"No, Charu, you don't understand. I'll never forget. I'll always look for you - in every thought, every pause between thoughts. I'll keep looking over my shoulder, I'll keep coming back until one day, one day, you'll let me stay."
"Tum - tum aisa nahi kar sakte - Anir - Anirban!"
"Now don't misunderstand," he says with a ghost of his mischievous smile. "Tum na mila toh mar gaya. Tum jeet gayi main haar gaya. You kept saying you don't- you can't- you will never love me. Chalo phir maan gaya. I won't ask again. I promise."
"Ani-"
"Tum karo na karo mujhe toh kud se pyaar hai. Main ab iss uljhan mein jeena nahi chahta. Tum mera sauda karo yeh mujhe manzoor nahi. Toh lo. Let us put an end to it. Let us put an end to it all.
"Let us not meet again."
His head is still heavy in her lap, her fingers still locked in his mattered hair, his blood on her face, on her forehead, all over her. Fresh tears streaked through its brilliant and stubborn red, washing it away, diluting it until it faded into palest of stains.
Charu wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand furiously.
"I'll bring help. I'll save you. I won't let you go. I won't. I can't. I -"
He holds her by her wrist, holds fast enough for the first few of her bangles to crack. That bloodied grin on his face had grown mocking.
"Durga ke liye?"
He coughs, air makes a painful wheezing in his wind pipes.
"Tumhare dil mein kaha kissi ke liye pyaar honga, tumhe Durga se fursat hi kahan?"
"Let me go Anirban - I - I'll-"
"Didn't you tell me its wrong not to love someone who loves so much? To let them live without their fair share of love? Kya woh sirf Durga ke liye sach hai?"
"Anirban main tum se -"
"Pyaar nahi karti. Pata hai. I'm not enough. Pata hai. Then let me go, Charu. Let me go. It hurts to be half loved. It hurts to live like this. See you everyday and to know that you are mine but not mine. She's not mine but is mine. Main kud apna nahi raha. Ab iss Dard se aur guzara nahi hota."
"Anirban-"
"Tumhari kaanoon toh gunegaron ko bhi ek aakhri ichcha mangne ka mauka dete hai na? Toh humein bhi do, humari joh bhi ghuna rahi ho. Saza e maut se badi toh koi saza nahi suna sakti tum. You can't sentence anyone to live. Aur humari aakhri guzarish yahi hai."
The sob breaks through her now. Her hands warm with blood and his words drowning out with his own breath, Charu knows the battle is lost.
"Aur mera aakhri ichcha yahi hai."
Over and above them the storm ranges, bringing with it the first snow in decades over Darjeeling.
"Tumhare saat jee nahi sakta par - tumhare bahon mein - Mar- ar toh sakta hoon, na?"
"Nahi," the word stutters in her mouth. "Nahi."
"Tum mujhe chod kar nahi jaa sakte. Sab - sab chale jaate hai. M-ma - baa-baapu - aur ab - ab -t-tum -"
He brushes a thumb over the word.
"I never wanted to. But you did. Tum humesha yahi chahti thi na. Bhagvaan tumhari sunli. Mujhse chutkara dediya."
"Anirban."
"And you have your family now. Your sister. Your Durga.
"You have everything. Mujhe apne zindagi se kuch pal nahi de sakti? Pyaar nahi toh kya - hum dost toh the na?"
"Let me go Anirban. Let me save you. Let me -"
"Stay with me. Stay with me. Stay Charu. Stay."
He is no longer holding her, it's she who gathers him close, her frame shaking with sobs and making him tremble too. Anirban presses his head against the rhythm of her pulse, it takes effort and he feels nauseous, still there is a peace upon him. He closes his eyes to the thrum of her heart, the ripples of her breath.
"Stay," his lips form the word soundlessly, face cradled by her palms. "I want to sleep. I don't want to think anymore. I don’t want to fight anymore. Stay. Stay - Charu. Cha - ru. Cha..."
"ANIRBAN!"
*
They snatch him from her arms, cruelly, mercilessly - so thoughtless that it makes her screach.
"No. No - I have to stay with him. I have to protect him. I - he wanted me to stay."
