"We loved each other for years. Can't you give me, give us, another chance?" asked Ashna, appearing paler than Aniket had seen her in years. Her smooth and conditioned hair appeared frizzy and split ends peeped from the edge of her messy pony tail, and her face lacked the resplendent glow he has grown to associate with her.

The blackcurrant fragrance of her shower gel tickled his senses despite years of acquaintance. The woman using it had changed, the man tantalized by the smell had transformed, but her choice and his response did not.

A chance. An offer at having the upper hand. The allure of the promise enticed the estranged husband. The temptation too beguiling to have a chance at fulfillment. "Remember what I had told you about five months ago? I found a surrogate," said Aniket.

So abrupt and halfhearted was his shift from hesitance to determination that his tone had an uncharacteristic chilliness to it. A smile lit up on her face, much to his surprise. She had wondered if he would bare his heartfelt ecstasy for embracing fatherhood to her, and sharing his joy delighted her more than her agony for her inability to contribute to it.

"Your wish and dream of years will come true, Aniket. I am so happy for you," she said, beaming at him without the blemish of envy he had expected. "But, I don't understand, how is that related to our divorce?" she asked, the quiver in her voice threatened to power his conscience which had lied dormant for weeks.

Aniket deterred his eyes from Ashna. "The contract with the surrogate mother states that the authenticity of the contract is subject to our divorce. I do not wish to step back from my word, and that's just one of the reason I am intent on divorcing you. If you are forgetting, you cheated on me," he spat, relishing how she flinched at his words.

Her chest rose and fell in an erratic rhythm. "So have you, Aniket," she said in a trembling whisper, just audible on the account of the tense silence that had befallen them.

Aniket's eyes widened at the accusation in her defeated tone. "Excuse me?"

"Cheating is not just physical or sexual, Aniket. It is also emotional," she said, clearing her throat clogged with the tears she refused to shed. "Were you beside me when my mother was on deathbed? Huh?"

Aniket's enraged eyes found their way to the pristine white grantine floor, unable to meet her eyes. Her conscience had clamored for respite and demanded him to apologize for his absence for years, but his stubborn pride refused the little mercies to his bruised conscience.

"You did not come even two days after she had passed away. Everyone waited for the son-in-law to arrive and perform the last rites. And I, I waited for my husband to hold me in his arms and tell me I still had someone in the world. That I still had him."

Ashna bit back the sobs rumbling at the back of her throat. "All I got was a text message, when I was in the airport, expressing your condolences. I didn't want to lose you by fighting with you, Aniket. Not right after my mother abandoned me. So, I said nothing. But today, when you want to leave my side, I cannot remain silent anymore."

Aniket almost stumbled back by the impact of her words and the onslaught of the voice of his morality, but he soon steadied himself. "You don't want to be the reason of my happiness, or let anyone else be the reason, isn't it?" he taunted, laughing without mirth.

"I never wanted you to be bereft of happiness, Aniket. Maybe that's why I never let my inner demons complain to you, because I knew that if I complained, the little bliss left in our lives would dissipate away. Maybe that's why I allowed them to live off others. But maybe my love was not strong enough to guard your happiness at the cost of my own," she whispered with a rueful smile playing on her chapped lips.

Honesty.

The quality which had once endeared her to him. She had been honest about her shortcomings from the beginning. Never trying to hide, but never trying to flaunt them either. To hear her accept her follies and reveal the whimpering of her heart was akin to reliving the old times. But alas, he was not the old Aniket Rawat.

"Don't. Don't trap me in your words. You are doing this intentionally, aren't you?" he asked, running his fingers in his already rugged hair.

"I wish I could. When I could not stop you from leaving years ago, how can I stop you now?" she jeered at herself.

Before Aniket could respond to her, a message on his phone interrupted his trail of thoughts. He dug out the phone, knowing that it could be Kriti, and she might be in the need of help. Although it was from the woman of his thoughts she had not sent the message from a situation of peril but of happiness.

The message contained the picture of the first ultrasound of their baby. Ecstasy, elation and euphoria swelled in his heart as he eyed the baby which was an extension of himself. Surprised by the chain of events, Ashna moved towards him to look at what had caused such an emotional upheaval from the usually guarded Aniket Rawat.

The sight which she beheld had at once revealed that he was rightfully blissful but before she could notice the name of the sender, Aniket pulled the phone away from the line of sight of Ashna.

"I am sure you would want to speak to the mother, Aniket. Go ahead," she said, standing by her words she would never stand between him and his happiness, as she walked away giving privacy to him by closing the doors behind her.

"Ritz! The next time you go for an ultrasound, make sure you call me. I wouldn't want to miss this for anything in the world. I want to see this from my own eyes, want to see my baby move and respond. Not just a picture," he demanded as Kriti received his call.

He heard her tinkling laughter from the other side of the phone and it had calmed his raging nerves like nothing else in the past. "Without a fail next time, Aniket."