A/N: Unedited

Word Count: 4k

This is a new workplace, a new position to uphold, new responsibilities, new relationships, everything’s new except for that same old heart.

The heart that always makes him suffer.

And the key to this heart stands in his line of sight, smiling, celebrating with their new colleagues, looking like the most beautiful version of herself.

Lakshay smiles, his eyes well up with pride and maybe some longing, but that’s ok, it’s an everyday thing.

Everyday he sees his friend achieving something new, making other’s life easier, sharing happiness and bringing smiles to everyone’s faces.

He’s proud of his friend. He likes his friend a lot. He is in love with his friend.

“Lakshay, come join us.” His friend calls and he obliges immediately, blinking back the tears to take a good look at her.

“C’mon, let’s all cut the cake together.” She says, to him and to rest of their acquaintances.
Lakshay joins but doesn’t dare touch her hand, instead let’s the person, the man standing beside him envelope her hand, all happy. Khanak looks back at him with a questioning look but when she sees him smiling, she smiles back and they all cut the cake.

Lakshay claps the hardest for his darling. What a brilliant girl. Wherever she goes she makes a name for herself. He got lucky with such a friend.

They all get back to their respective works after that, Khanak to her cabin and Lakshay to his cubicle and then he thinks.

He thinks and regrets.

He thinks, regrets and atones.

He curses the old him, the old Lakshay who had taken that relationship for granted, who had dared to question the love of his life regarding her love for him, who had made her feel helpless, the old Lakshay who has made him like this, who has taken away the most beautiful relationship of his life and placed it so out of reach that he can’t even think of going back to it.

He is scared of himself.

He regrets doing all of that because even if it was the old him, it was still him. He can’t make the past better but he can save his future, can make the person he had lost in his past to be in his future, and so he atones.

He atones by keeping himself as far as he can from the woman he is ready to die for, from the woman he would surely die without. And yet this atonement is also full of flaws.
He finds himself unable to give her up fully.

No, he doesn’t get jealous when the guys from their departmemt give her flowers and small gifts every second day, for winnng her heart or their promotion, he doesn’t know and doesn’t care. Lakshay doesn’t feel curious when he doesn’t find Khanak in her cabin or in the office for hours, and just murmurs a prayer for her to be safe always. He laughs with her even if it isn’t him who is making her laugh. It doesn’t matter who is. What matters is the smile on her face. It must never deter. He hopes.

But he is scared.

He knows he can’t keep the pretension up for too long. Can’t hide the feelings that a friend could never have for another friend. He barely resisted bursting into her cabin the other day when she had returned from the field work, injured, and taking her into his arms, coddling her and asking her how it all happened. If she was ok or not and kissing her wound better. Instead, he had knocked and asked if he could bandage the wound.

The saddened look that he had got in return, he couldn’t make anything out of it.

Lakshay must be out of his mind because the moment he had stepped outside her cabin, he had thought and dreamt. He still does. He dreams of doing everything with Khanak that a couple in a relationship does, that a man and his wife do, because of course he had accepted her as his wife in his heart long ago. It had to be her or no one.

He wants to hold her in his arms and murmur sweet nothings in her ear. He wants to put her head on his chest and make her rest with the sound of his heart that beats only for her. He wants to cook dinner for her and ask her about the day. He wants to pet her head until she sleeps and soothe her with soft words when a nightmare threatens her sweet sleep. He wants to do that for the rest of his days, all his life. They could soon have children, only if she wants. If she doesn’t, he’s happy to stay just with her and grow old together.

And that makes him scared.

He has foreseen the end of his life with her when he doesn’t even know if he can stay in her life for even a month.

There are hundreds of Lakshays in this world who wants to do the same to his friend. Hundreds of Lakshays without abandonemnet issues, Lakshays who didn’t go to the therapist every Friday for the past six months, Lakshays who were not so messed up in their heads, Lakshays who would keep her happy more than this Lakshay ever could.

Lakshays amongst which Khanak would choose one and marry.

A Lakshay whose hand she would hold and get out of his life. Forever.

Oh he’s happy to stay as a friend but would she even consider him her friend if he were to voice out his feelings?

She wouldn’t and that, that would be the last day of his life.

*
“I’m getting married.”

Lakshay’s hand stops mid-way from where they were setting up the table for the dinner.

This arrangement has been going for a while now. Every Saturday they meet up at Khanak’s house and eat dinner. Like friends do.

Lakshay doesn’t think it will be the same tonight.

He pales.

“Wh-what?” he asks, wide eyes and breathless words, Khanak’s words ringing in his ear like an emergency siren. He hates it.

“I said I am getting married.” She repeats and Lakshay’s hold on the plate loosens, dropping it with a clatter on the table as he hears his scariest nightmare being voiced out.

