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Cruel Compassion

If 'being irritated' had a real face!

Batuk was standing with a frown on his brows, his eyes narrowed and his lips murmuring inaudibly.
"Wait. Wait. Wait.... damn Bondita, this sounds easy, right?"

"What are you saying?"
Bhargavi too was frowning sharply at him, both their eyes gauging each other in an unnecessary threat that was almost comical to look at.

"What's that to you?"
Batuk narrowed his eyes and folded his arms in defence.

"Are you generally this mean to everyone or is it a special occasion today?"
Bhargavi asked him with the same serious expression.

"Definitely special occasion." Batuk let out a fake grin. "What can be more special than meeting you two."

"Rude." Bhargavi looked away, murmuring the words.

"Oh...! and isn't it rude to barge into someone's life without invitation?" Batuk caught the trail of her words and questioned back.

"No one intrudes willingly, it's... It's compulsion." Bhargavi looked down, her last words were a slow whisper.

Rishit Sinha was sipping tea inside the bakery, while Mira and Bhargavi stood outside the open pavement of the shop along with Batuk. Bhargavi was standing close to Batuk, their eyes constantly waging cold battles, as Mira stood a little aside, her head down, and her arms clutching a small white cloth sack to her rapidly beating chest. This was the first time she had ever been outside Dehradun, and the clamour of the big city had left her completely disoriented.

How would she find him, her Anirudh, in such a big city?
Mira felt bouts of tears trying to break free from her core, tears of apprehension, tears of losing, and her only hope was Anirudh Babu, the man she had worshipped every day, every night since the past one and half years.

Rishit had paid the porters and the two tin trunks were kept near Batuk's feet.

"Why are those British police looking at us?" Bhargavi suddenly asked, and Batuk turned towards her gestured direction and looked away disdainfully.

"Why don't you ask them?"

Bhargavi had stirred at his suggestion, and probably she would have complied too, as suddenly she heard Batuk yell out at Mira.

"Arey... Arey... Don't sit there... It's a dustbin."

Bhargavi turned around at once, only to find a startled Mira looking at them with wide fearful eyes.

"Gaovar!" Batuk murmured and looked away disinterestedly, and Bhargavi held his arm at once, startling Batuk with her touch.

"Excuse me? What did you just say?"
Her words were sharp and Batuk rolled his eyes at her.

"I said... You sister, or whatever she is to you... Is extremely foolish."

"Don't consider her simplicity as foolishness, Rude Telephone Babu."
Bhargavi had walked up to Mira and had pulled her by her hand, closer to where they were standing.
Batuk too, took a quick glance at her fearful face, reddened and flushed in embarrassment and anxiety, and the moment his senses nudged his heart begging a little compassion, his stubborn sense of protecting his brother's marriage came in its way, making him look away at once.

"What's happening here? Is everything alright Madam?"
A young British officer approached Mira, looking at her rubescent face with curiosity, drinking in the beauty of her mountain white unblemished skin and her sharp features. Even the mild February heat of plains had reddened her skin, tinting her in an attractive glow.

"Are you alright Madam?" The officer asked again in accented English, taking amusement from the nervous uneasiness of the fidgeting pretty woman.

"Ya, she's alright. Thank you." Batuk spoke up, not been able to keep himself aloof from the situation any longer.

"And, who might you be?" The officer now had turned towards him, eyeing him thoroughly.

"I'm... I'm Zamindar Batakrishna Roy Chowdhury, of Tulsipur."

The officer narrowed his eyes at him.
"And who might this young lady to you be?"

"She... She's..."
Batuk fumbled to derive a proper connotation of his relationship to the woman, he couldn't have denied her acquaintance, as that would probably lead to her ending up at the police station, but before he could conjure up a word, he heard Bhargavi speak.

"Wife... She's his wife."

Batuk was startled for a moment, as Bhargavi pressed his hand firmly with hers, as if pleading him to stay quiet.
And, as Batuk brushed a slight glance at Mira, he saw her trembling convulsively, as if nothing was registering to her ears, as if she might collapse down anytime.

The officer had turned towards Mira once again.
"Mrs. Roy Choudhury, do you have any discomfort?"
His words were accented, and Mira kept quivering with her gaze lowered to the ground.
Batuk sighed, as he picked up one of the tin trunk from the ground and walked towards Mira, grabbing her wrist firmly.

"She doesn't understand English." He looked straight at the officer, "and now if you would excuse us."

He had only turned to enter the bakery as the officer called out once again.
His new posting in India, and the colorful native people of the new land had invoked much curiosity in him, and he was thoroughly enjoying his time exerting his supremacy over the common bengali folks.

"And, who is this one to you?" He pointed at Bhargavi now, standing near him, as Batuk kept down the trunk and caught hold of her arm too.

