2. Brooding over the Past

Aruna

The weather was chilly and grey clouds were slowly filling up the sky, making the weather gloomier.

"Looks like another shower is about to start", I muttered to myself. Pulling my sweater tightly around myself, I increased my pace. I did not wish to enter the school, soaked to my bones.

I didn't know many people in the locality as we had shifted to Dehra a few months ago. From my childhood, I dreamt about residing on the hills and now that I am finally able to live here, I am pretty satisfied. The reason behind shifting was my job, not that I didn't get a job in my hometown at Ahemdabad but later we shifted to Delhi. I opted to join here. I just have a special place for the hills.  So when I applied here and was called for an interview and was finally selected I didn't look back. My parents too did not object. Luckily, I found a house for rent.

While I was thinking about all this, my phone rang breaking my reverie.

I fished out the phone from my bag. It was my mom. "What?" I asked in lieu of the cursory greeting. "Will you come home early today?" She inquired. I remained silent. I knew what she was planning. Another proposal might have come from Malti aunty. Yes, it seemed this lady who was mum's childhood friend had taken up the job to find a suitable groom for me. I cursed her ( though we are taught not to curse anyone I couldn't resist).

"No",  I finally replied and without waiting for her reply ended the call and shoved the gadget back in the bag.

I was irritated. When will my mom understand? I thought. I too had a life, even after everything happened. I just lost my faith in 'love', in a happy relationship. I know that getting raped by a relative was not my fault, but society never saw it in that way. They always blamed the victim. Always. This too was a major reason for which I changed cities.  When would she understand that I too wanted to study further, see the world? That half the people I had rejected was because I did not want to dupe them and I knew almost all of them would reject me if they heard about my past.

Though I read romantic books I believed that in real-world there are few guys who can accept a girl who has been exploited by someone else.

I so wished that there was a delete button in real life so that I could delete some events of my life. A tear spilt from my eye. I blinked several times before to get rid of the blurred vision. 

I know she won't say this truth to the guy who would talk to me on skype(yeah, my mom and her friend found this method useful). But I was just not willing to enter a relationship by concealing my past.

I remembered how Akash, my ex-lover or it would be more apt to say my so-called ex-lover had reacted when after dating for 8 months he had proposed to me and I had finally confided in him and how he had stopped speaking to me after that day. One doesn't need to insult you to get rid of you, there are other ways and that was another way. I remember how I had cried for days. From then I had stopped believing that true love in real-world existed.

My eyes became moist again at the thought. I felt like pitying myself. "Aruna, no self-pitying", I chided myself in my mind for becoming weak. "You are not a weak-willed woman", I tried to be resolute. I then realized I had arrived at school.

I entered the classroom after mustering up a smile but when I saw the bright faces that awaited for me in the class I realized that marriage is not what is on my cards right now, that there are many other things which gave me happiness.

I decided not to brood over the past. I will look forward. I will try to learn from my experiences.

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Happy reading  📖

Asmita 💜