Shraman: Tales Of Love || Completed

1.7 the face-off

~ always remember that God never takes away something from you without the intention of replacing it~

Shravan was sitting right in front of his parents, his fingers interlocked and his gaze fixed at the floor. There was no way he could ask the questions that haunted him day and night looking at their faces. His father was his super hero. He could never watch him defeated. And no matter the years of separation and the anguish in his heart, he still loved his mother to the core. That was the greatest manufacturing defect in Shravan. Despite all the heartache he received and all the pains he gave away, he still cared for his loved ones. He still loved them.

" Papa,why did you do all that? Why did you ask nirmala ahuja, I mean maa to leave us? Why did you push away suman, that too at the cost of preeti and pushkar? And maa, why did you not try to atleast come to me?", Shravan finally asked and Nirmala and ramnath gulped down. Either of their explanation was not legitimate, none would be able to lessen his pain and trauma.

"Shravan....", Ramanath gulped and the same old story again. How his male ego hurt at the sight of his wife more successful than him. How the chauvinist inside him awakened at the sight of nirmala and Mr ahuja and how he was convinced they were more than just professionals. The painful abuses he hurled in her way and the ways she retorted back. How Ramnath felt insecure seeing little shravan wrapped around his mother's little finger. And that tragic day of Mr ahuja's sudden death when nirmala ran to comfort his only 6 year old son- aditya! The poor kid was badly traumatized at the sight and here Ramnath welcomed the opportunity by filling shravan's ear that how his mother had eloped with Mr ahuja. And broke the little boy, tainting his ability to see the world. If a mother could deceive so can anyone, couldn't they? This was the one question shravan had fought with, his entre existence now. As Ramnath finished with his explanation, shravan looked at his mother.

No words and no apologies could explain what Nirmala had done. She had let the submissive wife win over a dominant mother. It was true that ramnath played shravan and Nirmala both but it was also true that she could have come back to him. Not a single call or a single message nor a single effort to reach out to him.

"It was so easy to get over me na maa? So easy to move on with aditya as your son? Didn't your heart pain for me maa?", Shravan questioned with moist eyes and Nirmala broke into tears in front of her son.

"It did shravan. I have no count how many times it did. But I was scared for ruining your childhood, unaware that I was inturn ruining your entire life. There is no explanation beta. If you can, please forgive us...", Niramla joined her hands in front of Shravan and so did Ramnath. Both had streams of tears running down. Shravan was taken aback. He was hurt but he could never see his loved ones crying that way, especially his parents, his father whom he had literally worshipped and his mother for whom he had craved that bad. He got up and held their hands in his, shaking his hand in a no. He wanted to speak, to tell them that he loved them and he forgave them but he couldn't. He just couldn't. He wiped their tears silently before leaving the room.

Suman was pacing the room to and fro waiting for shravan. She knew his heart would be again butchered hearing the entire story, a story of selfishness on everyone's part. She waited and waited but Shravan didn't come, making her worry to no extent. Tears were already threatening to fall out of her orbs when her cell phone rang, the only name after shravan that could lit her dark nights, her beloved Nanu.

" Hello, Nanu?", Suman answered in the first ring, her voice already quivering.

"Suman beta, come over to tiwari killa now. It's important", Nanu instructed her and cut the call leaving a bewildered suman behind. But Nanu was Nanu and so suman quickly gathered her car keys and wallet before running off to tiwari killa.

Shravan was entirely lost when he had came out of his parents room. And as always, even the the depths of his despair his heart took only one name, similarly even in that lost battle, his feet took him to that one place he had seeked comfort in- tiwari killa. But there was a little twist, his feet did not drag him to his sumo's room but it took him up the stairs, to the room which held an old radio, their old pictures and old man who held the key to the treasure of Shravan's comfort.

" Nanaji", Shravan called him aloud, standing at the door, with a knock.
Deendayal Tiwari, a retired lawyer by profession, and suman and Shravan's common link, looked up at him.

"Shravan", he answered with a love filled voice and Shravan ran to him, keeping his head in nanaji's lap as he rested on the armchair. This was one person, shravan knew, who had loved him without any reason, without any reservation.

"Nanaji...", Shravan whimpered, unable to keep his tears in check, unknowingly moistening the old man's eyes. Nanaji caressed his hairs repeatedly as he cooed that 6'4" tall child. He did not ask him questions, he knew revisting a single thing again and again would not do any good to him.

"Nanaji, I also want a normal life. To laugh out with papa, to sleep in maa's lap, to move on with sumo. But I cant make myself forgive them nanaji. Everytime I try, it hurt me bad, really bad as the memories play like an over rated movie in front of my eyes. I am going mad with these questions and answers and everything else...", Shravan cried out loud, not bothering that this old man is actually suman's grand father and here is complaining about suman to him. But then that was the purity of their love.

" Shravan beta, why is it said that forgiveness is a virtue? Not everyone can forgive. We are humans. Sin is our nature. Forgiveness is not. And there is no reason which should lead you to punish yourself for this matter. But then love is a healer beta. You love your parents, you love suman. Isn't it? Eventually this love will win over your pain and hatred. And also, their efforts to heal you. It will all be okay son, it will all pass with time...", Nanaji comforted shravan and Shravan looked at him like a child looking at his mother.

" It will go away? I will feel fine? ", Shravan questioned with such an urgency that it broke nanaji's heart too, the reflection of raw pain that was visible in his eyes.

"Yes. You will be okay. More than okay. Give it some time...", Nanaji consoled him and he nodded, still lying in his lap. Sometimes the blood relations can not provide you with the comfort that you are seeking. But other relations do.

Suman came running upstairs and was about to barge in when that shadow caught her attention. She could recognise him in a crowd of 7 billion people. She saw her Nanu softly patting his head as he slept in his lap.

" Nanu?", She called softly as she entered, sitting beside him on the bed.

"Suman beta, take him home when he wakes up. And stand with him even if be tries to push you away. Once you had pushed him away choosing us over him, today he might push you all away choosing his need for stability over love. But don't leave. Stay with him until his insecurities die off and his fear of being left subsides. Ohk?", Nanu asked suman and she nodded. Though she didn't tell him her plan. She had already vowed to stay till her last breath, and she was going to do exactly that, no matter what.

A few hours later, suman and Shravan returned in suman's beloved ambassador, since shravan had come on feet. They didn't talk and they didn't explain. But suman knew in her heart that it would be a new beginning now and Shravan also realized the same, though he didn't speak!