Valley of Flowers Chapter 12

She arched her body, thrusting her breasts up as he placed wet kisses across the swell of her breasts. She clutched the hair at the back of his dark head as he traced an infinitesimally slow trail up her collar bone to her throat. He was killing her with his indolence so much that she urgently tugged at his hair forcing him to raise his head. His caramel eyes seared her before he swooped down to take her rosy lips with equal urgency. His tongue darted into the molten cavern of her mouth to mate with hers, sending a streak of electricity right down to her core, making hot liquid pool there. As he continued to assault her mouth, his hands moved down to mould her breasts, moving down her rib cage to the soft swell of her stomach,continuing to inch downward…..

Arrrnavv!

‘Khushi, are you okay?’ Arnav’s voice broke through her haze and she blinked her eyes to see his caramel eyes filled with concern. She looked about herself to see that they were in the tiny room in the tourist complex. She had been dreaming!

Sometime during the night, he seemed to have found a clean blanket. But to her consternation she had found her hand clutching his shoulder, her body plastered to his, his hand around her waist and her leg lodged snugly between his.

‘Did you have a nightmare?’ he prodded.

‘Uh….hmm,’ she muttered not trusting herself to speak. She stole a glance at him to see a flash of awareness entering his eyes that very second.

Detaching himself from her, he was up in an instant and went into the bathroom. After a few minutes he stepped out. ‘I will try to find a tooth brush or at least some tooth paste.’ He mumbled before leaving the room.

Khushi came out to stand near the window, hugging herself against the chill that had crept into her once again. She looked out into the garden with people walking about. As she took in the greenery and the flowers she realized everything looked so normal in the early morning light.

When she had stepped in the lobby the previous night, seeing the men approach them she had wondered for one brief moment if the place was haunted. She chuckled at her own silliness.

‘I found a brush and paste,’ Arnav told her as he entered the room, ‘Go freshen up quickly.’ The imperious tone was back. Laad Governor!

After brushing her teeth, Khushi decided to grab a quick shower quickly undressed.She realized that she smelled of his inimitable musky fragrance and her heartbeat quickened as it suddenly hit her that she had spent an entire night in his arms.

As she splashed on the cold water from the bucket, her eyes began to smart at the tenderness with which he had spoken to her in the morning. Khushi, are you okay?

After she stepped out,Arnav took his turn with the bathroom. As she went about straightening the room, there was a knock on the door and as she opened it there was a man with a tray and two cups of steaming beverage. He put the cups on the table and told her one was tea and the other coffee - black. She picked up her cup and went to sit on the chair by the window.

Arnav came out of the bathroom, his hair damp from the bath. Khushi’s heart skipped a beat at how rugged he looked with his hair on his forehead and the thick growth of stubble on his cheeks.He had discarded his waist coat and pulled the tails of his shirt out of his waistband.

He gulped down his lukewarm coffee and put down the coffee cup. ‘I will be downstairs checking out. Come down when you are ready. Don’t forget to wear my coat.’

It was still seven’o clock in the morning and still foggy but the day light had made visibility a little easier. Arnav was in and out of calls all through the journey and Khushi was lost in her own thoughts.

Why couldn’t life be simple as it was five years ago during Akash and Payal’s wedding? That month had been the most blissful month in her entire life.

After the New Year eve party, she felt like she was falling into a deep abyss of tumultuous emotions. Buaji had told her not to go for her dance classes as there was a lot of work to be done for the wedding. She felt like someone had squeezed her heart really hard when she realized she won’t be seeing Arnav every day. Who would make him his coffee the way he liked it?

A couple of days later, Anjali had come to their house to take them out for a movie. She had come home on leave and had told the Guptas that she wanted to get to know her bhabhi better. Khushi had taken extra care to dress up that day in the hopes that Arnav might be there. When they reached the cinemas, her face fell when she saw Lavanya standing next to Arnav and Akash. How could she have forgotten Lavanya was the chosen girl for Arnav? She decided to stick to Anjali asking her about her work in the college, trying her level best to ignore those mesmerizing eyes.

Just as they were being let into the theatre, Lavanya said, ‘How am I looking Arnav? Is my hair ok?’

‘It wouldn’t harm to run a brush through it I suppose,’ Arnav quipped.‘Why don’t you take your ticket and use the rest room?’ He gave her a ticket.

When they found their row, Akash went in followed by Payal and Anjali. As Khushi took her seat next to Anjali, she was surprised to see Arnav taking the one next to her. She saw the same surprise mirrored in Lavanya’s face as she took the empty one next to Arnav.

