She sat in the Starbucks cafe, sipping her coffee and staring out of the window. The blood-stained knife lay next to her handbag, covered with her blue silk scarf. She sighed a breath of ecstasy with her last sip from her cup.
‘Ridiculously overpriced for such a shitty taste,’ distant memory echoed in her mind. Sound was familiar, yet her mind struggled to map the voice. Raindrops had begun crashing faster against the screen she was sitting next to, another heavy downpour in past three days. Her mystic blue eyes maneuvered their way through that hazy window next to her, it was chaos outside, pedestrians running out on the street for shelter, every vehicle on the street honking to find a way out from a certain traffic-jam and, heavy rains creating dissonant noise falling over metals and concrete.
‘Fucking rain,’ she murmured under her breathe. Her gaze returned inside the coffee house and met the accountant standing behind the counter who gave her a formal smile. Wearing plain expressions, she gesticulated him to come to her. Accountant being busy at that moment asked a coffee boy standing next to him to attend the lady.
‘Yes mam,’ waiter asked politely.
‘I need a favor.’
‘Yes mam.’
‘I want you to call the police and tell them there has been a murder on third floor of the building opposite to your coffee house,’ that sweet voice didn’t flicker, neither the eyes.
‘Excuse me,’ the waiter was startled.
‘And tell them the murderer is sitting in your coffee house,’ she didn’t blink for a moment.
‘Yeah sure. And who would that be?’ The waiter mocked.
In reply the woman unwrapped the blood clad knife from her scarf, offering it to the waiter. Waiter fluttered back with his eyes expanding wide in horror and disbelief.
Within moments, the chaos inside the coffee house exceeded the chaos outside in the street.
***
‘You confess you killed Chetan Rathi, your husband.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘Because he was cheating on me.’
‘So you killed him. You could’ve divorced him, you could’ve left him.’
‘Every bit of my body worshiped him, and he promised that he will always be with me only. I helped him keep his promise,’ her voice was cold, distant from emotions.
The bulky police inspector sitting in that dark cell under a hundred-watt bulb opposite to that murderer indicated the constable to check her identity. Constable ransacked her purse to find a tiny driving license.
‘You are Pallavi Rathi?’ Inspector read the name from the license. An arrogant nod from the lady followed.
‘Why didn’t you flee?’ Inspector’s big black eyes never left alone her gaze even for a moment, keenly observant, trying to read whatever was being spoken.
‘Forgiveness of my sin lies in the acceptance of my verdict and suffer for the rest of my life remembering him,’ another blunt reply pursued. Inspector took a long breathe shifting in his seat as if positioning himself to say something important.
‘Mrs. Rathi your story is believable. Your love forced you to turn revengeful towards your cheating husband, your path for expiation forced you to turn yourself in and suffer. I have seen such cases in my life. However, one thing that doesn’t add up,’ a short pause followed, his eyes further penetrating her, ‘no tears, no sadness, no remorse. For god’s sake by what you have told me you have lost your soulmate whom you loved so much. Where are the fucking emotions?’ Inspector bellowed.
Pallavi froze to her place, her eyes flickered for the first time, her body shook as if waking from a slumber, ‘whom you loved so much…. whom you loved so much.’
***
World is divided between people who believe in true love and people who think of it as a misplaced emotion. But, irrespective of how vehemently someone opposes true love, there is a moment in everybody’s life when heart feels a tinge to go weak, opens gates for those alien feelings, and craves to pursue them for rest of the life. Unfortunately, rare are the ones who let themselves feel that tinge and rarest are the ones who pursue it all their lives. And then there was Chetan, who’s every heartbeat pumped love in his veins, whose eyes no matter opened or closed searched Pallavi’s face, his friends suspected him for either turning a maniac or falling in something bigger than love.
For four years of engineering Chetan relentlessly pursued Pallavi, got rejected thirteen times, but never imagined to give up. For him Pallavi was the reason of his existence and not just another seasonal passion of life. Pallavi’s blue eyes on her dusky oval shaped face were hypnotizing for him, those pink lips when moved gave Chetan goose bumps, those curls in the hairs when bounced over her shoulders would make him go weak on his knees, and every inch of her perfect body he would behold like a devotee, Pallavi was divinity for him.
