Love Circum-fended

𝐑𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐝 [ᴇᴘɪʟᴏɢᴜᴇ]

She stood still behind the cupboard suppressing her huffy breath and looked at her gloved hands. The wetness of her hair ran down her face and on to the gloves. The water droplets on the surface of her cohesive gloves dripped on the floor making sounds, startling her. As she heard a few footsteps, she tilted her head to her left side whispering, "He is coming" to the air space beside her.

She sees Amaran open the door and hastily run into the objects on the table. Outside, the speed of the wind increased leading to the pouring of an even more heavy rain. She observed him trampling on the scattered papers on the floor and tossing down on the armchair. His breathing paced down, reviving him from the blurred vision. Sweat started running down from his forehead. She could sense that the darkness was sending chills down his spine as he reached out to the landline on the desk.

She bites her lip in tension seeing him, going to pick up the receiver. Suddenly, he hears a loud clap sound to which Amaran turns his head around to the cupboard's side. She moves inside the cupboard, escaping from his sight. As she moves closer to the wall, she hears the sounds of dogs barking outside the building.

She looks around to check if anyone was there and focused on Amaran again. He dared not turn towards the window and clutched onto the receiver tightly. He swiftly picked it up and dialled his Personal Assistant's number. The phone did not ring. He noticed that the wires to the landline were disconnected.

"I cannot stay here for long...", he murmured to himself. She heard him and signalled to the air space next to her. As he stood up from the armchair, she rushed to him digging her hand into her pocket. Checking the draws for his phone, he turns behind hearing the sound of her footsteps.

Amaran gasps seeing her.

She turns around inconsistently in the fear of him being aware of her presence. In tension, he picks up a sharp pencil from the pen-holder and holds it tightly in his fist. She is unaware of what to do and tries to gathers some courage. Taking a deep breath, she paced towards him firmly with her pounding heart. As she went closer, he swiftly swinged his hand with the pencil towards her shoulder. She defended herself by catching and holding back his wrist. His other hand caught her neck which made her breathless.

"What are YOU doing here.. at this hour..?" he asked her furiously. Her eyeballs moved towards the pencil and moved away again to see the space behind him. "He won't hurt himself, if I push him now", she decided mentally. Breathless, with all her might, she pushed him which led him to fall on the floor. She gets disappointed seeing him still grasping on to the pencil.

Exhausted, he was unable to get up. Making use of this chance she tries to snatch the pencil from him, but he retorts. "Help...", she called out silently. He confusedly looks upward and finds nobody next to her. The next instant he felt a hand on his fist trying to detach his fingers from the pencil. In shock, he lets go of the pencil and she takes it and puts it back on the pen-holder arranging the armchair back in place carefully.

Amaran gets confused seeing her actions and steps back towards the door to escape. He pulls the handle of the door. The door gets jammed, as he tries to open it continuously. She puts a black plastic cover over his head and pulls him behind. She pulls him towards the only window of the room and holds two of his hands tied together in her one hand, and opens the window in the other hand.

The wind blows off the cover on his head, spritzing fresh raindrops on his face. His mind gets unstable as soon as his eyes see the ground. "N-no... Anj.. Anjana-ahh", he rages at her. Her lips tremble, hearing him scream in fright. She pushes him further out the window, thrusts his neck tightly and goes near him and whispers to his ear in a feeble tone, "This is my turn, Amaran... thanks for coming into my life again.. else I wouldn't have never been able to meet my friend again... or would I've done THIS...".