"Do you think I made a grave mistake?"
"If you run to her the moment we reach Mumbai, I think you may have some chances to make up with her."
And running he was.
He skipped steps, slipping on the iron stairs and pushing past a baffled Vidyut who tried to make sense of the situation. Anirudh was moving at the speed of air, not waiting, untapped, and continuously escaping the clutches if any. He ran through the tarmac letting the cold air slap him and let the alcohol wash off from his system, passing the security personnel and gates that seemed like a hurdle to him. A wall between him and his petal.
He jumped through the barricades trying to dodge the policemen who secured the exit of this private airport towards the waiting sedan but only to be caught by his bodyguard Hyde. The bulky man restrained his attempts his efforts to move past them.
"Let go of me, Hyde. That is an order damnit." He struggled in his hold, two more guards joined his force and they all together held back the man who wanted nothing but to run towards his wife.
"Where do you think you are going, Boss?" Hyde shot pushing Anirudh back from leaving the place. "You are drunk. You cannot drive alone. You need me to take you there."
Anirudh exhaled and brushed a hand through his ruffled hair. He blinked for a good second before nodding and hurrying towards the shotgun of the car. "Hurry. I need...to reach her quick."
A curt nod towards them and the car was on the roads, pulling up adjacent to fellow travelers and surpassing them. They broke a little too many rules in that 55 minutes that he sat fidgeting with his phone, unrestrained panic coursed through his veins as he kept dialing her number which went unreachable.
His family was clueless until he sprouted the truth of this night.
"Anirudh, are you in your senses? What do you mean by Dhwani is inside?" Rashi questioned through the phone.
"Mom...Dishant called." He answered biting his lower lip. "She was there, inside, and lastly seen in her office. She did...not leave. She may...be inside. I don't know any...more. What if she...is trapped?"
"Stop speaking nonsense." She cut his thoughts off. "Nothing will happen to her. She must have been in the traffic. She told me she was leaving. She called...how can she still be there?"
"Stop thinking the worst you both." Harshvardhan snatched the phone from his wife. "You, Anirudh listen to me. Reach the site, we are coming there too. Dhwani must be there. And she is fine. I know my daughter, she must be helping the kids and calming them. If she is there, she must be protecting those kids. Do you hear me? She is safe."
"Y...yes, dad." He dropped Hyde's cell phone in the console, picked a water bottle, and threw some on his face he wiped the last traces of alcohol from his face. "How much long, Hyde?"
"10 minutes more, Sir."
7 minutes and Anirudh could make out the smoke clouding his sky. The building was up in flames, burning to tilt and ashes flowing all around. The sirens burst through the air, roads blocked by authorities, and once the clear sky was filled with rings of smoke traveling up.
"Stop the car, Hyde." He commanded and his man followed not before a cursory glance at him.
Even before the car could fully stop, he had jumped out of the vehicle and ran towards the barricades stopping civilians from entering the premises.
There was chaos all over. The firefighters trying to find ways out to enter and check the buildings for survivors, the ambulance at standby, the police were holding back the crowd, and the media covering the live footage.
Some hundreds of mics turned towards Anirudh as he made it into their peripheral, the flock running towards him but held by the Hyde's team that followed him here. They stopped the leeches from reaching him and he stood analyzing the place. As if the world had come to a standstill, things stopped moving for him, eyes sweeping the surroundings to catch a glimpse of her but Dhwani was nowhere.
He could see the caretaker standing at the farthest corner with kids circled around her, he remembered her face from the employee file he had occasionally checked, and with her were two more women who hugged those little terrified souls to them. Their faces looked ashen, smoke residual on their clothes and skin, tears in their eyes, and some kids were shaken.
His steps staggered towards them while the voices felt deaf in his ears. He bent near the kids and several heads turned towards him. He caught a stumbling kid in his arms and checked him for injury. He was some 10-year-old who often waved him and Dhwani when he picked her up on their way home.
"Bh...aiya." He sobbed and jumped into Anirudh's arms, making him hold onto the body as it came crashing onto him.
"H-hey, champ." Anirudh shushed him, rubbing his hair and smiling in assurance towards the other faces who looked ready to burst into tears. "You are fine. Nothing happened. It was an accident, nothing else. You are out. You are safe."