At the end of the fourth year Chetan earned the highest salary package in the college from a USA based gaming firm. After finishing college, like their batch mates, Chetan and Pallavi too were leaving for a new quest in the outside world, Chetan was supposed to join the company in Chicago in next two weeks while Pallavi had a job in Bangalore. Whole college expected a high voltage drama on the last evening of college from Chetan but Chetan didn’t even bid adieu to the girl he called his life for all those years, he quietly left.
Everyone was surprised, even Pallavi, all those things she had been thinking she would tell him to buzz off for the last time, she didn’t even get a chance to say those. On her way back to home she couldn’t stop thinking about him, she couldn’t stop her eyes from welling up, ‘No more Chetan.’
After a month she joined the organization in Bangalore, her troubled heart desolated her of any delight she had imagined earlier with her long awaited first job. Something important had been left incomplete and for all her arrogance she might not get another chance to complete it in this life. Regret was all that was left behind.
One day when she was returning home on foot from her office, somebody called her name from behind. Her jaw dropped on the sight when she turned, Chetan was standing a few steps behind her.
‘Pallavi, I love you,’ his hesitant voice barely left his throat. Pallavi felt her eyes welling up, she took control of her emotions.
‘What are you doing here?’ she concealed her happiness under fake anger.
‘Proposing you for the fourteenth time.’
‘You should be in Chicago right now.’
‘I am searching a job over here. I couldn’t leave you,’ the way Chetan looked at Pallavi, she saw magic in those eyes. She ran and jumped over him hanging to his neck, crying like a baby.
‘I am sorry…..I am sorry Chetan…….I love you too…..I missed you so much,’ those confessions came spontaneous like those tears rolling over her cheeks.
‘I missed you too.’
That moment was the beginning, for next four years they lived their love diving deeper into eternity. They did what ordinary couples do but the happiness which they found in their hearts doing all that was extraordinary. Four years later they decided to get married to each other.
***
‘You want to marry Pallavi,’ Pallavi’s father Rajat Kapoor possessed an appealing personality. It was hard to tell from whom Pallavi would have inherited her stunning looks from, her father or her mother. Rajat, his wife Varsha, and Chetan were sitting on the terrace around a round table on a pleasant October evening in Mumbai at Pallavi’s residence.
‘Yes sir.’
‘How much…?’
‘Sir I earn enough to take care of your daughter’s needs.’
Rajat looked at Varsha, they both smiled at each other.
‘I was about to ask, how much do you love Pallavi?’
‘Ohhh….I am sorry, I am nervous. A lot. I love her a lot.’
‘We’ll see,’ Rajat sighed.
Chetan’s eyes sceptically tried to read both of them, something was wrong.
‘You know I have an empire of two hundred crores. It took me thirty long years to raise it from scratch. But you know I could‘ve done it in ten years but I didn’t. Why?’
Chetan slightly shrugged off his shoulders.
‘Because I believe in playing fair and honest.’
‘Chetan what we are going to tell you, just listen to it carefully,’ Varsha spoke for the first time, holding her husband’s hand she pressed it gently.
‘What is it Sir?’
‘We love our daughter very much but there are things you must know before reaching to any decisions.’
‘Sir I have decided.’
‘Just listen up son. Pallavi was kidnapped when she was five and it took the police one and a half year to find her. We couldn’t have been happier for we had lost all hopes to reconcile with Pallavi. But when she returned, something had changed. She was different. Cold towards everything,’ Rajat got off from his seat and walked to the railing looking at the setting sun, without turning back he continued, ’We had gifted a pup to him on her fourth birthday. It had become her best friend. When she returned she was so happy to see that pup. She cried hugging it for so long. And then one night I woke up to some sounds coming from her room. I went to check on her and to my horror, she had stabbed that pup and slashed its throat,’ Rajat paused for a while recollecting thoughts, ’I beat her up in rage and when I asked her the reason she told me that that pup wasn’t her anymore because it played with some other girl and seemed more happy with her. Worst part, next morning she remembered some girl had killed that pup but didn’t remember it was her.’
‘What happened then?’ asked Chetan.
