MishBir: Someone You Love(d)

|8| Falling Apart

Mishti stood frozen from the effect of whatever she heard, and Kunal too, didn't seem to know how to react. They booth continued to stand there, behind the door, dazed, until their eyes met, and Mishti's attention was shifted to Kunal. Kunal, though immediately averted his eyes, but Mishti saw through them, she saw the hurt he was carrying and trying so hard to hide.

Kunal turned on his heels and was about to leave, Mishti's gaze scanning through him made him highly uncomfortable, but Mishti was fast enough to hold his hand before he could go.

"Kunal? You aren't okay, so I am not going to waste my time asking if you are. But I would like you to know, that despite our egos, our fights, our misunderstandings, you can talk to me. I am here, for you too", Mishti's words came like a lightning bolt at Kunal, who stared at her wide eyed, as confused as guilty.

He had not left one chance to blame her, to throw mud at her, and here she was, letting him know he could lean upon her.

"Why?", only one word escaped the lump that had began to form in his throat.

Mishti smiled at him, and the light in her eyes told him it was genuine.

"Because I love Abir, and he loves you. Everyone and everything that is important to him, that he treasures, is equally important to me too", she patted his hand softly and Kunal somehow found it in himself to nod at her. His eyes had turned misty, but he didn't trust himself to talk right at that moment.

Mishti didn't force either, her mind and her heart were focused at Abir anyway, so she let Kunal go, and turned to look at Abir instead when she saw him walking, his gait tandem, towards his room.

Something broke again, inside Mishti's heart, the sight of his slumped shoulders and defeated steps made her eyes teary.

Abir, oblivious to her tears, kept shedding his own as he managed to walk to his room, and push open the door with staggering steps. He walked inside, not minding to lock the gate or switching on the lights even, and sat down on the floor, his back to the wall, his entire strength seeping out through his tears. Pulling his legs up, close to his chest, he rested his cheek on them, the wetness from his face wetting his jeans too.

It came in waves, the pain. The emotions that had been building inside him, for the last two months, finally broke free in that moment as Abir broke down into loud sobs. Just for this once, he told himself, and he let the heart wrenching sobs escape him, without trying to muffle them or hide them at all. He cried, and cried, and cried, his tears knowing no boundaries today as the ache in his heart paralysed him momentarily. And despite all beliefs of the tears relieving the pain, Abir only felt the weight on his chest increasing every passing minute, so much that it became difficult for him to breath. Gasps was all he could do, in the name of breathing, and even doing that for a few seconds felt like a huge task, but the comfort of two familiar hands rubbing his back came as a huge, welcome relief.

Abir jerked his head up and saw Mishti, kneeling beside him, rubbing his back as tears made their way down her eyes too.

Everything stilled for a few seconds, they kept looking at each other, and while Abir made sure she wasn't another figment of his daily imaginations, the Mishti who would come to him in the depths of his deepest despair, and would disappear after he had ranted his heart out in her lap, Mishti only stared at the set of eyes her world revolved around, and found herself drowning in the sea of his tears.

"Mishti", Abir whispered, half sure she would vanish into the air if he tried to hold her but when his shivering hands held her shoulder and she didn't fade away like he thought, Abir lept onto her and hugged her, her tiny frame entirely covered by his huge torso while he wept into the hollow of her neck, only chanting her name like it was supposed to take all his pain away.