, weeping into his neck. Toughy whimpered softly and stayed in her arms instead of wriggling away. Lavanya felt an immense sense of thankfulness for the little dog; it had been years since she’d had a shoulder to cry on.

  After a while, she stood up with him in her arms and went to her room. She did not want her parents to wake up and find her crying on the floor, clutching the dog. As she climbed the stairs quietly, she got very aware of her bangles jingling.

  She found her father standing at the top of the stairs. He was wearing a full-sleeved T-shirt with his pyjamas. Lavanya did not look at him as she walked past him, hoping to avoid a scene.

  ‘I thought I heard someone downstairs. Is the bidaayi over? Did everything go well?’

  Lavanya was walking by him to her room, avoiding a confrontation, but when he spoke to her, she stopped to turn back and glare at him. He was the reason why. He started all of this.

  His eyes were swollen and drowsy, but as she held his gaze, she saw them widen and become more alert. She was tempted to turn away, avoid looking into his direction as much as possible. She didn’t. She had been rightly accused of running away from her problems. For once, she wanted to face it.

  In a matter of seconds, the expression on her father’s face changed completely. His eyes got wider and more aware, his lips parted. Maybe in disbelief, Lavanya mused. Disbelief that his own daughter was looking at him. Mr Suryavanshi took a step towards her. ‘Lavi . . .? Are you okay? Have you been crying? Is everything all right?’

  ‘No.’ Lavanya grit her teeth.

  ‘What is wrong?’

  ‘Everything. Every-freaking-thing.’ She spat out each word deliberately, venomously. ‘Nothing is right here. And it is all because of you. You did this. You made me run away. You made me leave Mom alone, leave Shourya behind, deal with depression and loneliness and start doing . . . things I should not have done . . . It’s been seven years! Yet here I am, still dealing with the consequences of your actions.’

  Lavanya saw the horrified expression on her father’s face. She did not wait for his response; she had already said more than she should have, more than she had intended to. She rushed to her room and shut the door, leaving her father and Toughy in the hallway. She flung herself on the bed face first and put a pillow over her head, trying to block out the world, and all that was wrong with it.

  She had to get away. She had to run.

  It had already happened. She knew it in her gut; something terrible had happened. Something she could not run from. Her legs betrayed her, they always did. She crawled to the door. She could not remember where she was, but it did not matter. If she could make it outside, she would find someone who could help her find her way back home.

  She did not know where her wallet was and she still had not been able to locate her cell phone. Just as her fingers clutched the doorknob, she heard someone call her name. She turned around.

  ‘Where are you going?’ the man asked. He was standing with his back against another door. She had not noticed there was another door.

  ‘What did you give me?’

  ‘It’s mind-blowing, isn’t it? Blows your mind, like phew . . .’ he gestured his mind being blown.

  ‘What was it?’ she asked, her voice cracking with desperation.

  ‘Just coke. We snort mostly, but takes time. Smoking is faster. Shooting’s even faster . . .’ He pulled out a glass pipe from his pocket and waved it towards her.

  ‘No, there was a needle . . .’

  ‘Yeah, injecting is the fastest. Gets you off in like, three seconds.’

  ‘I have never done that before.’

  ‘Really?’ He had already slumped down on the couch.

  ‘Is coke bad?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  She leaned on the door. She could hear him snore within minutes. The fat guy on the floor had still not moved. Her eyelids kept drooping, she kept forcing them open.

  She had to get up. She had to run.

  Her hand slipped off the doorknob and she lost her balance, crashing to the floor. Her head hit the cold, hard ground.

  The crash brought back some of her senses. She willed her arms to move, to support her as she got up. She begged her legs to not give up on her again. She had to get up. She somehow pushed herself back up. The motion drained her of all her energy, and the drug took over again.

  This time she when her head hit the floor, she could not get up.

  But somehow she knew . . . she had to run.

  Shourya could not sleep for hours after Shreela left with Manav. He had already been distressed after his showdown with Lavanya. When Shreela hugged him and cried, he could not take it any more.

  When had life become so complicated? Why did they have to be so far from the people they loved? Everything was changing. Now that Shreela’s wedding was finally over, Shourya had to think about going back. He had only ten days left in Delhi before he had to return to California. He wondered what he would be going back to.

  And what it would be like to come back home.