Heedless. They are heedless. They don't understand.
"Durga karengi." Someone says. "Durga usski rakshakavach hai. Durga -"
"Durga unki kuch nahi hai!" The words spill forth in a spell of rage and self loathing fury. They could hold her back, tie her down, she would not care. "Kuch nahi hai! Unki patni main hoon. Anirban ki shaadi mere saat hui thi!"
"Has this girl lost her mind?"
She's painted in his blood, blinded by her own tears and Charu doesn't pause to think if she truly looked like a mad woman raging as she turned upon the only woman who knew what she was talking about.
"Masi ma! Tell them the truth! Tell them!" Charu takes hold of the older woman and shakes her. "Tell them!" She sobs. "Tell them before they take him. Please don't let them take him away. Anirban didn't want to go. Aap - aap hi ne kaha tha na? Mujhe - mujhe unke saat rehena hai? Mujhe - unki raksha karna hai? Woh log une le jaa raha hai Masi ma. Anirban ko nahi jaana tha. Une rokiye, une Sach bata dijiye! Une rokiye! Mere pati ko - mere pati ko le jaane mat dijiye."
She falls on her knees keening, until the older woman collapses beside her, claps her in her arms.
"Shona! Charu - shona meri baat sun. Meri baat -"
"Anir! Anir! Masi ma stop them - stop them - please!"
Sampurna cups her face, stills her trembling urgency. Her own eyes swimming, her own mouth quivering she raises a hand and deliberately wipes the blood streaking- half dry on her parting.
"N-nahi."
Sampurna bites back a sob of her own and shakes her head, holds her girl closer and rocks gently.
Dragging a shaky inhale, she looks at the others watching them suspiciously.
"She's telling the truth," she keeps it short, passing many shocked faces her eyes find Durga's. The shock has paled her, her hands tremble, her eyes fill. Sampurna drags another tortured breath, holds one grieving girl in her arms and stretches out a hand for the other; the collateral damage of that one wrong decision. "Durga...?"
Durga doesn't move, doesn't take that offered arm.
"Then, woh sab Sach tha? What Latika Ji aur Chumki were saying? How could you Masi ma? Why would you make me live with my sister's husband?"
She lets the disgust take over and turns away from her, just as the Banerjees work out their own fury.
"Do you realize what you did - Sampurna ji? You - you are responsible for this! Humara beta - our heir - we did tell you how important it was for his wife to -"
"As if you people were any better!" For the first time in her life Rajshri raises her voice. "Apart from wanting to keep him alive so that you have a heir on display, did you even consider Dada to be a human? Did you consider he had a heart and it was being broken all over every day? Aap sab ko apni izzat ki, pratishta ki padi thi! Aap sab - aap sab ne milkar dada ka iss haal kiya hai!"
"Rajshri -!"
The accusations is a hum around her, a hum of angry bees, stinging, scratching - Charu wants to scream. They still did not care. Still, all they wanted was to pass the blame on to somebody and wash their hands off. Wash - hands -
She looks down at hers, still caked with his blood.
He had always saved her, always been there, even if she kept running from him and the truth. Now that she was screaming the truth, demanding it to be accepted, the one man who would have lived had she dared to raise her voice before, the one man who would have supported her without a question - he was no more.
It claws at her, the realization.
They weren't worried about the swap at the wedding anymore because she was a bloody Roy Chaudhary. But Anirban had loved her before that, when she was just Charu.
He had proved her innocence when she was just a convict on parole. He had given her proof to win against his father when she was merely grasping at straws during her first trial. He'd asked her to rip out his heart and see, measure the truth of his feelings for her.
She'd dismissed him. Broken him over and over again. He'd been patient, he'd been trusting, he'd always been more than she had deserved. She'd driven him to the end of his patience, refusing to see anything beyond her unquestionable loyalty to Durga.
She'd driven him to death, simply in seek of peace from her.
The chaos around her fades into a dull hum as Charu shrugs off Masi Ma's consoling hand. She walks away from them on unsteady feet, another monster among the monsters, who saw nothing beyond her own purpose.
He'd come here running from her.