Khanak comes out of the kitchen with a spatula in her hand, and asks calmly, “Is everything alright?”

He doesn’t answer. Lakshay doesn’t think he has the capacity to answer and so he just keeps sitting there, aimlessly, and dead.

Khanak walks back into the kitchen and puts off the stove, putting down the spatula. She inhales a deep breath and moves her hand to her chest in order to calm herself down.
She had been planning this from a long time.

From the day Lakshay had asked them to be friends. It has been three months to that day. Three months and she can’t stay his friend even a single day more. She has had enough. Enough of his antics, enough of what he wants. Now she’ll do what she wants.

Lakshay either takes it or doesn’t.

And so, with another long breath she walks outside the kitchen and finds Lakshay now sitting on his knees, shellshocked. She wants to comfort him, but she doesn’t.
With a daring breath she picks up the wedding card from the table and waves it in front of his face.

“The wedding card. You’re the first one to see. Don’t ever say that I wasn’t a good friend to you.”

Lakshay looks at the card horrified, not daring to touch it.

Good.

“Why are you sitting on the floor like this? Come on, get up. We have to celebrate.” Khanak says with a the most joyous and fakest smile she could conjure, the same smile that wavers when Lakshay looks up at her, face pale, forehead adorning with tensed lines and welled up, melancholic eyes.
He doesn’t even try to hide the tears. The sight makes her want to curse herself for doing all this. But she has no choice.

It’s now or never.

Khanak somehow forces another smile on her face.
She extends her hand. “Come on, get up.”

Lakshay gets up but doesn’t take the offered hand. A tear drops from his eyes on the same hand as he longingly looks at it.

Khanak can hear the voice of her heart breaking. Lakshay’s had broken minutes ago.

“Why are you crying, Laksh?” she asks because she has to, but isn’t feigning the concern her eyes hold or the tenderness with which she wipes the tears from beneath his eyes, her hand staying there.

“Don’t cry.” She breathes out, forgetting the act for the moment, worried of breaking him beyond repair.

She inhales a breath of relief when he talks to her.

“Khanak,” he whispers with a broken voice.

“Hmm?” she smiles, stroking his cheek with her thumb.

“Can I touch you?” he asks, his breath stuck in the throat, so frightened. As if he is asking for his last wish.

Maybe he is.

“Of course.” Khanak smiles. And then adds because she has to. “Friends can touch each other. I’m touching you, see?” she pats at his cheek, and nearly cries when another wave of fresh tears roll down his eyes. She hates herself.
Lakshay shakes his head, frustrated and tired. “No,” he says with trembling lips. “I want to hold you in my arms. I want to kiss you. Can I do that?”

Khanak shakes her head in a no.

“No, love, that’s what lovers do. But we are just friends. You wanted us to be friends.”

“N-No! No, no. Please, no!” He cries, shaking his head and falls down on his knees. “I can’t. I can’t, Khanak. I can’t do it anymore. I am sorry. I can’t be your friend. I am sorry, I am so sorry.” He cries, now his hands covering his face, and shoulders shaking. He is apologizing because he can’t bear the thought of him wanting to be with her. He is despising himself, again.

And that’s her limit.

Khanak can’t take it anymore. She falls down on her knees in front of him and covers his hands with hers.

“Lakshay, look at me.” she says but his sadness is too loud. He is too broken to hear her.

“Laksh, baby, look at me. Won’t you look at your Khanak?” she says and his entire body freezes, his cries stop in between, and his hands fall down by his side. He looks at her with wide, baby-like doe eyes.

“Wh-what did you say? M-My Khanak?” he asks with most breathless voice as if not believing his ears.

A tear finally drops down her eyes.

Why was he so surprised hearing the only truth of her life. Hasn’t she always been his?

Khanak gives him a teary smile. “Am I not?” she asks, and before a new stream of tears roll down his eyes, she shushes him.

“Shh, baby. If you won’t stop crying, I won’t be able to hear what you have to say. You… have something to say, right?” she asks then, slight insecurity entering her own voice, scared what she’ll do if he still doesn’t have anything to say, what she’ll do if he’ll let her go all over again.

“You do… right?”

Lakshay nods, thankfully he does, a little erratic.

“May I touch you?” he asks once again and this time Khanak relents.

He immediately cups her face, his hands mapping her entire face, tracing her brows, her lashes, her nose, her lips, her chin. He brings his lips to her brows and repeats the entire process.

Khanak’s heart hammers in her chest.

Lakshay dares to give her a smile. Khanak immediately smiles back, albeit with tears rolling down her eyes. God knows how much she had missed him, his gentle caresses, his affectionate gaze, his tender loving, and his beautiful smile.

She wants it all back.

