Page 23 of The Promise of a Traitor

Aastha

The awkward evening with her family ended and Aastha found herself walking Advik out. Her mother followed them, her anxious energy seeming to wrap around Aastha and make her own nerves dance beneath her skin.

“You must come again,” Binita chattered to Advik. “Maya and I have to meet soon too. We need to plan the engagement and-“

“Ma.” Aastha’s interruption was a little too loud and both Binita and Advik glanced over at her. She flushed as she added, “It’s late. I think Advik needs to get home. We shouldn’t delay him.”

Advik stepped into the brittle silence that fell over them. “It’s almost midnight. If I don’t get back soon, I’ll turn into a pumpkin,” he told Binita with a charming smile.

And there he was. The man she’d loved so deeply. The man she’d left behind with most of her heart. The man who still found it in him to be nice to an intrusive, overly anxious older woman.

“It was a pleasure meeting you all,” he told Binita sweetly, lying through his perfectly aligned teeth. “And, I look forward to spending more time with you in the future.”

Aastha watched her shrewd, calculating mother melt into a gooey puddle under this man’s charm. She wanted to be angry about it. She wanted to hate him for it. But she felt only gratitude.

Advik met her eyes, his hard gaze softening momentarily at whatever he saw in hers before giving her a small smile and murmuring, “Goodnight.”

Aastha wondered if her mother would go back inside, give the two of them a modicum of privacy. But no. As always, she was either clueless or nosy enough to insist on being part of every last moment. Probably a bit of both.

“Goodnight,” she replied, when her mother continued to stand there smiling and nodding like a bobblehead doll.

With a last, amused look, Advik got into his car and left. Aastha stood there a moment longer, watching his headlights disappear into the night. Her heart ached in her chest, for what she’d had, what she’d lost, but really, for what she’d never have again.

“What a lovely boy,” her mother said, shattering the moment. “I’m so happy –“

“I won’t do it.” Aastha’s firm words sliced through her highly strung chatter.

“Won’t do what?” Her mother’s smile slipped away replaced with the icy anger that Aastha was familiar with. This was the other side of her mother, the one most people never saw, but one Aastha knew intimately emerged.

“I won’t marry him.” Aastha turned away from Binita, walking towards the entry of the building.

Her mother reached out and grabbed her hand as she passed her, sharp, manicured nails digging into Aastha’s wrist, her signature move.

“Do you think you have a choice?” Binita hissed, her eyes narrowing. “Do you think any of us can afford principles right now? Do you think you can afford to develop morals?”

“I won’t do it,” Aastha repeated, meeting her mother’s glare. She pulled her hand out of Binita’s grip and stepped back. “Not to him.”

She turned her back on Binita and walked towards the house, her feet leaden with old grief and newly awakened fury.

“I don’t understand.” Binita’s cold question had her stopping. “I thought you’d be ecstatic.”

A strange prickling started under Aastha’s skin, a million pins and needles coming alive as awareness flooded through her.

“Ecstatic?” The word felt like lead in her mouth. “Why would I be ecstatic?”

“He’s the boy, isn’t he?” Binita sneered. “The one you moped around about for years. The one who inspired the marathon weeping sessions at night. Your one, great love. The boy you swore you’d never get over.”

There was a dull roaring in her ears, her mother’s words receding into the background. “You knew.”

“I knew the minute Maya sent me a magazine article about him and his company. The beard threw me off for a bit but then I recognised him from your pictures.”

The pictures. Aastha swallowed, the hard knot of emotions clogging her throat making it hard to speak. The pictures she’d buried in a box at the back of her closet. The pictures her mother had found and set fire to, holding them over the open flame of the stove.

“If you know who he is,” Aastha rasped, refusing to let the tears stinging her eyes to fall, “then you know why I can’t hurt him. Not again.”

“Like I said,” Binita said, her voice frigid steel, “you can’t afford morals. We can’t afford morals.”

“Why not?” Aastha’s voice rose, wild and shrill. The building watchman glanced over, wide eyed at all the drama playing out. “Why the hell not? I don’t want to use him. Not for my benefit and certainly not for any of your twisted schemes.”