Meant to be

Chapter 9: Dark Clouds

Shehnaaz looked up at the dark and monsoon heavy clouds rumbling over her and covering the brightness of day. She felt something similar happening inside of her. She was waiting for the other shoe to drop. It can't be this easy, life was never this easy and it is certainly not going to start now is it. With all the talk about the first padhaav and new entrants, she felt very restless and disturbed. It is funny that while not many things had gone her way in the past she always had an acute sense about things and her gut feelings about these matters never went wrong. She knew in her gut that there was something dark and difficult swarming around her. Logic would dictate that as one of the new entrants the makers would bring Himanshi. She knew it. She sighed. One small comment, a momentary lapse in judgement will she never be able to escape it?

She was also getting more aware of how much she wanted to be friends with Sidharth. Because of the way life had treated her she allowed very few people into her inner circle, because once they were there then she would let all her defenses down and completely surrender all ego and pride and become entirely selfless towards them. So far only Shehbaaz, her grandmum and her mother enjoyed that privilege. She did not count the cost of loving them. Strange that this person Sidharth Shukla seemed to be knocking on the door of that inner circle. She sometimes justified it to herself saying that it was because here in this house she did not have anyone else who gave her so much of attention and affection.

She had a massive crush on him at this point. The man was well groomed even in his wretched shorts! He was always so clean and smelt wonderful always was a manly man, what melted her the most! He was so unreadable,guarded, brooding and feisty with everyone else and with her he was soft, engaged, playful and there in all his entirety. She was a very tactile person, her Mum was not , her brother was and the two serious relationships she had in her life it was more of her giving than receiving. There was a lot of touching and hugging but it was always driven by libido more than emotions, this was not to say that Shehnaaz did not enjoy it or she wanted it to be anything else , but with Sidharth he was as tactile as she was.

That was an unintentional yet wonderful discovery in their friendship, they were always holding, hugging, wrapping and resting against each other. She had never gravitated physically and emotionally as she had to Sidharth. It was almost like a sweet compulsion and the fact that they did it under the umbrella of laughter and affection made it all too special. Initially she was blissfully unaware about it but slowly she started noticing how when he was in the room he always sat next to her or came and Lay his head on her lap or her shoulder and tugged her or tucked her in closer. Or if she came to sit or lay next to him then would immediately sit in such a way that her head rested on his arm
Or his leg was flung over her or his feet rested on her. He did this sweet thing at times when he held her hands, he would engulf her hand with his and hold it in his fists and rub his thumb over it. It was a very intimate gesture and it calmed her, it had the power to unknot and release every bad memory life had cruelly gifted her with. The rare moments she allowed herself to think about it she was filled with such contentment and security and a sense of belonging. But wasn't it just an illusion a fallacy? Just like what these 3 months were for the contestants. They called it "ghar' the bb house but it was hardly that was it. The contestants were certainly not family and even friendships were with an agenda. Eventually friends would be pitted against each other and eventually one would even be forced to consolidate with enemies. In all this what were Sidharth and she doing?

This house and what was happening inside of it was all just a pressure box with circumstances and situations created by the makers. You were literally just puppets in the hands of makers. So in all this how was she to navigate this curve ball, this calm and claim that exuded from Sidharth. She could not help enjoy it but she also was scared of expecting it and then get disappointed.

Sidharth on the morning of the first finale woke up before the morning song played. He turned to look at the Shehnaaz lying next to him snuggled within her blanket. If she was awake he would have pulled her in for a hug but doing that to her when she was sleeping would have been downright inappropriate. They were not there...yet? YET? He angrily asked himself. He shook himself out of that ridiculous thought. The last week had brought within him some amount of conflict. What Asim and Arti constantly fed him about Shehnaaz disturbed him out of a bubble that he had built around himself and her. In many ways it was a good course correction he needed because he felt at sometimes he resembled a besotted teenage boy.

She made him think and do things that he would scoff at when he saw others do the same things. She had a magical way of holding his attention, everything she did was so genuine, so spontaneous and heart warming. One thing he loved about her was how she had no ego or qualms or even an ounce of malice towards anyone. He found himself unknowingly and embarrassingly completely captivated by touch. It was not sexual in any way...not yet. YET! He grunted! But the truth is he was captivated and drawn by how she felt against his shoulders when she sat next to him, he loved tucking her small feet under his giant legs. He loved smelling her hair when she laid her head in his shoulders.

He knew she had a sharp mind but she never used it for putting anyone down. The toughest thing for him to consolidate with though was that she would never fit into any mould! She was a free spirit a self made woman who chose to retain her childhood charm. He admired that in a woman, he would have loved to get to have her unleash the full extent of her personality on him outside of this house. But in here it scuttled his game. The only one whom he could be real with was the only who would flit in and out of playing the game with him.

He sighed, now new people would enter the house. Her attention would be divided and in all this he had to focus and figure how he could protect his team and also bring in a few worthy new players. He was in it to win it. Shehnaaz was an unexpected plot twist. If he really thought hard about it outside the house it was unlikely they would ever cross paths but right now she held the crazy ability of weakening his game and at the same time strengthening him as a player!

As both Sidharth and Shehnaaz considered these dark and heavy cloud swarming over them, little did they know that there were the likes of shefali.z and Himanshi who were coming in to tear them apart but life and destiny were that much more strongly pushing them towards each other.

Very challenging to capture their emotions and frame of mind into words, not that one truly can, hence it is a good this this is fiction and none of these really exist.