“Khanak, I can’t do it anymore. I can’t live like this. I can’t be your friend. I’ll die either way. If you go out of my life, I’ll die missing you and if I keep being your friend, I’ll die longing for you. There’s no solution to my problem.” He admits, defeated.

She cups his cheek and makes him look up at her. “There is. Every problem has a solution. And there’s no problem of yours that I can’t solve.” Khanak gives him the smallest of smiles.

“Let’s – let’s be together, Laksh. Just like we were.”

He freezes on the spot. And the hope that Khanak was preserving, freezes as well. It threatens to break.

“Wh-what?” he asks, astonished.

Khanak’s smile wobbles. “Let’s be t-together.” Her heart breaks as she adds, scared, so scared. “D-Don’t you want to?”

But with some miracle Lakshay stops it. He doesn’t let her hope die or the pieces of her heart scatter.

“Of course, of course I want to. Of course – there’s – there is no one for me but you. It was always you. It – It will always be you.” He says hastily, his eyes searching her entire face for any hint of a lie, to know if this all a dream or it is really happening.

“I want you, always, b-but you? Why would you?” Lakshay asks with the most sympathetic expressions, as if he pities her decision of wanting to be with him. He looks so confused. Why would she want to be with someone like him?

It irks Khanak. How dare he think so low of himself.
She is angry but doesn’t let it show. “Why Lakshay? Why can’t I be with you? Why can’t I want you? Don’t you know that you are also it for me, my first and last?”

Lakshay keeps staring at her incredulously. “But the things I did –”

“What did you do?” Khanak asks finally, voice raising. “What did you do so wrong that I can’t want you again? What was so wrong that we had to stay apart for so many days, so many weeks, so many months? I agree, I agree that there was a moment when I had considered getting away from you, to give us some break but it was all for us to get back together at the end, for us to make our relationship strong!

“Our love, our relationship just needed some efforts, some time, then what was so wrong that we can’t imagine getting back together. Why I had to pick pieces of my broken heart every day? Why I had to see you torturing yourself? Why we had to stay friends who can hold each other’s hands but can’t hold each other…” she says, inhaling a deep breath and then exhaling a shuddering one.

“You’re not like that anymore. You love me. I know you do. You could never hurt me. Even if we needed the separation, Lakshay, darling, why can’t we get back together?” she breathes in a shuddery breath as tears blur her eyes. “I long for you every day. I miss you so much. I want to dream about our future again. A future together. A future where we send our children to school and where we cook each other breakfasts, where I make you meet my family and where we thank your grandparents for loving you so much. Why can’t we do that, Laksh?” she asks and all she is met with is tears.

Happy tears and wobbly lips, astonished eyes and trembling shoulders,

Lakshay still doesn’t believe her. It’s ok. She will make him believe, in her and himself.

“Tell me, Laksh,” she says then, wiping away her tears and cupping his face to wipe his.
“Tell me, do you… would you still try to know who I am talking to on the phone?” she asks, and Lakshay looks at her with so much hope in his eyes, as if he is getting a new life, a new chance at life.

“Never.” He breathes out.

“Would it matter if laughed with a man, someone form our office, my male friend?”

He shakes his head immediately, brows curling together. “Of course, not love. You are your own person; you can do anything you want.” He promises.

Khanak doesn’t know how to reign in her happiness.

“Would you give me space if I wanted? Some time away from you?”

He nods. “That is healthy. I learned it. Of course, I’ll give you space, but I’ll also be there, right behind you for if you need me.”

If Khanak dies right now, she’ll have no regrets, she’ll die a happy woman.

“What if I get jealous?” she asks then, biting back a teary smile.

“I’ll never …. Wh-what?” Lakshay pauses when the question seems a bit out of syllabus and it is when Khanak laughs, letting all her fears, all her insecurities scatter in the contagious happiness.

“You’re one handsome man, dear Lakshay. Sometimes I get jealous too.” She says and enjoys as a smile finally crawls up his lips, gaze flitting all over her face.

He finally believes her. And himself.

“One last question.” She says, sobering up. She then takes the wedding card, opens it up in their lap, letting Lakshay finally see its contents.

“Will you marry me?”

The smile on Lakshay’s lips dies. And Khanak’s widens.

He nods incessantly, head down, a teary smile coming onto his lips. Khanak can’t be happier.

Lakshay Prajapati
WEDS
Khanak Thakur

The card reads.

*

Epilogue

“What’s taking you so long? Come out! I need to brush my teeth. Laksh!” Khanak knocks at the bathroom door, looking at the watch and then at the closed door.

If only hotel rooms had two bathrooms. Or if only she hadn’t had to work on a vacation.

Yes, the latter is definitely a better wish.