The soft nothings came as an assurance he himself needed. How did he wish to hear that nothing happened, that they are safe, that she is safe, that she is out with them?
He pulled the boy away and cupped his face, wiping his tears from his cheek "Your d...didi wouldn't like seeing her little munchkins cry. Do you want to upset her?"
He admired how quickly they all said no. The kids adored Dhwani and she loved them as her own. He knew the extent she could go to protect them. She wouldn't care for herself but them and how he wished it wasn't true?
What if she had risked herself for their lives? She could.
She would happily do it and more. She was selfless that way and it scared him.
He blinked hard to keep his emotions in check.
"Stop crying, okay?" Anirudh cajoled the little lives his petals cherished.
"Sir!"
He turned towards his left to find Dishant coming towards him, out of breath and out of wits. He looked distressed and boggled. "Sir, I...I was...waiting for you."
"Arrange food and water for the kids and staff. Make sure everyone is well and not hurt. Meanwhile, contact a local hotel and shift them there." He shot the commands at once.
"Sure...sir." Dishant was still trying to have his fill of oxygen.
"Shift them away from here. The place is not safe anymore." Anirudh added and turned towards the caretakers who stood at a distance with their heads ducked down. He addressed them. "Please take a headcount and make sure all the kids and staff members are out. Take rest for the night, I will see you tomorrow morning for some questions."
"All 70 kids are here but..." The oldest lady, one of the matrons he guessed trailed, looking unsure, and for the other two to help her continue.
"There was a woman with us." The third one continued with a choked voice. "She is not out yet...she was pregnant...I don't know why she did not leave...Didi ji woke up all of us..."
It caught his attention and he froze, he wished all the gods above to prove him incorrect. "Dhwani was inside?"
The woman nodded wiping her face with her saree. "Yes, didi ji saved us. She made us run from the kitchen door. She was there and saved the kids. If she wouldn't have been there, all the kids would have been trapped inside the fire."
"She knew something was wrong, when she came to the main dorm, she was panicked. She woke the elder kids and asked them to take the younger ones out till she ran to us. We didn't realize what happened. We were in deep sleep. She threw water on Savitri tai and then Tai woke us all. She said Didi Ji asked us to take the kids out. We somehow made it out of the building and it suddenly caught fire. If we have stayed another minute..."
The woman cried thinking about the what ifs.
"Did...did she not...come out with you all?" He feared that answer as much as he anticipated it.
The women shook their heads and his knees gave up, he staggered and felt his lungs give up.
"She is inside?" He restrained himself from speaking, not wanting to manifest it to become truth.
"We don't know, sir." Savitri Tai hugged that woman to her chest, "I last saw Didi ji when she woke me. She was frantic and kept saying that we had to evacuate the building. The moment I was in my senses, she left for Manna's room. She must have left to save her and it is also possible that she took the garden exit because it was closer. We don't know, sir."
"Garden?" He nodded to himself and made a run toward the opposite side of the compound.
He passed the barricades to enter the small playground near the building when a loud blast threw him off his feet. The east side of the building had burst into flames and the firefighters rushed to this part.
Several hands pulled Anirudh up, checking him for injury.
"My Petal. My wife, she needs me, you dumb-wit. Let go!" He was screaming and could feel his vision clouded with unshed moisture he didn't realize he was capable of. He hadn't cried, not when Vandita broke up with him, not when he saw her leaving his life, almost never but today he seemed to couldn't stop himself from wanting to do anything that could stop the time and let him reach her. "Let go! She is inside the building."
"No one is inside, sir!" The captain tried holding his struggling form back.
"You haven't checked properly," Anirudh yelled at him. "She is inside, my wife was trying to save others. She is inside and trapped. Let go of me and I will check. Let go!"
"We have checked the 80% of the part. No one was found alive."
"Alive?" His actions faltered.
"Yes, we found 3 dead bodies. They were severely burned. No one else." The captain pitied him. "A woman and two men. There is no one else inside the building."
"Is the woman pregnant?" Hyde inquired making Anirudh snap his head towards him. "The matron said Manna was 7 months pregnant. Dhwani mam went to save her."
"No. I don't think so." He shook his head assertively "She wasn't pregnant. She was a thin woman, around her mid-20s. The paramedics say she was long dead before the fire. She was hit on her head and stabbed multiple times. Her features aren't damaged so you can check the corpse. The ambulance took the bodies."
