An Imperial Affliction

Chapter 30 - There is no refuge from memory

There is no refuge from memory and remorse in this world. The spirits of our foolish deeds haunt us, with or without repentance.

-Gilbert Parker

Maybe the most awful thing in the world is to introspect everything you have ever done in your life.

Or maybe, the most awful thing is to introspect everything you ever did, and come up yourself as the guilty. Naturally, introspection comes when one goes very wrong in their judgment. There is already that self -doubt, but the action itself ruins the remaining self-confidence. They make us feel our behavior, action, or even the words we spoke were tied to the da*nation we created for ourselves, somehow.

Staring at the unseasoned rain pouring over the city through the window pane of ETF building, the cloud grumbling above angrily, Riya was thinking exactly when she went wrong in her life that this huge error of judgment occurred, which, several years later, came to give her a severe blow. Was it when she left her home? Or when she shattered the window glass of the apartment with a stone whose music was disturbing her study for preliminary exams? Or it was when she met the same person a week later, and they went out for Coffee? When she missed the glint in his eyes which could have been interpreted as wicked later? Was she so blind that she never noticed how he made plans to escape this life, for whatever reason, simultaneously making plans with her for tomorrow and made love?

Or is she making the error now? Maybe she is just making up the lie in his eyes when he is telling truth. Maybe she is misjudging his wrong situation because she is too blind in the hurt. Can she even trust herself anymore? 4 years and countless signs which screamed she is going wrong, and it took Him to appear before herself and prove it right. The biggest case, most personal incident in her life, and how wrong she went in that! She put herself and others through hell, endangered many just because she missed the neon signs telling her to back off, telling her there is nothing to find. How many lives she had destroyed? How low she had sunk in these years just because she could not give up, she could not function like other normal people and was being stubborn to see it through? How different her life would have been if she had never left her job, this world, 4 years ago?

If He was indeed in danger, as he is claiming now, why he had not trust her enough to confide? Why he chose to take the drastic steps, wiped out his life and went into hiding? Where she went wrong that he could not count on her to pull him out of a tough situation?

Or maybe she is being blind, again. She is being stubborn, again, hell bent not to trust him because he didn't do the same in past. Maybe it was all about payback, earlier his 'killer', now him. Maybe she is just a spiteful, determined on vengeance person who just needs someone to blame, someone to hurt. Something she just realized now.

She just didn't know what to believe anymore. She was not sure if she wants the answers. Maybe she is a coward too, of a different type, who shuns away from emotions and truths but never flinches when bullets fire at her. Maybe her brevity surfaces only when she knows it won't hurt her, physically or mentally.

She sighed, and closed her eyes, trying to block the questions and introspections.

As the time passed and more people filled in the bullpen, she found herself near the coffee machine, making a mug for her. She never liked the taste and always threw it after taking barely two sips, but found it was an interesting place to take off one's mind, staring at the machination of the inanimate object. Glancing around once, she found the uncertainty creeping inside again, leaking through the wall which she put up to block everything for a few moment. Everything she did, in these 4 year, there was an ulterior motive behind it, and joining here was part of same thing. Now that the motive was gone, she was unsure of her place in here. Should she stay? Should She stay? If she leaves, what will she do? Can she even lead a life which feels so . . . empty now?