“I’m decent. Come in.” the voice comes from inside. Khanak thanks the heavens and rushes in.

As expected, the bathroom is foggy but Khanak doesn’t pay heed to it, picks up her toothbrush, puts on the paste and starts brushing her teeth.

“Someone’s really in a hurry, huh?” The voice comes from behind the glass divider, demanding Khanak’s attention.

The brush almost falls from her mouth.

“You said you were decent!” Khanak accuses, paste foaming in her mouth.

The man has the audacity to smirk.

“I’m your husband of three years, not your boyfriend of three days. This is as decent as you are getting.” He says gesturing to his toned and very uncovered torso and the lower body covered with a towel. 

Khanak narrows her eyes at him, shakes her head and gets back to the task in hand, not paying the not so pg 13 sight another glance, because of course she is also his wife of three years. She bets she has seen it all.

Although, it gets hard to ignore when the said man snakes his arms around her waist, sighing into her shoulder. “Oh, this is nice.” He murmurs, adjusting his head and exhaling into her neck.

“It tickles.” She complains and wiggles away to wash her mouth and then her face.

When she turns around, her husband is still there, waiting. A chuckle threatens to escape her mouth which she suppresses into a non chalant shake of head.

“Let me go, love.” She asks but of course her love is nothing less than a menace, not when he stands there all tall and proud, tilting his head to the side as he fakes a yawn, showing off his neck and shoulder muscles.

She never thought he could be like this.

She never thought she could be affected by this.

Is it unethical to get dirty thoughts about your husband?

Probably no.

But if it’s right before a meeting?

Definitely.

“My dear husband of three years, can you show it all off later? I am getting late. Please!” She says and then huffs out a chuckle. “You don’t need to impress me anymore. So please give me way!”

The man laughs with her at that, crossing his arms across his chest. “That’s a relief. I don’t have to worry about you leaving me.” He jokes and moves out of the bathroom and Khanak hums, following him out.

Though she’s forced to halt when the man in front of her does, turning around. His eyes are wide, scared. “I didn’t mean that.” He says suddenly and Khanak has to replay the conversation in her mind to understand the context.

“I didn’t mean that. I - I am not forcing you to stay with me.” he forces out a chuckle, but Khanak doesn’t laugh. A sad smile surfaces on her lips but that’s ok. She is here for days like this, days when he gets insecure. She’s there to assure him.

Her smile turns cheeky as she steps forward and her husband steps back.

“Khanak?” he asks innocently.

Oh, how the tables have turned.

She walks until he backs away, finding purchase on the wall.

She grins up at him. “You must think of me as a mad woman, hmm?” she says against his lips, having to stand on her tip toes. She makes him hold her around the waist for balance and he does so unquestionably.

“Who would want to leave all this?” she asks grazing her finger on his abs, chuckling as subconsciously he puffs out his chest, trying to make them more defined.

“Who would want to leave this?” she asks then, with a gentler tone, her laugh simmering into the tenderest of smiles as her hand traces his chest and stops at the centre, inclining towards the left.

His heart thuds under her hand as she breathes out a breath of relief.

“I don’t think I can leave the heart that loves me so much until of course you think of me as a mad woman.” She looks up at him innocently. “Do you?”

The awestruck smile that she is rewarded with mends it all. Gives her the courage to do it again and again, to make him believe her and himself.

“No,” Lakshay shakes his head. “You’re not mad.” He says and quickly turns them around so that her back is resting on the wall.

He grins, confident and oh so charming. Khanak falls for him for the millionth time.

“But even if you were…” he says as he noses around the side of her face, his breath tickling her ears. “You’d be mine. My mad woman. My lovely Khanak.” He says and sprawls his hand on her belly.

“The most beautiful mother to ever be.” He speaks and caresses the skin, and maybe it’s still too early but Khanak can promise she feels a movement in there. “You don’t know how lucky you are my munchkin; you’d have the most wonderful woman on this earth as your mother.”

Khanak lets out a teary chuckle when she hears him talking to their baby who has been inside her for just two months. He then keeps on rambling and Khanak keeps on listening, smiling all the while, shushing the alarm that goes off in her watch and declining when her assistant calls.

The boss is allowed to take a day off, she guesses.

Once everything’s done, it’s only her and her happiness.
She sees as her wishes come true one by one. When her husband takes her in his arms and lays her down on the bed, when he kisses the baby through her tummy and then gives its mother the most gentlest of kisses. A tear rolls down the corner of her eyes when he lays her head on his chest and lets her sleep to the rhythm of his heartbeats.

She sleeps a dreamless sleep because of course, all her dreams have come true.
Maybe that’s the result of never giving up on the person you love, “of never giving up on you….”

A/N: Do tell me what did you think about Khanak and Lakshay’s story, if you want :D