"No. It cannot be true. Dhwani is somewhere inside. She is alive, god damnit." He had stopped hearing the description. "I need you to check again, if you cannot, let me go inside. I will check myself, I need to bring my wife back."
He will look for his wife himself, he didn't need these foolish men who couldn't understand that people were missing. His wife was missing.
He fought the hold only for Hyde to pull him away. He was a giant of a man for whom it wasn't difficult to dump people around but Anirudh made sure to give him tough competition.
"Don't you dare stop me!" He yanked his arms away from him, pushing the man away. "I am your boss, not the other way around, Hyde. You are fired. Get lost. Do not try to stop me!"
"Fucking come back to your senses, Anirudh." The man screamed in his face. "Start thinking rationally and I will leave you alone. You think you are some superhero to jump into that fire and save who? She may not be here for all we know. There. Is. no. fucking. One. Inside. Do you understand now?"
The adrenaline dropped, so as his knees and he was on the ground. Shoulder hunched, eyes, blurred, breathing labored, and heart sinking. The world may be crawling at the speed of a snail but his brain ran a million miles every second, shuffling through her memories in his brain, the days he had spent in her thoughts and the nights he had kept himself awake due to his inability to make a move. There were so many of them when he could walk towards her and confess his want for her. How he could have taken a step towards her but each time he had only recoiled away from her.
And now, when he had gathered so much courage and surpassed the hurdles between them, he was so close to losing her.
Or he may have lost it.
"If you lose your breath when she is in pain, don't push her away. Because she is the only one who can make you breathe again. You will die when she does."
How was he to explain to Vidyut that he had pushed her way? If not pushed, she might have already left him. She may be in pain but he had no idea, still, he could feel breathless, and his lungs felt constricted. But she didn't die. She was alive, he could feel her around.
She wasn't dead.
His petal cannot. Their hearts may not sync together but they would stop at the same time. For, this was no fictional world where the others felt pain when their soulmates were hurt. This was no love story, not the cliché one which ended in grief. With them moving separate ways or losing the other one.
This was their arranged marriage. They were bonded together to live and stay. They weren't two individuals who bumped outside a coffee shop or were introduced by mutual friends. They weren't two alike people traveling in the same circle. His heart didn't claim her his in the first meeting, neither he was amazed by her beauty the day he met her. He had watched her day after day letting her peak in his days at his will. She may have been an arrangement in his life but when she had stepped into it, she had made her own place. Dhwani Chauhan wasn't just anyone. She was the girl who calmed her own storms and healed her own wounds without bringing someone else into that chaos but she had let him. She left a passage open for him and he had willingly walked inside, like she had.
They were two strong individuals who came together as a couple.
They could never separate or let grief conquer their relationship.
It could never happen.
She would never let that happen.
And, he would fight the gods if it ever, ever was required.
"Get up." Two palms clutched his shoulders and yanked him back up. His once-shut eyes snapped open and Hyde's stone face was reduced to one of empathy. "I said she isn't inside but I never told you to stop searching. Are you giving up on her?"
"I will never." Anirudh's declaration made him smirk proudly. "How can I give up on her? I may give up on everything but her. Never her. I promised her, she would find me everywhere she went. I will be beside her, behind her, infront of her. Anywhere she wants me, I will be there for her and I bloody well intend to keep that promise to her."
"Then stand strong." Hyde held his shoulders and glared into his eyes. "Stay the pillar you are, Anirudh Chauhan. Don't let this, this fucking fire get to you. You need to go find your wife and get back home. Remember, it is your fucking day and you gotta own it like the king you are."
"I will." Anirudh nodded, letting his brain restart. "I will find my woman. I need to."
"I will get our men to round the area. If she isn't inside, she has to be out somewhere." He fished his phone and tapped into the screen hurriedly, cocking a brow towards his employer. "Just to make sure, do I still have a job?"
"Of course, you do." Anirudh grimaced feeling embarrassed at his outburst.
"Pity, it means another no to Rajveer Malik." Hyde snorted in fake disappointment.
Anirudh scowled. "Get back to work, Klaus."
With a salute, Klaus Hyde was back to work.
