Naseema Khan sat beside the bed. The white bed. Numbered - 65.

Who knew, white beds would cover such huge extents of her life altogether?

Naseema found not a tinge bit of improvement in her brother, in all these years. And everytime she realised that, a string of her heart, broke.

He lay on bed, or sat with his back on pillows. Or at most tried to limp upto the window.

Recognised nothing. No one. Blabbered incoherent things.

These days, he didn't even blabber.

Naseema cried, everyday she visited him.

Wasim Khan. Her bhai.

Having been a CBI inspector, even if for a month, the central bureau bore half of his treatment expenses. And the hospital being government affiliated, its charges were minimal. Yet, Naseema felt awkward, submitting bills and receiving a cheque from the headquarters every month. They stared weirdly.

The primary school she now taught in, didn't pay her enough to bear all the expenses herself. She would have done that otherwise.

She repeatedly asked the doctors, why wasn't her brother showing improvements, despite a five year long treatment?

They nodded and said, dementia hardly cured. They were doing what medicine could, keep trying.
They told to take him home, if she felt.

Yet, her heart didn't wish for that ever. What if the daily therapies cured her bhai someday? What if the weekly injections cured him someday?

Naseema hated hospitals. She had herself spent five long years of her life lying in one, unconscious.

And now, her brother did that, almost.

Naseema owned nothing, except for a brother, since sixteen. He was thirteen then.

She had pleaded before him when he decided to join CBI after graduations. " If something happens to you, how will I live bhai? "

" And if I don't, you will die everyday appi.... " , he had firmly said, staring into her eyes.

Local doctors had said, his blood showed something called prions. Like viruses, even more dangerous. They were destroying the cells of his brain. The initial effects were drastic. He lost every present memory at a go..
The disease had then progressively increased.

Naseema knew the treatment procedure in this hospital. Everyday they practised some cognitive therapy to which he mostly didn't respond.
Every Wednesday they injected some medicine.
Every Saturday, they did tests.

When this disease first struck, eight years back, Wasim was twenty five.

Only a month in CBI, just a trainee, wasn't involved in any critical case,
Hence, CBI completely dismissed the idea of his job concerning his sudden disease.

Though the presence of such virus like substance in his body, worried the doctors.

Yet, CBI withdrew, but agreed to take up half of the expenses. Just because he was their trainee.

After three years of race in different directions, Naseema finally settled him in this hospital, the best in Hyderabad.

Since then, her daily routine had been....school in the morning and the rest, beside a white bed.

-----

Subhadra was nearing her twelfth finals, and Maanav, in his second year of MBBS.

" So, you turn eighteen tomorrow. " , Maanav Hegde smiled.

Subhadra smiled in response. They now walked down the street below Maanav's residence. Subhadra loved this street. Clean. Green. Peaceful.

" And you turn twenty one the day after. " , she added.

" Aha!! Amazing, right? We grow in the same pace!!

By the way, did you realise? We both touch the marital age together. " , Maanav exclaimed.

They turned the corner. Maanav waved at a number of eunuchs and beggars who were always found in this corner. They waved back and smiled. Such a soothing equation with these two secluded stratas of the society!!

" So, shall we marry? " , Subhadra said. Out of the blue.

Maanav Hegde stopped. Completely.

While, Subhadra had already turned red with the awkward slip of tongue.

Shush! Why even!?

Maanav turned to her and looked into her deep brown eyes.

" Thank you for asking Subhadra.

I will do that, the very moment...you, and law permits me. Without a hiccup. Without a second thought. "

Subhadra knew, a tornado rose in her blood vessels.
The air around turned comfortably cool, and the sun poured its last lights, only on her.
The world turned yellow,  just for moments. The bridal light. The breaking dusk.

" I....was joking, Maanav.... " , she stammered.

" I am not, Subhadra.

I don't like prologues to eternal love stories. But we have been reading only a prologue, repeatedly, for the last two years.

Both of us.

I wish,

Subhadra turns Subhadra Hegde..

.. and forever remains that, in thousand years to come."

Subhadra couldn't hold back the lone tear that escaped a corner of her eyes.

Love? Really? Finally?

The girl, who didn't even trust being loved by her own parents, her own sibling, her friends, as much as she wanted to be, was loved back by the best man of her life?

Maanav had started walking. Subhadra silently followed. For the first time in life, emotions overpowered her steps.

" I know Subhadra, you think I'm not normal.

One who provokes his own father to suicide, cannot be normal.

Maybe I'm not!

Trust me, I loved my father a lot. Till the day I saw him on BT road, with two other men I couldn't see faces. I wish I did..

My father fought with mom, broke things, had the worst temper on earth, even slapped her twice, drunk so much, yet, at the end of the day I had always seen my parents in each other's arms. Quite in love.

Henceforth, discovering that my creator, my mom's man, was a criminal outside home, that too of the most grievous offense, tore me to pieces.

He told me that night, he was drunk. And he himself was dying everyday.

I could not castrate him, but had placed the knife in his hands.

I left the room, asking him only one thing.

To slit his throat, or slit his.............

Dying must have been a better option than living with a son, who knew of the darkest secrets of his father.. "

Subhadra was panting. Because Maanav was walking faster than needed. Moreover she didn't feel like hearing these......

Maanav stopped.

" The seed of hatred that the dead man sowed inside me, was dangerous Subhadra...

Do you know? I used to visit mom's hospital whenever I felt like while preparing for the entrance. I loved walking through wards...

And one day, I came across a girl. Gynaec ward, bed 7. I still remember the exact number. Because it was a love at first sight.
For the first time in life I fell in love with a heavenly girl, who was raped by her own cousin...... "

Subhadra choked.

" No one knew who your rapist was, except for my mom. You had blurted out in delirium, when no one was around. Only she.

My mom fell for you. But was threatened by your father, in my name, when she talked to him.

A mother's heart. She gulped in everything. Remember, how she told you to not talk of your visits to us, at home?

She tucked in everything.

But could I?

I, in whom a fire was ignited by his dead father, against each and every rapist on earth? "

Maanav Hegde looked into Subhadra's widened brown eyes. He whispered,

" Remember, I told you, I've friends with benefits?
Irony is, they can do anything, just anything for me. I wonder if I'll ever do that much for them!

Your cousin.... Abheek Patel, was castrated alive by those eunuchs down the street.

They can be extremely cruel when need be.

He mostly couldn't bear the pain, plus the shock of blood loss killed him. And then his face was brutally trampled by them.

Under my instructions. "

The yellow lights had disappeared.

Instead, silent thunders tore the sky, above Subhadra......Hegde!

" I fell in love with you, because you were as dangerous as I am. "