“Mashima!” Sumi ran into her as soon as they entered the house, “I have so much homework today. We must start right away.”

“Ask your Baba to help you with that, Sweetie. I need to finish some urgent work,” she replied and ignoring the confusion and hurt on the child’s face, shut herself in her bedroom.

She was not crying this time. The cat was out of the bag.  She must think calmly if she were to wade through the muddled water it had led her into.

For a moment, her mind went back to the kiss. She had admired Mukundo from even before, when she had only known him as a professor at her university. But from the time she had set foot in their home, the admiration had grown to be overwhelming. And yet she wouldn’t have dared name it love had it not been for that kiss. That had somehow made him accessible, familiar and intimate.

But she had never forgotten her mother’s death-bed warning.

“On the one hand, it is fortunate that you will live with Thakurs, Pihu. You will be taken care of in a way that I could never do for you. But on the other hand, it can be dangerous. Remember what they are. Not only rich, but also an extremely prestigious family. Never ever do anything that will taint their prestige and make them regret taking you in. Do you understand me?”

“Yes Ma,” she had replied pressing her mother’s hand.

A hard knock on her door interrupted her ruminations. Neither Mohima, nor Sumedha would have knocked that hard. It must be Mukundo. She waited hoping he would go away. But the next knock was even harder. Even through the closed door, she could feel his fury seeping in. If she didn’t relent, he wouldn’t be unequal to breaking the door.

Resigned, she went to the door and opened it. He flung it ajar and strode in.

“Don’t you dare,” he growled, “Ask me to leave. And don’t you dare leave this room until I have had my answers. Honest answers.”

She walked back from the door and gingerly sat at the edge of the bed. She didn’t trust herself to remain standing. She flinched when he opened her drawer, but he looked so furious then that she didn’t have it in her to object to it. He pulled out her drawings from the bottom of the paper piles and walked to her.

When he came near her, she noticed that all his aggression had vanished. There was only melancholy written all over his body. She gasped when he knelt before her and spread some of the drawings on the floor between them.

“Why must my love for you always make me a villain, Piyali? I was a villain when I didn’t think you appreciated my feeling. But even today? When I know that you reciprocate it and reciprocate it fiercely? Why?”

She stood up and walked some distance away from him where she stood with her back to him.

“Your villainy is not towards me, Mukundo Babu. It is towards yourself, your family. Have you ever run through the list of proposals that have come your way since you were widowed? It will translate into a list of who-is-who of Kolkata and rest of the country. Beautiful, educated, intelligent women from well-respected families. And you have rejected them all. How can I put myself in your way then? I—I don’t even know who I am. I don’t know who my father was. My mother barely made the ends meet with her sewing and odd jobs. And I have no family except that you and Kaki have graciously made me part of yours. What would it be like introducing me as your wife to your friends and relatives? Embarrassing, that’s what it will be.”

“Which era are you living in, Piyali? You think I care for all that?”

“Convention is there for a reason, Mukundo Babu,” she repeated his own words, “If you go against it, you would be a martyr. Would that be a great payback from me for all you have done for me?”

“But it is okay to make both of us martyrs? Is it a fine payback if I pine for you all my life?”

A chill ran down her spine and she took a moment before turning back towards him.

She smiled through her tears and said, “You want me, Mukundo Babu? Then take me. I will–”

“Piyali!” Mukundo yelled so loud that it brought Mohima running to Piyali’s door.

And before any of them could orient themselves, another loud sound assaulted them. Mukundo had slapped Piyali. Hard. And it had come so unexpectedly to her that she hadn’t offered even the instinctive defense. Her lips were bitten by her own teeth and a thin streak of blood appeared at the corner.

“Mukundo!” Mohima hissed, ran to Piyali and gathered her sobbing form in her arms.

Mukundo’s raging face softened. He looked at his hand as if it was something outside of him and then looked at Piyali, sobbing into Mohima’s shoulders.

“Go Mukundo!” Mohima shouted, “I don’t care what it is, but go now!”

Casting a wretched, guilty look at Piyali, he retreated.

Mohima made Piyali sit in the bed and examined the blood.

“I will get the first aid kit,” she said, “You sit still here.”

“Kaki,” Piyali yanked at her hands, “Please don’t go to Mukundo Babu. Don’t say anything to him. It wasn’t his fault.”

“How was it not, Piyali?”

“I offended him in unmentionable ways. Please Kaki.”

“Sit still. I am only going to get the first aid box.”

—

“I feel wretched that I slapped her, Ma, but I am not going to apologize,” Mukundo burst out when Mohima came to his room later, “This girl will drive me crazy. And if she must stay this way, send her away. She says she is capable of living on her own and I agree. I am also capable to living my life and taking care of my daughter without her.”

“That sounds like lover’s tiff except you are not—Oh! Are you?” She jumped up at the thought.

“Damned if I know, Ma. Ask her.”

“Mukundo,” Mohima looked fearful, “You are not forcing her, are you?”

“Ma!” he looked hurt, “I haven’t. All these years. Fully aware that she was young and I had no business exploiting her gratefulness. But what do I discover? That she won’t marry anyone else because she loves me. But she won’t marry me either.”

“Why?”

“Now THAT! You ask her. I have to help Sumi finish her homework.”

—

To be continued