Anirudh shook his head at his bodyguard's antics and heard the commotion towards the other end where the kids were huddled around their caretakers. He watched a bus pull up at a certain distance and matrons rushing to get all the kids to board the vehicle. He walked towards them to make sure they all were taken care of, and Dhwani would do the same.
He caressed a sleeping girl's head, she was hardly 3 and clutched a soft toy to her chest. He gently picked her up and held the hand of the boy he met before, gently placing the kids he shot them a soft smile.
"You wouldn't trouble Savitra Kaki, would you?" He requested the kid.
"Never. I am a good boy. Didi says I am an angel." He bragged and Anirudh felt his eyes tear up at her mention.
"That you are." He nodded pushing the tears back.
"Didi is an angel too." A girl from the adjacent seat mumbled, one eye open and peaking at Anirudh shyly. "But she did not come to see us. Where is she? She said she would announce the winner and bring chocolates to us once the hide and seek is over."
"What hide and seek, doll?" He frowned, turning towards the matron who shook her head cluelessly.
"Didi said we have to hide from Prakash uncle and Ravi bhaiya. They are the denners for today. As we play in the garden, we will play inside the rooms and run away before they catch us. If we successfully dodge the denners, we win." She completed and glanced at the elder kid. "We won, right, Vishu bhaiya?"
He nodded averting his gaze.
"What...what is the meaning of all this?" Anirudh wondered and walked towards the 15-year-old boy. "What did Dhwani tell you? Why Prakash and Ravi?"
The boy, Vishal, recoiled at his interrogation. "Didi...she met me up before them. She said I have to take the kids out of the building. They weren't safe anymore. She said it was a game and we had to hide from Prakash uncle. He was coming to harm them. She locked the door from inside and made us jump through the window inside the kitchen. We had to use the back entrance to get them out."
"Prakash and Ravi." Anirudh tested the name and his jaw clenched. He was so close to solving the mystery yet so far from reaching her.
"And she gave us this." Vishal forwarded a tattered phone and a gift box. "She said I have to call the recently dialed number for help. Someone will come to help us and I have to give this box to that man. He will know whom it belongs to."
With shaky fingers, Anirudh took the phone from him and tapped on the broken screen. He glanced at the square-shaped box, its once neat wrappings were ruffled and torn. He caressed the torn note and felt his heart constrict at the handwriting.
A lone tear slid past his eyes. It was for him. She prepared a gift for his birthday.
He quickly brushed the tear and unlocked her phone. It was again his name on top.
She was trying to reach him for help, she still believed in him, and like a moron, he had ignored her, let her down, and worst of all, he couldn't find her anymore.
"Thank...you." He stammered, pursing his wobbling lips and smiling gratefully at the kid. "I will..."
He couldn't say more.
"Will you find our Didi for us?" The girl asked with her hopeful eyes, pouting as he nodded swallowing the lump.
"I will." He promised. "I will bring your Didi back to you. Always."
â â â â
A few hours back...
Imagine, if there is this only another minute to live. 60 more seconds before your surroundings would come crashing down. You are trapped inside the place, the walls shaking, the ceiling ready to fall and take you down with it but you are given a minute. That covered you and your loved ones from all parts and you see a door, that can lead you to a safe world. Away from chaos, collapse, the death. You have a chance to save one person, pushing them to the door that takes them away from the destruction. One minute, one person, and one life.
Who would you choose?
If you choose yourself, you will be tagged selfish all your life and live in a guilt so large that it will eat up your happiness, and your future. Your sanity. But if you save someone else, there will be no life for you anymore. Either way, what is left for you is a life unattainable. A life or no life, you are meant to opt for death.
And you will when you have no one waiting outside that door.
You are lonely.
You aren't wanted.
She wasn't wanted.
Cupping her face and sticking to the wall, she wanted to muffle herself in the shadows to not get caught. With the dim brightness, she dialed for him but the call never connected and she had never felt this alone. The one day she wanted him beside her, waiting for her, Anirudh Chauhan wasn't available for her and her wish to be wanted by him hurt like never before.
"Please, god." She wished for the gods she had once lost her hopes with. If there were any present and available, she wanted this one night to end. "Please."
"You said she had left. How could you be so careless, Prakash?"