  He had always p
lanned to come back . . . he could easily find a good job in Delhi, or Bangalore or even Mumbai. Be closer to home, visit his family whenever he wanted. True, he still had a student loan to repay, which was easier and faster to do when he earned in dollars. If things went as planned, he would pay it back within two years and come back to India.

  That had been their plan. He did not know what Deepti’s plan was any more. She had been calling him all day. Shourya had been so focused on Shreela’s wedding arrangements that he hadn’t really thought about what Deepti had proposed. But now that the wedding was over, he had to make a choice. He wished he could talk it over with Lavanya. She had taken over all his actions and decisions regarding Deepti, but he’d driven her away.

  When he had returned to his room, there was no trace of her there, except a faint hint of her perfume. He lay down on his bed, feeling dizzy. He should not have said all those horrible things to Lavanya and made her cry. As if she wasn’t going through enough already. It was so tough to see her break down like that. He kicked himself for putting her through that.

  When he fell asleep, it was a troubled sleep. He dreamt of Shreela in her beige lehenga and red dupatta, holding Manav’s hand and walking away from him. He saw Lavanya running away from him again, leaving him at the airport without a second glance. And he saw Deepti snuggle into Avik’s arms on the deck of a cruise, sailing away.

  The insistent ringing of his phone woke Shourya up. He pulled out the wretched thing from under his pillow and picked up the call to make the shrill noise in his ears stop.

  ‘Hello,’ he muttered gruffly a moment later.

  ‘Shourya, beta, is that you?’ a female voice demanded from the other end.

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘Hello? Shourya?’

  ‘Hmm.’ He managed to open his eyes. The room was dark and quiet. He was completely disoriented about where he was and what time it was. He pulled the phone away from his ear to see who the caller was. He did not recognize the number. He spoke into the phone, ‘Yes, it’s Shourya.’

  ‘Shourya, this is Mrs Suryavanshi . . . Lavanya’s mom.’

  ‘Oh. Oh, hello Aunty. What is it? Is everything all right? Is Lavanya okay?’ Shourya sat up on the bed. The only times he had received calls from Mrs Suryavanshi were when Lavanya was in some kind of trouble.

  ‘Is Lavi with you?’ Mrs Suryavanshi asked.

  ‘No, she left here in the morning. Around five or six, I think.’

  ‘Oh! We don’t know where she could be,’ her mother cried.

  ‘What? Since when?’ Shourya’s heart beat loudly in his chest as he thought about the last conversation he had had with Lavanya. The hurtful things he had said.

  ‘She left in the morning, around ten. She did not tell us where she was going, but she looked very upset . . . She hasn’t taken any of my calls all day.’

  Shourya checked the time on his phone. 6.23 p.m. Somehow despite all the craziness in his life, he had managed to exhaust himself and sleep all day. ‘Don’t worry, Aunty. I’m sure she’s okay. It’s not that late . . .’ he said, getting out of bed.

  ‘I’m worried about her, beta. She kept herself locked up in her room all morning. And then she left without a word.’ Mrs Suryavanshi sounded distraught.

  ‘She’ll be back soon,’ Shourya reassured her as he pulled on a shirt over his T-shirt. ‘I’ll—’

  ‘I have never seen her this . . . troubled.’

  ‘I’m going to look for her. And I’ll talk to her.’

  ‘She had a fight with her father this morning.’ Mrs Suryavanshi’s tone was timid and fearful.

  Shourya froze.

  ‘It was early in the morning. Soon after she came home from Shreela’s bidaayi, I think. Neither of them told me what happened, but I heard them in the corridor. When I came out, she had already locked herself up in her room.’

  Shourya gulped. If something happened to Lavanya . . . He could not think that way. He had to find her. If he let such thoughts come into his mind, they would paralyse him. ‘I’m going to find her,’ he said, more to him than to Mrs Suryavanshi.

  ‘Toughy was whining at her door all morning, but she did not let him in.’

  ‘I will find her. Please take care, Aunty, and don’t worry about anything. I’ll find her. I’m sure she’s okay.’

  As soon as he hung up, Shourya called Lavanya. There was no answer. He tried again, and was about to hang up when he saw lights blinking at the foot of his bed. Lavanya’s phone lay on the floor. She must have forgotten it in his room in the morning. ‘Darn it!’ he muttered under his breath. He quickly pulled on his jacket and grabbed his car keys. Where could she be? Delhi was so big; there were innumerable places where a person who wanted to get lost in the city could go.

