Empty Pages Episode 5

This week doesn't have a theme either, other than reusing the same prompt maybe? The last one is based on a movie ( mentioning this because nobody understood who Mastery was based on either). Let me know what you think/feel about my work.

#29 Broken

She was lying on the floor.
Lying on a bed of blood and broken glass.
She couldn't move. She wanted to but couldn't.
The house was silent but her mind was screaming.
How did things get this far?

Her story had had a jerky start.
She hadn't had the best of childhoods.
She had waited for the day she could just leave.
For a new beginning. For somebody to share it with.
That somebody had been elusive to find.
Everyone she met reminded her of people she knew.

She had been under so much scrutiny, all that she wanted was affection.
Till the day she found it. Pure unadulterated affection.
She was exhilarated by her finding. Finally.

He wasn't the best pick maybe, but he had what she needed.
He made her feel the way nobody had ever made her feel.
The ability to make her feel special. Wanted. Beautiful.
It was wonderful while it lasted.
Till he made her feel other things nobody had ever made her feel.
Nobody other than him would accept her - a piece of broken glass.
Unwanted. Undesirable. Incapable. Dependant.
He was her crutch, he told her. She couldn't function without him.
She didn't need crutches, but she didn't know that yet.

She knew something was off, but decided to ignore it.
Cover it. Hide the signs. Conceal the unhappiness.
Shroud the abuse. Disguise the lies. Bottle up the resentment.
She burnt bridges to keep him alive, keep him with her.
She destroyed everything she stood for, to stand with him.

Till the day, he broke her. Crippled her.
Snapped her like a doll a child no longer wanted to play with.
She had given him everything she had, which he no longer needed.
She lay there, like a broken doll, unable to move.

Her thoughts would race to compensate for the lack of movement.
They thought of everything, before, now and the future.
Part of her wanted to believe, she needed a crutch.She was broken.
Part of her wanted to believe, she had stood before, she could again.
Part of her wanted to lie to herself.. Make excuses as always.
Things would get better. He would change. He loved her.
He just didn't know how to express it. He cared.
The same lies that she would tell others. Rationalise.
Today she couldn't lie to herself anymore.
She inched towards her phone. She would call the cops.

#30 Broken glass

He couldn't understand why she was so upset.
It was just a piece of glass. Women were dramatic beings.
She sat there with tears streaming down her 88 year old cheeks.
She touched the pieces for what would be the last time.
Her son was yelling something about getting cut.
She didn't hear anything. She couldn't feel anything.

They had had a very modest beginning.
They couldn't afford basic furniture or utensils.
They hadn't fallen in love or anything.
Their families decided they should marry. They did.
They were however fond of each other. Almost like friends.
Over time, they had learnt to be a team.

He wasn't a very emotional person. He hardly said anything.
He was romantic in unconventional ways, maybe. She didn't mind.
He had come back from a trip, with this gift.
She had received a terribly covered, misshapen parcel containing it.
It was the first time he had gotten her a gift.
He didn't know what she liked, she liked the fact that it didn't stop him.

This was decades back. For years it had been an empty bottle on her shelf.
Nobody knew why she still had it. They considered it junk by all means.
Nobody knew she woke up in the night when she missed him.
That when she couldn't sleep, she'd walk over to her shelf.
The fragrance still lived in the bottle. She could smell it.
That was all she needed to relive every happy moment she had had with him.

She had her family, she loved them, they made her happy at times.
But she missed him. Not in the way young lovers do.
She missed him in the way old friends do.
Today all that was left of him were fading memories and broken glass.

#31 Lies

Never be late. Don't lie. Be a gentleman.
Those were the fundamental rules of his house. His father had served in the army and these rules were the singular priorities of his life. He had died early but his family still followed this blueprint.

He stood there watching a gun being pointed at a woman and her child.
He'd have to lie to save her life.
If he didn't he was a coward, an inhuman coward.

Time was running out. The problem with never lying is not knowing what works.
He decided to go for it.
He wished somebody had done for his father, what he was willing to do for these strangers. He would be the hero he had hoped existed in his childhood.

It didn't matter which country she belonged to, which religion. He saw their faces. The fear. The terror. The knowledge that it could all be over in minutes. The child's small beady eyes. His life would be over even before he had a chance to live.
He would do all he could to keep them alive.

#32 Jet lag

He had reached home in the wee hours of that Tuesday.
All he had on his mind were -removing perishables from his suitcase and sleeping.
He lay there mentally in a different timezone, physically in another.
It was night he told himself, till he could smell mouthwatering food.
He was sure the mosquitoes felt the same way about him because they were attacking him in battalions.
A prayer was blasting in the kitchen from a Bluetooth speaker.
He slowly made his way to the kitchen only to find every person he was related to en route.
They all bombarded him with questions about American politics, everyone seemed to know everything.
He didn't care, all he wanted was sleep and whatever his mother was cooking.
His mother noticed that he was hungry and started piling food on his plate.
Meanwhile the relatives were spouting expertise on life in America and who's who lives where.
He hoped he'd never have to meet any of those people. Soon enough he hit that soft spot.
Jet lag fuelled by good food.
He was lying on the floor, on a mat, mosquitoes swarming, the fan speaking a language of tuk-tuk-tuktuktuks on a sticky, sultry day. It was the best nap he ever had.

#33 Tiff

It was 11 pm on a sultry night.
He was in the cab, on his way home.
The cab driver was engrossed in a 70s song playing on the radio.
He was weary and couldn't wait to reach home. It was going to be a long drive.