The hurried footsteps made her flinch and held her breath. Her office door was thrown open and came the resounding noises of her things crashing on the tiled floor.
She yelped in surprise but never let a voice pass through her lips. She had done this before, the game of hide and seek. She had defeated her chasers once, she could do it all over again.
She had escaped her bullies once, she had dodged those high school boys and saved herself from their incoming inhuman actions. They had torn her classmate's shirt and scratched her arms. They could do the same with 11-year-old Dhwani but she was smarter. She had bunked her last period and hid inside the storage room, peeking through the slit as the boys loitered outside their class after the final bell. They stayed there waiting for her for another half an hour. She had missed her group and returned to the orphanage later than the normal time, alone on the streets but she had saved herself from them.
Then she had saved herself. She could save her kids too.
"That bitch. She could debunk our plans for the night. Find her at any cost and terminate the risk. Go, find her." Ravi, the cleaner yelled commands at Prakash and the old man sprinted out of her office and in the opposite direction.
The door slammed shut and she watched the man step out, his hawk eyes swept the area for her. She was grateful for the darkness, it worked as a shield for her hideout.
"Ravikant, stop wasting time on her." A woman joined him and the voice made Dhwani fist her hands.
Was she trusting the wrong people?
"Dhwani is a danger, Ishani." The man screeched impatiently. "If she sees us taking the kids away or even gets an idea what is taking place behind her back in the orphanage, she will throw us to the cops. She may seem gentle but she is a Chauhan. She is powerful. Did you not see how she fired my men after the first case? She took the boy to the doctor and got him checked. Luckily, we only gave him some sleeping pills and nothing else, imagine if she would have checked the marks on other kids. We would have been dead by now. Our dream to cash on these filthy kids' organs would have only remained that. A fucking dream."
"Then you should ask that idiot Ramesh and Vijay to be careful. Had they not messed up the consignment? we would have received the payment by now for selling his kidney."
Dhwani hiccupped clutching her lips, tears leaking from her eyes as she strained to hear them more.
Those kids, those fragile souls were going through so much. Their faces were her biggest motivation, their smiles made her wake up every morning and they were the ones who put her to sleep at night.
And these monsters tried to snatch that very smile.
Dhwani had worked all these years to protect them and today, she would do the same.
Protect her own.
She may or may not have a family in name, but these kids were her family in every sense.
They may have got hold of her family once. Not again. Never again.
"Ishani, do you remember the faces of the new kids?" Ravi asked scratching his beard.
"Yes." She nodded. "They are allotted in the second dorm. There aren't any older kids sleeping in the same room. Also, I had mixed the sleepy pills in the kheer so they will be passed out by now. We can easily take the kids out."
He hummed sweeping for any intruder, and fishing some papers. "Her paperwork is not done. I have checked it and taken the forms. Their absence will be ruled out like that little bitch. Dhwani Chauhan can keep kicking and screaming but no one will listen to her tale of new children. I will make sure Savitri Tai keeps her mouth shut like before."
Savitri Tai, as well?
Dhwani could hardly think about trusting the people again.
"That old hag will keep mum until we have her granddaughter with us." Ishani snorted "She is tied in the storage room and remains there until the case is ruled out again."
The two nodded and moved towards the storage room while Dhwani wiped her face clean of any residual tears. There was no time for them. She had to work quickly and get the kids out of there.
Pushing herself out of her hideout, she runs towards the dorm room. Quietly, she entered the main room.
She surfed through the faces to find the little munchkins she had admitted yesterday evening and stopped at the corner seeing a small light on. Her heart was ready to jump out, while her fingers clutched onto her thin material to stop it from shaking.
"Didi?"
She snapped towards the soul, jumping at the suddenness.
"Vishal," She breathed in relief. He was a kid she could try to trust. Right now, her staff was not an option. She quickly grabbed his shoulders. "I want you to not ask questions and do what I say, can you do it, please?"
"But, Didi..."
She shook her head cutting him off, "Please, Vishal. Just do as I say. Please. You are the only one I can trust right now."
Her distress met his acknowledgment and she could see hope amidst the darkness.
"I want you to lock the door from inside and wake all the kids." She glanced around the room. "Wake them and take them to the kitchen. Don't leave anyone behind. No one. They are not safe here. You need to hide there until I come to take you."