"Tum mujhse yeh paap nahi karwa sakti," he'd told her, his voice had trembled with the weight of it. "I'm not my father - I'm not him! My mother had died knowing that there had never been a single day when he'd been faithful to her, when he'd been true to his vows. His betrayal had killed him. Aur tum! Meri patni ho kar - yeh chahti ho ke main Durga ke saat -" he swallows his own bitterness. "Mare aur Durga ke beech kuch nahi hone wala. Suna tum ne? Kuch nahi. Explain it however you will. Tell her whatever lies you want. I am not going to take part in this dirty game of yours."
"Agar yeh mera haq hai toh main -"
He'd pressed a finger to her mouth, effectively shutting her up. It was not the usual playful gesture she'd remembered from before, no, it was the fury that drove him.
"Haq lene ke liye haq dena bhi pad tha hai," he tells her slowly, allowing his breath to fan over her. "Jab tumne mujhe koi haq diya hi nahi toh tumhara kaisa haq?"
"Tum kya chahte ho Anirban?"
"Let me be!" He tells her wearily. "Mera peecha karna chod do. Nahi aane wala main. Nahi maanne wala. Chale jaao. Aur Agar tumhe meri zindagi main nahi aana hai toh, mere zaamne bhi mat aaya karo. Chale jaao! Chale jaao!"
Had he stood by his word, he'd have lived. But he'd come to save her, despite all the cracks and thorns between them, he'd come when nobody else did, when it was her life that Chumki and her mother had wanted to take.
He'd come and saved her, left her to stew in the realization of her mistakes. She had let it happen thinking her death would have saved all the problems, taken out the obstacle between Durga and her happy ending - Anirban and his conscience - with her gone, nothing would have stopped them.
But she'd forgotten, some cruel fate had bound her life to his, made her his raison d'etre. And he'd taken the doom meant for her, knowingly, purposely, while making certain she remained unscathed in his arms.
"This," he'd said, "is the only possible ending to us. Because I'll never forget. I'll always look for you - in every thought, every pause between thoughts. I'll keep looking over my shoulder, I'll keep coming back until one day, one day, you'll let me stay. Today, you'll let me stay - won't you - Charu?"
A stone in her path makes her stumble and she collapses on her feet.
"Anirban..." it starts as a whisper.
Today, she'll burn the heavens and raise the hell if it meant that he'll stay. That he'll come back.
The futility of it burns her, the loss eats her through. None of these people she'd have died for, none of them loved her as she was - no, being Devi meant something to them, being Roy Chaudhary's daughter meant something to them. Not to him, never to him. And he'd died for her, for Charu. She'd lost him to her own foolishness.
"Anir!"
The cry is torn from her, for every unspoken word that has turned into acid on her tongue, for all the times she could have called out and he'd have just returned to her.
"ANIR...!"
Her hands fist on the dirt, the sand cutting into her skin. Now he no longer heard. No longer looked over his shoulder. No longer came running.
She chokes on that name now, the tears running free, the sobs making her drown on her own follies, it has become a broken chant, the name she'd die calling.
"Anir...Anir...Anir!"
*
They find a new topic for their war of tug soon. Where would she go, to the Roy Chaudharys to be their Devi, newly found or to the Banerjees to be their Bahu, the last link to their departed son.
Charu goes to neither.
In his last ditch attempt to escape the mockery she'd made of their lives Anirban had made a home in Darjeeling, where he'd told her she'd be only welcome if she came to accept their reality.
It is home to him in a way the Banerjee haveli had never been. It feels home to her too, in a way no place had ever done. She doesn't bother to explain why. She doesn't bother to find out. The time stands still there, a soft fire burning in the fireplace, scent of its wood filling the house, an open book with his place marker still in place, his favorite record in the gramophone - as if, her heart clenches painfully at the thought - as if he'd left in a hurry, meaning to come back, as if - he'd walk in any moment.
As if the very house stood on that hope, existing for him to come back, feed that fire, read that book, hum along with that record.
It's a world full of him, world he had wanted to, yearned to share with her. She drowns herself in it now, discovering him a little every day, falling a little deeper in love every day, breaking slowly apart with each day.