As the movie began,Khushi’sdhak-dhak began when Arnav’s large hand wrapped itself around her small one in a firm grip. When she tried to steal a glance at him from the corner of her eye she realized he was engrossed in a conversation with Lavanya! Her anger went up a few notches and she tried to wriggle out of his grasp only to fail miserably. His grip was unbreakable. She decided to ignore him and relaxed her hand completely and began to concentrate on the movie. Then his grip slackened --- but her relief was short lived as he turned her hand and interspersed his fingers through hers, the tips caressing her thighs at the same time. A tingling sensation sliced through to her core as he squeezed her palm gently but firmly. Then his thumb began to make little circles on her palm, sending shards of fire right into her veins to suffuse her entire body with heat. The images in front of her began to blur and she squeezed her eyes shut. Then she jumped as a husky voice whispered in her ear. ‘Relax, Khushi.’

On Wednesday morning just before the results of the exams was to be announced to the students, Khushi sat in front of Mrs Bedi, the head of Nrityadham, her dance school. She was vivacious woman in her fifties, a yesteryear odissi dancer, who wore thick khol in her eyes and a big bindi on her forehead. Her office was large with pictures of great dancers adorning the walls. She picked up a slip of paper that look like cheque and waved it in the air.

‘We got a sponsor!’ she squealed like a little girl.

Khushi was exhilarated at the news. ‘How much is it madam?’

‘I have strict instructions not to reveal it Khushi,’ she said waving the cheque gaily. ‘But as they say bhagwaan jab deta hai….’

‘Can I know the name of the sponsor?’ Wariness entered her voice.

‘As if you don’t know it is your friend Mr Arnav Singh Raizada,’ she chided. ‘You talked to him about it didn’t you?’

‘I did,’ Khushi agreed.

‘Alright I will tell you this much,’ she leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘This year we will bring the scholarships up to six.’

‘That’s wonderful, madam!’

‘Yes, wonderful!’ Mrs Bedi put the cheque to her mouth and kissed it. ‘Mr Raizada is undeniably a very generous man. It is very rare to find such patrons of the arts.I have asked him to come to our graduation function so I can thank him personally.’ She beamed.

‘I would like to inform Piyali’s family if you don’t mind.’ Khushi requested the older lady, who absolutely had no objections.

‘It is your privilege my dear.’ She smiled.

Later, as she was returning back home Khushi released a deep breath. So, Piyali had been accepted, she thought wonderingly, and all because of Arnav. Not only Piyali, but five other deserving students as well. Suddenly, her phone began to ring. It was her amma. She had called her to remind her that they were supposed to go to ChandiChowk for shopping. She informed her that she was on her way and laid her head against the window and closed her eyes.

After the movie expedition, Arnav had begun to possess her heart and mind with an intensity that bordered on craziness.

A few days later, when they had gone shopping for Payal’s wedding lehenga, he and Akash had turned up with Anjali. She tried her best to ward off Anjali’s suggestion that she should try some lehengas herself and told her to help Payal make the selections. Then she received a message on her phone, from Arnav asking her to try out a lehenga she had just rejected – a red lehenga with a wine colored velvet border and a matching choli and chunri. The work on the chunri and the lehenga were elaborate and exquisite and Khushi was absolutely sure it was something really expensive.

When she put on the lehenga and stepped out of the trial room, he stood behind her, his caramel eyes hot in the mirror, as he swept her from head to toe.

‘I can’t accept this Arnavji,’ she had whispered tremulously when she heard him tell the sales girl to pack the costume.

‘It is not for you,’ he said, and when she looked up at him questioningly, he had added, ‘It’s for me.’

Khushi came out of her reverie when the car stopped in front of her house. She looked down at her hands and the tears that she had been holding on to all this while flowed unchecked as she looked at the ring shining on her finger. She couldn’t do this anymore. She would have to talk to him.

**

‘How did it come to this Nani!’ Anjali said pacing about in her grandmother’s room. ‘Khushi will be getting married tomorrow! Why can’t you do something?’

‘Have you heard of the saying that you can bring the horse to the water but you cannot make it drink?’ Naniji said with a look of resignation on her face. ‘I persuaded Arnav come down to India to help us with AR, thinking that if he and Khushi saw each other things might work out, but  I wonder if I was mistaken ---’

‘No Nani, there is no mistake,’ Anjali said with a shake of her head, ‘you and I knew even five years ago that there was something going on between the two of them.But then she just packed up and left for Mumbai. Mom was the one who sponsored her, right?’

‘Yes,’ Naniji’s old eyebrows creased with consternation. She had wondered about her daughter’s unusual behaviour when she had told her that she wanted to sponsor Khushi’s education in Mumbai, as her she was not prone to such spurts of generosity. ‘She told me that Khushi had come to her for help.’

