Attachments 2.

Chapter 33

As I waited for Karan in his cabin, I spun a pen around on the table and absently stared at it, without blinking. I couldn't absorb the truth. I couldn't believe that Darshan and I weren't together, anymore; I had to remind myself about it, and every time I did, I thought I was dreaming. The reality was too unreal to be believable. Everything happened within a blink of an eye, and rushed before me that I couldn't grasp, and get hold of, the situation. After parting ways with Darshan, a part of me sunk in regret; I felt I walked away too quick. Somewhere I thought that I should have tried one more time; he wasn't in a state to explain, but I was, and maybe, I could have tried harder to convince him that we'd last together. But my mind was still in two states; I didn't know if I did the right thing, or if I reacted impulsively, as always. Whether I was right, or not, didn't matter anymore, for we snipped off the strings that held us together, and the only other option I had was to move on in life – that was exactly what I decided to do.

"Hello there! Where were you all long?", Karan's cheerful voice broke straight through my empty thoughts, and forced me to look up at him. "Good morning", I greeted him, dully, and he kept his belongings aside, before sitting down on his chair. "Tea? Coffee?", Karan offered, clasping his hands on the table. "Singapore", I told him, right away. "Singapore?", he echoed, raising his brow, and I answered him with a brief nod. "I thought about it, and you were right. I need to be extremely fortunate to get another life-changing offer, if I turn this one down, and I don't want to take the risk. And maybe, I simply got carried away and got off-track for a moment, but I've understood that nothing matters more than my dreams", I reasoned. "You're not afraid of leaving certain people behind?", Karan prompted, and I smiled, looking away from him. "You cannot leave the people who've already left, Karan", I told him, and he was silent; he simply looked at me, almost bewilderedly, as though he struggled to understand the meaning concealed behind my words. "Singapore is still on, right? Or, have I lost this, too? Like, I understand I'm late and I took forever to decide, but can you do something? Please?", I asked him, disrupting the silence between us, and Karan shook out of his thoughts, but he didn't utter a word. "Darshan say so---K-Karan---Karan, say something", I breathed out and shut my eyes, looking down at my lap. "Singapore. Yes. Y—you can go. I mean---you have to go; I was rooting for you all long, and I'm beyond glad you made the right decision", Karan blankly said, scratching his head. "You'll be departing in a week. I'll finish the formalities and get back to you within four days. Until then, if you want to go back home and spend time with your family, you can", Karan said. "No, it's fine. I don't want to go back home. I'm better in Mumbai. I'm sure my parents will understand", I blabbered, and Karan simply listened. "Okay, then, thank you", I exhaled, and rose to my feet. "Are you okay?", Karan blurted out, looking up at me, expectantly. "Yea, cool", I answered him, uninterestedly. "Okay. Cool", Karan said back and I walked away from his table. But once I was ten steps away from his table, I stood to my ground and turned back around to face him.