Charu wouldn't call it a penance, for Anirban wouldn't have punished her, wouldn't have wished pain upon her even when she'd been cutting him upon on a daily basis. No, it is no punishment. It is learning, in grief and loss she learns how beautiful life could have been, how simple - how joyous. And how shallow and empty it was now.
Who if left, she is cordial to them, but distant. She couldn't see either family without thinking how attached she'd been to them once, the idea of them loving her, that she'd openly ignored the hurt she'd been causing on him, the hurt they'd been causing on him.
She couldn't love them the way he had yearned to be loved, knowing he'd died for it and still did not get an iota from her.
She learns, she works and she wins most of the time. But it never leaves that sweet taste in her mouth which her first victory had given, when he'd been there to take her in his arms and hear her gloat about her achievement.
She never dines with others. The invitations she get she declines them.
Her evenings have a patten, the fire, the book, that soft music of his favorite record. She dines in silence, in her heart she tells him all the little happenings of her day.
She becomes a senior member of the bar. Gets appointed to the bench. Serves a term and steps down when it becomes too much of a stress. The Darjeeling law school seeks her out, it suits her just as well. The youth in her classes inspire her, reminds her of her own hot blooded days. She remembers each student she ever teaches for she tells all about them to him in the evenings.
They make her their first female Dean, an achievement that she knows would have made him happy. His Charu was not just Charu anymore, but senior Counsel Charu; with three books on jurisprudence to her name. She signs her name as Charu Anirban Banerjee, and finds a little solace everytime she sees their names together, entwined in a way they'd never been.
The years go by. She never forgets. She never forgives herself.
When Dadi passes away, Charu is in London, she never manages to come and see the woman in her last days. They never call her when Abhiroop dies, breaking his heart over how his most adored younger son was ruining his name and reputation.
Charu remains by her side during Masi Ma's last days. In her delirium, the woman keeps apologising to her, asking her to forgive her, forget this mistake she'd made, get married again. She tells her nothing, just that she'd married once - and it's enough for a lifetime.
Durga doesn't talk to her for years, furious over what a mockery she'd made of their lives, just like Anirban had warned she would. They make up at Masi Ma's deathbed, become tentative sisters - but never grow as close as they'd once been.
That is another loss she mourns, but not every day, like the living breathing wound on her heart that Anirban had left.
Charu lives through all the losses she'd once thought she wouldn't be able to take. Takes all the separations, deaths, and distances she'd once feared to imagine.
Durga passes away two years after she'd been made Dean of that law school. The winter's been hard on her, her son tells Charu over the phone. Yet, she died happily, after seeing the third of her grandsons being born.
The winter is hard on her too, and she couldn't travel - They do not wait for her.
Finally, half a century later - she's the only living breathing person who'd remember Anirban Banerjee. Who'd seen the way sunlight played with his hair, who'd known that no photograph of him did justice to the way his eyes sparkled with mischief. Who'd known his friendship, his fierce loyalty, his kind heart - his potent love.
The fire still burned, the book was still marked, she puts the record again, the soft notes chasing one another.
"It's just you and me now, Anir," she whispers to the dancing shadows of the firelight. Her voice long grown raspy with the age. "And I'm tired today."
She hums along the tune, takes a mock turn around the room. It's a music of a slow dance, she'd seen the actual performance once in London.
There's a hand on her shoulder, warm and light as it had always been in her dreams. She jerks and whips around, eyes widening in surprise.
"Tum? Yahaan? Kaise?"
The firelight highlights coppers and golds in his hair, brandished the lines of his face in molded fire. His eyes are dark, full of that mischievous spark, his mouth crooked into a sideways grin.
"Kaha tha na tum se - pyaar hoon. Kabhi bhi kahi bhi ho jaata hoon," his grin deepens as he draws her closer, his breath on her face is warm. "Kyun? Tumhe bhi ho gaya na?"
She closes her eyes to a surprised smile, draws in a lung full of that unforgettable scent, beneath her palm his heart beats, her own feels younger by decades - enlivened by some witchcraft.
She doesn't think. She doesn't fight. He reaches over and presses a kiss to her wrinkled brow.
"Haan," she sighs. A woman finally home, a woman finally forgiven. "Haan. Haan."
**