  Shourya could not think of a place to start from. As he got into the elevator, he tried to look for some clue to where she could be. Her phone was locked. The only place he could think of was their school, but he knew Lavanya had no love for it, so it would not make sense for her to go there. He could circle her street and the surrounding area, to see if she was taking a walk. But who took eight-hour-long walks? His palms were clammy and his forehead was beaded with sweat.

  He ran to his car, and unlocked it. It made a sound, and he saw a startled Lavanya stand up on the driver’s side of the car.

  13

  Lavanya’s heart was pounding in her chest. She could not only feel it, she could also hear it. And it wasn’t just because the sound from the car had alarmed her. It was because of the person standing in front of her.

  She had not expected to see Shourya there. Although, now that she thought about it, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise to find him in his parking spot at some point. The thought that he might come down and see her before she’d successfully gathered the courage to go up and face him had not crossed her mind once.

  ‘What the—’ Shourya muttered. He paused in his tracks for a second, before rushing to her. ‘God! What are you doing out here in the dark? Do you know how worried everyone is about you?’

  The words caught in Lavanya’s throat. Shourya did not look angry any more. He looked concerned, ruffled, even frightened. For her.

  He held her by her shoulders and studied her under the dim light coming from the street lamp outside the parking area. ‘Are you okay?’ he muttered.

  She nodded rapidly, repeatedly.

  ‘Oh God, Lavanya! Look at me. Lavanya, talk to me. Let me . . . I’m so sorry for saying all those things to you. I was . . . I was angry and frustrated . . . and it had nothing to do with you. I’m in a very bad place right now, and I needed an outlet, and you were there and I vented it out on you. I didn’t mean any of it. I’m so sorry, I’m such an asshole—’

  ‘Shourya . . . Shourya . . . Shourya!’ Lavanya tried to make him stop, but he went on speaking, apologizing.

  ‘No, no, listen to me! It was wrong of me to dump all that on you. As if you didn’t have enough problems of your own. I feel like shit. Don’t believe a word I said earlier, I was just being a jerk and blaming you for my problems . . .’

  ‘SHOURYA!’ Lavanya snapped, silencing him. ‘Will you stop? You said nothing wrong. It doesn’t matter why you said it or the way you said it. The fact is—you were right. I did all of those things to you. I was the asshole. And I deserved every word you said, it was a long time coming.’

  ‘It’s not like that . . .’

  ‘No, you are right. I had my reasons, but should they have been enough for me to leave everything? I was selfish. I really was. You are right about me.’

  ‘No, you’re not. You were just a child. You were only looking for a way to be okay.’ Shourya looked at her with such intensity in his eyes that she could not speak for a minute. Everything they had been through, everything she had shared with him, every moment they spent together—she could see it all in his eyes.

  She remembered the time when, years ago, she had skipped her physical education class and left school early. She had found her fat
her’s car parked outside an unknown house. It wasn’t until she saw the little board that said Mrs & Mr Benoy Dey on the gate that she realized it was her science teacher’s house. She double checked the number on the car; it was definitely her father’s. Lavanya wondered if Mrs Dey had asked her parents to meet her outside the campus. Science was not her strongest subject, but she had it under control. She did not understand the need of a parents–teacher meet.

  Lavanya decided to wait for her parents to come out. As unusual as it was for a teacher to ask parents to meet off campus, it was very unlike her parents to do something school-related without telling her. For a minute, she had wondered if her father and Mrs Dey’s husband worked together. That could explain Lavanya’s dad being there. Or he could be in one of the other houses on the street and had not been able to find a better parking spot.

  Lavanya kept thinking of scenarios. It was her nervousness about her performance in Mrs Dey’s class that made her slide down the bonnet and walk towards the house. She was a bundle of nerves; her gut told her not to open the gate, to keep on walking all the way home. Whatever Mrs Dey had to say to her parents couldn’t be that bad. She could go home and ask her dad where he had been, and what Mrs Dey had said.

  She had taken seven steps—was it odd that she remembered even this tiny detail?—inside the gate, when she had noticed a movement on the first-floor window out of the corner of her eye.

  When she remembered the moment now, she saw herself standing there, watching as realization struck her sixteen-year-old self. She saw herself look up to the source of the movement. And she saw her father looking down at her. She would never forget the expression on his face. He looked baffled for a moment, rooted to the spot, his hand on the drape. Then she saw him release a troubled breath and gasp for air. She saw his lips move and mutter her name. Lavanya didn’t need to look away from his face to see that he wasn’t wearing a shirt.