‘That’s so strange. Khushi never came across as the over-ambitious type to me.’ Anjali said thinking about the free-spirited bubbly girl of eighteen.When she came back from Mumbai, she was just a shadow of what she once was. She looked melancholic, like a woman who had lost something very precious in her life. But she had seen glimpses of the old Khushi in the past couple of months since Arnav was back. She glowed like a lamp in his presence. Arnav was the same. The way they looked at each other, the awareness between them was palpable. ‘There is definitely no mistake.’ Anjali repeated aloud.

‘Nani, don’t you remember what happened just before Khushi’s and NK’s engagement?’

Anjali had heard a loud noise of a utensil crashing to the floor and rushed to the kitchen to see Arnav holding Khushi’s hand under the running water of the kitchen sink. Apparently, in the middle of making coffee for Arnav, Khushi had touched the steel handle of the round bottom pan in which she had just finished making jalebis. The fingers of her left hand had blistered so badly leaving her in intense pain.

She remembered how her usually calm brother had panicked and berated the poor girl who was already suffering from excruciating pain.

‘I can’t believe Mami decided to go ahead with engagement in spite of the accident. I have a feeling Khushi did it deliberately,’ she said sitting on the bed, ‘she didn’t want NK to put the ring on her left ring finger.’

‘How could she?’ Naniji said looking at her granddaughter with a smile on her lips. ‘She was already wearing Arnav’s ring on that finger.’

‘What are you talking about Nani?’ Anjali said her eyebrows rising, her eyes going wide with surprise.  

‘You know I had been telling you that I wanted to gift Khushi something for a long time,’ Naniji began. ‘A few days after she came back from Agra, I called her to come to the jewellery store. She told me that Arnav was just picking her up from the house to take her for some important meeting. When I spoke to Arnav, he agreed to bring Khushi to the store en route as they could squeeze in some time.

‘Khushi came and we started looking at rings but Khushi was having a tough time choosing one. After deliberating for nearly thirty minutes she told me that she didn’t want anything and stood up as they had a meeting to rush to. She said we could do it another day. Just then your brother came up behind her,picked up a ring from the selections, took her hand in his and slid it on her left ring finger. He looked at me and told me that Khushi had never been able to make up her own mind.’

‘He is actually right.’ Anjali said as she remembered the shopping spree during Akash’s wedding.

Naniji continued. ‘Unfortunately, it was the same night that Manorama announced that the engagement was to be two days. I saw how desolate they both looked at that moment.’

‘Khushi is stuck between two idiotic men!’ Anjali said getting up from the bed.

‘First one is NK. Can’t he see that Khushi doesn’t love him? He had been so busy with work from the past couple of months and now he has happily gone to Australia to bring his mother for the wedding tomorrow. He has just taken her for granted, hasn’t he?’

‘And the  my brother is the other idiot. He took off to the US without a word on the night of the engagement. And after that he refused to talk about Khushi whenever I called.’

She continued. ‘And Khushi is no less.Yesterday when I went to her house for her mehendi, she pretended to get a phone call when the mehendi artist asked her if she wanted her fiancée’s name on her hand.

‘I tried talking to her but she won’t tell me anything. That girl can be so irritating sometimes. She thinks she is the only one who can be great. She thinks I didn’t realize the effort she made in bringing Arnav and me closer during Diwali.

‘Why is she doing this Nani? Why can’t she tell her parents she is not interested in this marriage?’

‘Obligation.’ Nani said laconically. You of all people should understand that very well, bitiya Naniji looked at her granddaughter sadly.

‘Khushi had always been made to feel like she was an adopted child at the Gupta household. Moreover, the Guptas have given their word to your mami and they probably don’t want to rub your mami the wrong way. You know the fuss Manorama had created for Akash and Payal’s wedding.’

‘Ah  Mami!’ Anjali grated in frustration. ‘And what was the need for her to advance the wedding date by a whole week?’ Anjali lamented. ‘Arnav is attending some offsite meeting up in the mountains. His phone is unreachable.’ She looked at her grandmother. ‘God Nani! How can you be so calm?’

‘Bitiya,’ Nani put a hand on Anjali’s shoulder.‘Arnav and Khushi are grownups. They have to make their own decisions. You and I cannot make it for them.

‘But I also believe in destiny and divine interventions. Have faith in Devi Maiyya.’ Afterall they were written in the stars.

Delusional fools! Destiny and divine interventions indeed! Shyam thought as he walked away from Naniji’s door. They only saw what they wanted to see, didn’t they? They were making their own interpretations about accidents and rings.How could they talk about Khushiji like that? He went into the bedroom and took out a plastic bag kept at the bottom, under his clothes. He took it to Khushi’s room, took out the tan jacket from inside and placed it inside the wardrobe gently. Thankfully, he had been the one to receive the courier when it had arrived this morning. It had been sent by the manager of The Oberoi, Amar Vilas Agra, to Arnav Singh Raizada, apologizing for the delay.

Khushiji deserved only the best in life. Only the best.And he would do anything to ensure that.

