She(Avantika) had burned her world to get to him -Romantic- (1 Video) - Scene 4*

[ashuezy2]

Scene 3

I waited on my balcony until the black SUV disappeared into the rain. Then I looked down at Girish.
He was still standing in the open doorway, staring at the empty street. He looked like a man who had just walked away from a car crash. His shirt was unbuttoned, hanging off one shoulder, and he was completely soaked from holding her wet body. He didn't go back inside to clean up. He just slid down the doorframe until he was sitting on the wet floor, putting his head in his hands.

I knew I shouldn't go down. It was none of my business. But the silence coming from his flat was too heavy. It was the kind of silence that makes you worry.
I grabbed my pack of cigarettes—my usual excuse—and walked down the stairs. My flip-flops slapped loud on the wet concrete. Girish didn't even look up.
"Hey," I said. "My lighter died. You got one?"
He looked up slowly. His eyes were red and wild. He looked exhausted, like he hadn't slept in a week. He didn't say a word, just reached into his wet pocket, pulled out a lighter, and tossed it to me.

"Can I come in?" I asked, pushing my luck. "It's freezing out here."
He shrugged. He didn't care. He was too drained to care.
I stepped inside, and the smell hit me instantly. It was thick. It smelled like sweat, spilled whiskey, and expensive women’s perfume. It smelled like raw sex.

The room was a war zone. The bed was pushed weirdly against the wall. The sheets were twisted into knots and half on the floor. There was a broken lamp in the corner, glass everywhere. And right in the middle of the floor, there was a wet patch on the rug where she had stood dripping wet.

Girish walked over to the small kitchen to pour a drink. His hands were shaking.
"You heard, didn't you?" he asked, his back to me.
"The walls are thin, Girish," I said, lighting my cigarette. "Hard not to hear when you're breaking furniture."

He turned around, glass in hand. He wasn't embarrassed. He looked proud, in a twisted way. "She’s wild," he murmured, taking a huge gulp of whiskey. "You see her on TV, all proper and stiff. But in here? She’s a total animal."
"She sounded like she was in pain," I said, testing him.

"She likes it rough," Girish said bluntly. He walked over to the bed and kicked the messed-up sheets. "She begged for it, Sarika. She wants to be used. She told me to leave marks so she remembers she’s alive when she goes back to that boring house."
I walked over to the bedside table. Amongst the mess, there was something shiny. It was a broken piece of a glass bangle. Red and gold. It must have snapped when he was pinning her hands down.

"She forgot this," I said.
Girish snatched it out of my hand. "She didn't forget it," he said, staring at the sharp glass. "She leaves things. Last time it was an earring. She wants me to have pieces of her." He squeezed the glass until his knuckles turned white.
I left him there to drink himself into a coma. But I couldn't stay away.


The next morning, the storm was gone. The sun was out, drying up the mud. I went back down at 10 AM with two coffees. Girish’s door was open.

He was sitting in front of his stand, painting. He looked like a zombie.
"Turn on the TV," he said, pointing with his paintbrush.
I turned it on to a news channel. And there she was. Avantika.

She was standing next to an older man in a white kurta—her husband. They were cutting a ribbon at some charity hospital. She looked perfect. Her hair was in a tight bun. She was wearing a cream-colored saree, smiling politely.

"Look at her," Girish whispered, a dark smirk on his face. "Look at that fake smile."
I looked closer at the screen. She looked calm. But then I noticed she was wearing a blouse with long sleeves, even though it was hot.
"Long sleeves," I said. "To hide the bruises on her arms."
"Exactly," Girish said, dipping his brush in red paint. "I bit her there. And on her neck. She has to wear a scarf today."

I looked at his painting. It was violent. It showed a woman with her head thrown back, screaming, covered in red paint that looked like blood or wet silk.
"It looks like you're trying to eat her alive," I said.
"That's what it felt like," he said. "Like we were eating each other. She doesn't come here to make love, Sarika. She comes here to get fucked until she can't think anymore."
"When will she come back?" I asked.

Girish stopped painting. He looked at the empty spot on the rug where she had stood the night before.
"I don't know," he said quietly. "Maybe next week. When the pressure gets too much again. I'm just her drug, Sarika. She takes a hit of me, gets messy, and then goes back to being a queen."

He looked back at the TV, where Avantika was shaking hands with a minister.
"Does it bother you?" I asked. "Being the dirty secret?"

Girish laughed, dipping his brush in the red paint again. "No. Because right now, while she's shaking that minister's hand, she's sore from what I did to her. I own the parts of her that her husband never gets to see."