He called her, maybe hearing her voice would make him feel better. She was on call, having a relatively free night. Had she been busy, the conversation would have ended with a few- I love yous. Tonight she had the time to discuss things they couldn't otherwise. She had been seething, he was too tired to think. They argued for half an hour. Till she started crying. She ran out to hide her tears of anger, resentment and despair.

Maybe things would have been different if they had argued in person.She screamed "I hate you! I don't want to see your face again. Don't talk to me ever again".
She splashed her burning face with cold water over and over again. He sat there wondering what he did wrong. He'd have to fix this over the weekend.

She didn't reply to his messages. Long ones. Short ones. Missed calls. He gave up after a while. She'd come around. She was angry but she still loved him.She read every message as soon as it was delivered but didn't reply. No, she was going to punish him. The last message she read read "In one kiss, you'll know all I haven't said." She was too angry to be amused. She got busy and left her phone on the desk.

20 minutes later, she could hear sirens blasting, an ambulance pulled over.
She was attending to another patient, so yelled instructions to her juniors through the curtains. She could hear the chaos and whispers through the curtains. She walked over and pulled the curtains apart.

He lay there, motionless.His usually twinkling, kind, brown eyes now vacant and pale. She couldn't take it. She did everything she possibly could, her words still ringing in her ears. Her knowledge, her skills, nothing came to her rescue today. She watched her world crumble one second at a time. She wanted to believe this hadn't happened. She picked her phone to call him. Last seen 15 minutes back, his last message read - I wish I could turn back the clock. I'd find you sooner and love you longer.
It hit her. He wasn't ever going to talk to her again.

#34 Five years

She looked out of her balcony,cradling a cup of coffee and hoping it would be an uneventful Friday. She was gazing across the street when she saw a familiar form walking towards her building. After five years, he just happened to be walking down her street?

She had thought by moving to a new city, she had abandoned her past. She wasn't sure it was him. Maybe she was imagining things. Their meeting had been a series of accidents. He had messaged a wrong number. She had first been curt and brushed him off. They ended up wishing each other for enough festivals in the calendar to start chatting. They never found out who he was actually supposed to have been texting.

The first time she met him, her being was drowning in a mixture of fear, excitement, happiness and warnings all her friends had thrown her way.She was expecting this to fail. She was expecting him to be something she didn't want to look at or somebody she didn't want to laugh with. That would make life so much easier. Maybe the display pics were somebody else's. Maybe he was some middle aged psycho who was coming prepared to kill her. She was getting ready to bolt.

He wasn't sure he could be as confident in person as he could be on chat. What if she was repulsed by his well known terrible sense of humour. Not that his jokes weren't funny. If he had to put everyone who found him funny in a vehicle, a Santro would be enough. Worse what if she realised she was too good for him. She was definitely out of his league. He had brushed up on topics she liked. He had come prepared for rejection. Yet he was scared to step in, it took him every ounce of courage to open that door.

He walked in to see her rise. She got up and saw him stand there frozen. They looked at each other for few seconds, not sure what to say. There were too far in to leave. They started off with some awkward talk. It took quite some coffee to get the words moving. Once they started talking though, they were so engrossed neither checked their phone for hours, which was a record.

Things however came to an end before they started. Life pulled them apart like it was testing the elasticity of a rubber band. They chose not to stay in touch. She wanted a new beginning, away from her past. He had his commitments to keep. They drifted apart almost as abruptly as they had been pulled together. They still thought of each other, whenever anything they had discussed came up like coffee, rain, mango ice cream, fresh laundry, ice cubes. The mountains after rains with small waterfalls. The grey sky vs. the green scenery in the monsoon.

Till the day she saw him walking down her street. She was hallucinating she told herself. No way he'd move across cities to meet her. She went on with her work and pretended it never happened. It kept nagging her all day long though. The next day she peeped from her balcony. Sure enough, he was walking down her street. She locked her house, took her phone, pepper spray, and keys made her way down. She looked like a disaster to herself at least, oversized t-shirt, pajamas and messy hair. Maybe it wouldn't be him and some stranger would wonder why a crazy woman was staring at him. Her heart was pumping like it wanted to just explode any minute. Her brain was behaving like a child high on sugar.

He didn't know for sure where she lived. He had moved to city a few years back, not knowing she lived there. He had had a glimpse of her one day from a taxi. In what could be only described as stalking he had managed to find out where she lived. He felt guilty about it, but he didn't want to miss the chance of his life. He walked across that street every day hoping he'd be able to find out where she actually lived. What if she was married? What if she had a thug boyfriend? He kept closing the popups in his head. He had seen enough and didn't want to go back to that life. He was ready for a no. He wanted to hear it from her so he could live with the knowledge he tried, and a good story for his kids someday.

He was close to giving up. It started drizzling. Drops of water on his phone, his specs. He cursed his luck. He had thrown his umbrella out his car today. He would still have to make it to the end of the street. He was drenched anyway. He used his fingers as windshield wipers for his foggy specs. The fog cleared. She was laughing.

#35 Walls

She looked at the walls with the plaster coming off.
Water seeping through the gaps.
The bricks were naked, for everyone to see.
She had left everything to be here, between these walls.
She had thought, the walls she built in her life would last.
The ones for that sheltered her all her life.
The ones that she could lean on, after building them.
She had always though relationships would be just that.
Brick and cement. Give and take.
Today she realised maybe he didn't want any of that.
She was embedded too deep by now.
Like those little plants that grow from within the wall.
Either she would survive or the wall would break.
He was gutted about putting her in this position.
He didn't know how to fix the unfixable.
You can break walls, make walls, but you can't modify them.
Till the day he lost her, maybe forever.
He didn't understand how integral she was to his life till that day.
He understood that the willingness to shoulder responsibilities, being that pillar of support mattered more than his abilities to do so.