"She is my wife too. Hope that's not a problem."
He winked at the officer as the man rolled his eyes at him in surprise.

"Um... well, I'm his half wife," Bhargavi's sudden interjection made both the men turn towards her, and they saw her smiling.

"Half? As in?" The officer asked quizzically, amused at this new knowledge.

"As in, I'm his sister-in-law, his wife's sister, hence his half wife."

"Well whatever, but a man with two wives should definitely be worried about the notorious Krantikaris roaming freely in this locality, especially when the women are of such beauty."
He eyed Mira once again as Batuk almost dragged them inside the hotel, making Bhargavi sit inside a small cubicle. Mira was standing behind him, in the same rigid manner as before.

"Sit. Or you would require some special invitation." Batuk joined his hands before her and gestured her to sit.
His words had somewhere startled Mira, and she slowly sat down on the wooden bench opposite to Bhargavi.

"Where is Rishit Da?" Bhargavi asked, looking across the table where Rishit was seated.

"Probably gone to freshen up. "

"Oh... So, people do have places to freshen up in big cities." Bhargavi sighed.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I thought big city dwellers are all about huff and puff, and hurtful words."

Batuk glared at the girl, and then suddenly his gaze mellowed down, noticing the tired patches under her deep-set eyes.

They must have been really tired after the two night long train journey.

"Do you want to freshen up?" He asked her politely as he saw her jump up from the wooden bench.

"I'd love to... I need to... Well..." She murmured softly.

Batuk nodded at once and made way for her, showing her the direction where women would go to conduct their business in private.

"And you?" He looked down at Mira, his voice a little lowered as he saw her nodding her head in a No, her gaze hasn't come up even once since she had arrived.

"Would you like to have some tea?" Batuk had already gestured the young errand boy of the bakery as he saw Mira half nodding her head in a half hearted agreement.

Rishit wasn't there, and nor was Bhargavi, and inside the cubicle, Batuk sat opposite to Mira, in complete silence, looking at her face.

No wonder she was pretty, but something must have scared her to death, the poor girl was trembling violently, jumping up at every minute sound around her.

"Mira, what are you scared of?"

The old bakery owner had brought them tea, and he smiled politely at Batuk and left.

"Your tea... Have."
Batuk spoke again, and Mira raised her two white hands to pick up the piping hot small clay bhar filled with tea, her trembling hands giving away to the heat.

"Careful!" Batuk almost yelled, and that loudness had en exactly opposite effect to her than intended. Mira had spilt the hot tea on the table and on her lap, and fresh stream of tears were flowing down her crimson cheeks.

Was she crying because of the burn?

The healer in Batuk was immediately in action, as he pulled out a white handkerchief from his pocket and soaked it in water from the brass jug kept on the table, and wasting no time, he quickly got down to his knees infront of the weeping woman and took her tea burnt hand in his.

Their hands had touched, and probably their hearts too, and their eyes met for the first time. Batuk was looking at her, and Mira gathered all her strength to lift her eyes to see the owner of the pair of compassionate hands that had held her.
It was rare... It was what she had very less in life... Compassion!

It was as if you dream for a thousand nights of a calm sea shore after a violent boat wreak, it was as if an angel of life extending his hands at the verge of a bloodied death, it was as if the man whom she had worshipped in her dreams every night had come infront of her, offering her his hand...
One glance, and the striking similarity of the face near her with that of the face she had curved in her heart made it almost impossible for her to separate the reality from the surrealism of the moment.

"You!" Her lips quivered, the plum lower lip still had traces of tea glistening on it.

"Yes, I." Batuk murmured too, almost in a trance, as the touch of her hands somehow recreated the magic of the romanticism that he had experienced before.
Mira gulped nervously at him.
"You... You aren't him... But..." She swallowed, "you look... "

"I'm his brother." Batuk smiled warmly, making her lower her gaze at once.

"Oh... I... I...want to meet him."
Her words were a gentle stagger.

"Boudi has gone to fetch him." Batuk informed her politely, as his voice went down a little lower and he almost hushed, carefully not to startle the woman again.
"What it is that you want Mira?"

Mira had looked up again, and her eyes conveyed an unfathomable pain that made Batuk's heart wrench as well.

Was he too harsh in judging her?

He wanted to sooth her, comfort her, but before he could come out of his thoughts, he heard her speak... One word, and it was enough to make all the empathetic emotions brewing in his heart vanish like camphor, his jaws had stiffened and his fist had tightened at once, the cruel joke of destiny to be blamed perhaps!

"Anirudh.." Mira spoke in tears.
"I want my Anirudh!"

.........................................................

This is my second update for the day.
Please vote for the previous chapter as well.
Stay blessed ❤️

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