As her friends danced in her sangeet, in the next room, Khushi looked out at the night sky from her bedroom window.

Nani had summoned her to the house, asking her help the ladies in the family learn a few short steps for the sangeet, along with Khushi’s own solo performance.

‘Khushi, suggest a song so Arnav and I can dance,’ said Lavanya just as Arnav came down to join the group along with Akash.

‘No!’ Both Arnav and Khushi said in unison.

‘Oh I know,’ Lavanya continued emphatically, ‘we should dance for ‘teri ore’ from Singh is King.’

Arnav raised her eyebrows sardonically, ‘Who is the Queen then?’

‘The steps for the guy are easy Arnav,’ Lavanya pointed out oblivious of Arnav’s mockery. ‘And I am sure Khushi will be able to teach me Katrina’s steps.’

On the day of the rehearsal, Anjali informed them that Lavanya was running late and that she should go ahead and start without her and show Arnav the steps. When she switched on the song so they could take a look at the sequence, he had started laughing.

‘How is anyone supposed to dance for this?’ he said looking at his sister. The he turned to Khushi, ‘Can you?’

‘Yes.’ she had replied simply.

‘Show me.’

The one time Khushi always shed her inhibitions was when she danced. And she had a photographic memory where dance was concerned and she pretty much knew how the steps would go. She began to sway to the music and just like the heroine of the song, she began to twirl. After a minute into the song, she found herself being pulled as Arnav bent her over really low in his arms.

‘Am I doing this right?’ he said looking deep into her eyes.

She just nodded her mouth going dry. Just when she thought he was going to kiss her right there in front of his sister he pulled her up.

‘Ok then,’ he said still holding her in his arms, ‘if this all there is to it then this should be a cakewalk.’

After that he hadn’t really come for the rehearsals at all. Lavanya had tried her best to do the dance gracefully but failed miserably and Arnav’s absence in the rehearsals added to her irritation.

Finally on the day of the Sangeet, Khushi came in wearing a plain red georgette saree. Arnav had sent her a message earlier that he wanted to see her in red, with her hair left loose. Those mesmerizing brown eyes were on her all evening, flustering Khushi so much that she was sure she was going to mess up her dance performance.

But she had given a wonderful performance and had received great applause from everyone. She had changed back into her saree when she saw Lavanya had come in with her mother, her foot in a cast. She had sprained her ankle the previous evening during a shopping spree and would be unable to even walk without the help of crutches.

‘What is this Sumi,’ Sharada Raizada said as the family gathered around Lavanya, ‘After all the efforts Arnav put in to learn dance for the first time in his life, your daughter ends up injuring herself.’

‘That is exactly why I am not going to let it all go to waste,’ he said suddenly. ‘Khushi knows the steps.’ He grasped Khushi by her hand and went toward the stage, shocking both Raizadas and the Guptas.

As the music began wafting through the air, Khushi looked at Arnav standing across the stage from her and in that instant they were both transported back to their magical place – The Valley of Flowers.

Khushi trepidatiouslylifted her pallu and turned around, her arms wide moving her lips automatically to the words in the song….

Dil khogaya

Hogaya kisika

Ab raasta mil gaya

Khushi ka…

She walked toward him slowly and stood in front of him. She couldn’t help as her emotions flowed out through her luminous eyes, his warm caramel eyes scorching her as she walked around him with her hand on his shoulder.

Aankhon mein hai khwab sa

Kisi ka

Ab raasta mil gaya

Khushi ka

Arnav took her hand his eyes unwavering as they stood arms length apart from each other….

Rishta naya rabba

Dil choo raha hai

Kheeche mujhe koi dor, teri ore

Hebegan pulling her toward him…..

Teri Ore Teri Ore Teri Ore, hai rabba

Teri Ore Teri Ore Teri Ore…..

She could feel his breath on her neck as he bent her low in his arms, one hand on her upper back and the other on her bare waist. He then he pulled her upflush against him, her back to his front. As he stood behind her, he ran his hands down the length of her arm to come and rest on her stomach. Then he put his hands on her waist and turned her around to lift her high up in the air. Khushi’s eyes never wavered from his, her long hair covering his face as she slid down slowly…..

Khulti fizaaein, khulti ghatayein,

Sar pe naya ha iaasaman

Chaaro dishaayein, hass ke bulaayein,

Ye sab hue hain meharbaan…

He bent her once again, holding her behind her neck as low as the ground and lifted her slowly back holding her hand…..

Hume ko yahi rabba

Kasam se pata hai,

Dil per nahi koi zor

Teri Ore Teri Ore Teri Ore, hair abba

Teri Ore Teri Ore Teri Ore…..

The loud blare of music brought Khushi out of her reverie. Oh Arnav she sighed, the pain in her heart deepening, as tears glistened on her cheeks like the stars in the night sky.