"What do you mean, Didi?" The kid tried his best to not look scared but she could see right through him.
"There is no time to explain, darling." She cupped his face and tried a smile. "Please use the window and take them out of here. You keep this with you."
She handed her phone to him and dropped her bag near the wall. Fetching the small gift box, she caressed the note she addressed to him.
She looked up at him, "If in another hour, I don't come back. Please take this box with you and leave the building. I want you to call the first number on my speed dial. If...if he doesn't answer. Call a contact named Dishant. I know I can trust him here. Tell him that I asked you to hide and he will come to get you."
"I...I will." Vishal frowned at the information but nodded nonetheless.
"Remember, Vishal. 1 hour. If I don't come for you, you will take the kids out of the back door and run. Don't wait for me."
"Y...yes, Didi." He nodded with conviction and Dhwani pulled him in a hug.
"I will come back to you, son." She promised. "Keep the children safe, will you do that for me?"
"Anything for you, Didi."
She smiled and stepped out of the door, gesturing for him to close the doors behind her and lock them. Hearing the lock click into place, she breathed a sigh. But the relief was short-lived, her heart rate spiked as the footsteps neared them. They tore through the silence of night and again she looked for a corner to hide herself, having a peripheral vision of the room.
"They are inside," Ravi informed Prakash who stopped at the door and tried pushing it open.
"Is it jammed?" Prakash wondered and pressed his body against the door to throw it open.
"It was fine until yesterday," Ravi grumbled in annoyance and banged it. "Open up, damnit."
"Quite!" His partner chided him, "Will you wake the other kids too? Tone it down."
"Ishani added sleeping pills to the food. All will be dead sleep."
But they weren't. Not when none was served the sweet dish. Dhwani never felt proud of Prakash's clumsiness until today. He had dropped a bottle of oil in the kheer and it was wasted. Kids never ate the dish so the sleeping pills never reached them.
"Really?" Prakash's face morphed into a grimace and he averted his eyes to hide his mess. "G...good. But why is the door not opening?"
"It won't." She whispered to herself.
Busying the two men, she hurried towards the other two dorm rooms and woke the kids, asking them to lock the door from inside and run towards the kitchen.
The kitchen was huge in comparison to these dorms. It was a common room used as a play area but was later turned into the dining area and kitchen with an exit that led to the main road. Getting food deliveries and other essentials became easy for the cooks. Also, being the common area, it was visible from the dorms having a window opening directly to the area. It was surrounded from two sides by rooms, one door, and lastly, the hallway that led to staff rooms.
These men have worked inside this building for so long yet not long enough to remember the blueprint of the windows and doors by heart. Dhwani never thought she would use the windows and ask the kids to jump through them but tough times required these decisions.
Taking the stairs, she reached the dorm rooms on the first floor and made the kids follow her silently.
"We are playing hide and seek." She had explained crouching to their level. "Whoever will reach Vishal bhaiya first and follows his orders for the rest of the night will get lots and lots of chocolates from me."
"Really?" Simi, a 7-year-old asked and Dhwani nodded with her practiced smile.
"There is another rule." She watched the curious faces and felt worst lying to them. "No one will speak a word. Do you remember yesterday's class?"
"This?" Another boy raised his hand for all to see and made signs using his palms.
Dhwani nodded proudly. "Yes, you will show palm up for 'yes' and palm down for 'No'."
She showed them the signs for 'Stop' and 'Move' respectively. "Don't take and don't run. Walk softly and straight towards the Kitchen. Remember who is the denner?"
The kids nodded together. "Oldie Prakash and that lambu Ravi. We don't like those fools."
She didn't feel the need to correct them. These kids could judge them better than her for what they deserved to be.
"I want you to win, my lil' ones." She kissed them all quickly and watched them move like an army of trained soldiers, they were taking this as a new game unknown to the fact that those monsters were planning to play with their future.
"I win, Didi. I win." She heard the little muffled shrieks and nodded with moist eyes.
She smiled at their smiling faces drawing strength from them "I hope you do, my Jaans. I really wish you do."
To be continued...
I kept mine so you keep yours. An update I said, an update you get.
Waiting for lots of comments from you all along with votes.
Take care and keep thinking until the next weekend, or before that. You never know!ð¤
Good night.