"I'm not okay", I confessed, openly, and Karan smiled, sympathetically. "I am not okay. I don't know what's happening with me. I feel I've lost everything. I don't have friends. My boyfriend—my ex-boyfriend broke up with me. I'm feeling way too many emotions at once, but I cannot cry. It's tearing me apart and it's hurting so much, but I cannot scream. I need to reach out for help, but there's nothing one can do to heal a broken heart, so I chose to stay silent and I chose to smile. Someone once told me that, if I pretend to be strong, one day, I'll forget I'm pretending; so I'm wearing a brave face, with hopes that sometime soon, when I wake up, I wouldn't have to consciously wear that mask because I'll genuinely be brave, without having to pretend. But how do you wake up when you haven't fallen asleep, all night? Through my bedroom window, I stare at darkness turn into light and if I happen to fall asleep, he disturbs my sleep; not literally him, but I can hear his voice in my head and I can picture him. I've woken up in the middle of the night, because I heard him calling out for me. He's everywhere, and I don't know how to get over him. He's an obstacle I cannot cross. I almost feel that I won't ever forget about him, and the love between us. I know that life will happen, and I'll move on, one day; but until that one day comes my way, I'll have to die every day and that scares me. He left and he took me away with him; I cannot even recognize myself in the mirror anymore. No matter how cheerful I try to be, there's still sadness in my eyes and I don't know how to erase that. I'm not okay", I vomited out the storm I concealed for days, and Karan opened his mouth to say something, but I stopped him. "No, Karan, no! I don't need your sympathies or empathies. I'm fine. Like, I know I sounded like a psychopath, but I'm feeling much better right now. I blabbered everything out because if I kept my thoughts to me for a little longer than I did, I would have exploded. It was driving me insane, throughout, but now that I spat everything out, I feel much lighter. I think, I'll finally go to bed with a calmer heart tonight and maybe, I'll even sleep. You know what I was thinking? I thought I'll buy sleeping pills, and survive on them for one night only; like, I need to sleep but I cannot sleep and I feel like a zombie because I cannot function without sleep. I feel good after talking to you, so maybe, after sleeping for a while, I'll feel even better", I jabbered, senselessly, and that was one of my biggest problems – I would go on talking, when I'm sad, because it was my way of showing the other person that I wasn't in too much pain, and that I'll be okay.

"Can I say something?", Karan paused, and I nodded. "When you're hurt, accept it. It is okay to deceive the world, but don't cheat yourself, because then – when reality hits you, it'll hit you so hard that you'll struggle to stand back up. You're such a bold girl, but Dityaa, I don't think anyone has ever told you that – bold girl can cry, too, and they're allowed to cry. You're so defensive; 'I'm strong. I'm unbreakable. I won't cry. You can put me through hell, and I'll still not cry' – that's the wrong attitude. You'll get hurt, too, and so what, if you do? You're a human being, too. If something hurts – cry, scream and reach out for help. Wearing a smile while walking through a storm is beautiful, but sometimes, that smile will emerge only after you break down. If you take happiness seriously, you should take sadness seriously, too – don't simply brush it off. Let alone dealing with our sadness, we don't even acknowledge it. But why? Because that's the easy way out? The easier way out is to confront your sadness, cry it out, pick yourself up and move on; when you do that, you'll never look back. Oftentimes, we leave people behind and carry the weight in our hearts forward with us; and that holds us back from moving on. And one more thing – come forth, accept and understand the simple fact that you're not a laptop. You are not a machine to have all your memories deleted, and not remember a thing, again. You'll meet someone and you'll fall in love, but when things don't go your way, it becomes a memory. At some point of time in life, you will look back at it, or maybe, the memories would flood back to you, somehow. It's going to hurt, and it will hurt because that's what happens when beautiful things die; you cannot change that, it is something inevitable. The person with the softest heart feels the pain, and even the one with the strongest heart does, sometimes to the same magnitude, because in love, all of us are vulnerable and tender. So, Dityaa, it is okay if it hurts; just don't carry it forward, and I believe that the only way to not take it forward is to confront it and spill your emotions out, understand?", Karan ended his speech, which impacted me, greatly, and I couldn't go past smiling at him, gratefully. "This chapter of your life is over. Turn the page, now. A chapter with a bad ending does not mean that you're destined to have a story with a sad ending. Your story belongs to you, and whether, or not, it has a happy end wholly depends on you. Who said that 'happy endings' only happen when you unite with your Prince Charming? Building your own kingdom is a kind of happy ending, too. Learning to keep yourself happy, being enough for yourself, achieving your goals and living your dreams are happy endings. You're on the driver's seat, and your life will head in the direction you choose. So, cry everything out and start packing your bags; Singapore is waiting for you", Karan told me.

I walked out of Karan's cabin, with a lighter heart and a focused mind. Maybe, Singapore would change the game for me and I was beyond thrilled to take the flight out of India.