‘We consulted a psychiatrist who told us that Pallavi was suffering from Dissociative identity disorder. The trauma she had gone through in that one and a half year had divided our Pallavi into two people, one our Pallavi and another one a cold blooded jealous person whom we hardly knew. Doctor said both of them share the same memories but can’t remember each other.’
‘She seems perfectly alright to me.’
‘She has improved a lot and her other personality has been suppressed largely. However, the psychiatrist told us something at that time, we must keep an emotional balance in her life because extreme of emotions could invoke that jealous other Pallavi. We took a good care of that advice for years by not loving her too much. But in past few years we have seen few changes in her, of course we didn’t know of you so we didn’t know the reason. But now that she has told us we could contemplate the changes. She is riding high on your ‘love’ which concerns us.’
‘Changes like what?’
‘Generally she is very talkative, she likes rain, she is emotional. But many times lately she has behaved weird, completely opposite to what she is.’
A long silence followed.
‘Sir I respect your honesty and if you allow me I would like to take care of your daughter for the rest of my life,’ Chetan was standing besides Rajat holding the railing, watching the reddishness of that horizon fizzling out slowly. Rajat turned towards him, tapped Chetan’s shoulder and, both of them hugged each other like father and son. Varsha wiped that little droplet forming at the corner of her eye.
***
Chetan and Pallavi got married, for next one year their lives couldn’t have been more ecstatic. Love was in the air they breathe, love was in the food they ate, love was in the work they did, love was in every moment they lived, love was at its ‘extreme’. Revelling in love, Chetan never noticed anything changing.
‘Hey love I am home,’ chirped Chetan closing the door one evening. House was silent.
‘Love?’ Chetan searched the house, Pallavi was sitting in the bed room with all the gifts from Chetan she had saved as memories from their bachelor lives.
‘What are you doing love?’
‘Whose gifts are they?’
‘What?’
Her glaring eyes didn’t belong to her.
‘Love are you alright?’
‘Whose are they?’
‘Yours. I gave them to you.’
‘I know you are seeing someone.’
‘What?’ Chetan was bewildered by this sudden change in Pallavi.
‘I heard you telling her that you love her.’
‘Pallavi that’s you I tell this every moment.’
‘I would know when you will tell me about your fake love,’ Pallavi shrieked. Chetan stood aghast, rooted to his spot.
‘I saw her pulling you out of starbucks last evening.’
‘It was you. Love remember you told me how much overpriced place it is for such a bad taste,’ Chetan tried to justify.
‘I love that place. And I am not mad, I would remember such a thing you liar.’
Chetan stood clueless amid such ridiculous conversation. ‘I am sorry,’ he calmly said.
‘So you are cheating on me,’ said Pallavi.
‘Please calm down.’
‘You bastard how could you…..’ she lambasted Chetan for next few minutes, convinced Chetan had broken his promise with her.
Chetan somehow managed to make her rest and quickly called Pallavi’s parents, narrating them everything. They rushed to the psychiatrist of Pallavi in Mumbai and after consulting him urgently, they called back Chetan in Bangalore after a couple of hours.
‘Chetan you must send her to a mental asylum tonight. Psychiatrist clearly told us, your life stands threatened if you share the house any longer with her,’ Rajat was panicking.
‘She can never hurt me. And with me alive she is never going to any asylum.’
‘Its time to be rational Chetan. She is sick and your love has made her suppressed sickness return with a vengeance.’
‘No she is not going anywhere.’
‘Chetan don’t make the mistake of mixing a medical condition with emotions.’
‘I am not cheating on her. I would make her understand that its her only whom I love with all my soul.’
‘Chetan you didn’t get it. Pallavi envies Pallavi. There wasn’t any other girl ever, who played with that pup.’
‘Whaaaattt?’
Next moment a metal penetrated through his neck, cutting his windpipe from behind and the communication broke in between. Spitting blood from his mouth he fell on ground gasping for air. He didn’t turn around for he knew what had happened but didn’t want to believe it. His trembling arms dragged his dying body for a few feet before another blow slashed his throat. His body writhed in pain for a few moments before coming to rest.
Holding the knife Pallavi stared at Chetan who was lying dead in his own pool of blood. She removed her blue scarf from her neck wrapping the knife into it, took her purse, and left the apartment.