Conversation

“At least, give me a smile.”

“I am smiling.”

“Then, why can’t I feel it?”

“Probably, you have stopped feeling my smile.”

That hurt. That hurt real bad.

I hung up the phone on that heavy note of silence, like the many more previous ones. It is a weird cycle of you-hurt-me-i-hurt-you more that has been going on in our lives now. But, to be told that I have stopped feeling the happiness in your voice…or rather the lack of it…that was unfair.

And then I would keep looking at the phone to ring again, with you saying you did not really mean it. But there wouldn’t be any calls.

“Where do I stand in your life? What is my position?”

“Do I have a stand in yours? Let us run away and start in a new place, with no known face.”

“I can’t run away. I can’t leave the people behind.”

Yes. And you can leave me. I am the mistress: the one who has no position in your hierarchy of priorities. You give me no option but to leave you or as you say to let you go. And also, to take full responsibility for it, as if you had no say.

But I can’t stop calling, can’t stop acknowledging my feelings for you. I keep thinking about those eyes, those words that give me the immense happiness that I have never felt in my life. And the excruciating wait that happens after every small moments of bliss.

I am a romantic. I was born one. I gave up my dream of the ideal man, and chose the one that was closest to it. Only to find the ideal one now.

And he is another’s.

“Ria. I love you.”

“I love you too, Darsh.”

Goodbye Rehaan. You lost your one chance.

Sorry Darsh, but I can’t let you know.