Hello everyone! You guys are the very best! I hadn’t known this track could have done so well ever. Thank you all so much for all your love, for your trust in me and the story! Hoping to have the same constant support throughout. Happy reading!
Twinj: My Lifeline: Episode 75 (Now that’s a milestone!! Yay!)
A quick recap: The physical distance between Twinkle and Kunj seem to only worsen the misunderstandings between them, even as they crave to just bring things back to normal. While the latter is restless over the recent developments, the former waits desperately, slowly beginning to run out of patience.
Twinkle jumped up slightly when she heard a shrill tune that was in sharp contrast to Kunj’s soothing voice in his songs that were playing on loop on her phone. She lunged across the bed to grab her phone and picked the call immediately, putting it to her ear and managing to say, “Hello?” before releasing a breath that she didn’t even know she was holding back. “Twinkle? Why aren’t you asleep yet?” His voice was dripping of concern, tempting her to believe that nothing had ever gone wrong. “I was. Your call woke me up.” She lied blatantly, eyeing the clock, literally fighting herself not to point out that he was calling two hours beyond the latest she could stay up. “Yeah, and I don’t know you.” He answered, the sarcasm evident in his tone. “You had said you would call.” She said in a small voice, mentally patting herself, for things had gone pretty well so far. In comparison to the complete chaos their earlier conversation had been at least. “I’m sorry, things dragged on longer than I could have even imagined.” She heard him explain and sighed softly, worried at how dangerously close they were looming to the issue that had created all the tension in the first place. “Everything feels awfully empty in your absence…” He ventured nevertheless, well aware of the peril he was taking up. “Don’t laugh!” He added almost immediately, hoping he had been right at guessing her reaction. She stilled momentarily at how accurate he was, slouching back on the bed as she replied, “I’m positive I have it was harder, Kunj. Your work keeps you occupied all day, but I don’t even know what I should be doing of all the time I have on my hands now!” She realized a little too late that the last bit had come out like a whimper, but he seemed to get exactly what she was saying without further explanation. “I can’t believe you chose to take along Krish, of all people!” She heard herself saying before she was even aware of it, and regretted immediately. “How did you know?” He breathed, anxious over the idea of her having found out, not even wanting to know how she had figured anymore. “Kunj, why are you doing this to yourself?” She asked instead, but he didn’t seem to be in a mood to answer that either. “This is exactly why I didn’t let you in on the details! Had I brought you along, you would have never let me work with him!” He was only stating the facts, she knew he wasn’t wrong too, but she felt cornered at his accusation, no matter how true. “Stop making me sound selfish, when in reality, you chose to lie and get away for an entire week while all the work you had there would have taken a couple of days to finish!” She shot back heatedly, unable to recognize what was actually causing her to lose temper and squabble like that. “Why would I make you sound selfish? That’s just a baseless allegation you’re hurtling at me for hiding things from you!” He had responded equally annoyed, and things had gotten out of hand soon after.
It was another phone call that had brought Kunj shuttling back to Amritsar, just halfway through his week-long trip. It had been two days since he had had a real conversation with Twinkle too. They had strictly restricted all their calls to asking how the other was doing and how their day had gone. It appeared though, as if Usha and Manohar had been kept blissfully unaware of the situation, and he couldn’t have been more grateful to her for it. When he had received Yuvi’s call that afternoon, he had assumed it was just him checking in on him to make sure everything was alright, but he had been hugely mistaken. He now sat on the edge of his seat, feeling uncomfortable due to the strong smell of the antiseptics and the periodic beeping of the devices in front of him, not knowing what he should be doing to make things better. “Twinkle hasn’t been picking her phone for hours now, I didn’t know what else to do. I know you were out on some important work…” Yuvi explained, as he laid a gentle, reassuring hand on Kunj’s shoulder, having gauged his worry from the way he was restlessly tapping his feet. “The doctors say it wasn’t anything major too. She’ll be fine sooner than you’ll know it.” Yuvi spoke again a few minutes later and heard Kunj sigh loud enough to be heard in the piercingly quiet room. As he watched, Kunj mustered every bit of courage in him to look up from the point on the ground that he had found interesting for so long, to finally look up at Usha lying motionlessly on the bed in front of him. “I’m so grateful you reached there right on time.” Kunj spoke slowly after what had seemed like an eternity to Yuvi. Yuvi knew this was hard on Kunj, and decided not to prolong his narration of how he had gone to the Sarna mansion to get Twinkle, but had found the maid on the verge of calling up an ambulance since Usha had suddenly fainted midway through cooking. Yuvi had then rushed her to the hospital in his own car, trying to reach Twinkle repeatedly, but when she hadn’t responded even when they had reached the hospital, he had called up Kunj. Kunj simply nodded, his eyes trained on Usha, struggling to keep his tears from flowing down his cheeks. His only emotion other than the numbness because of Usha’s state was anger – anger over Twinkle being unavailable, anger that she had chosen to be out with her friends when Usha needed her most.
Yuvi was glad, to say the least when a couple of minutes later, he heard the door swing open and Twinkle rushed in. He turned to look at Kunj, who he thought was glaring at her as she sat where Kunj had been sitting moments ago, watching Usha carefully. “Twinkle! She’s going to be alright!” Yuvi proceeded to console Twinkle when he heard her sob quietly, having judged that there had to be something wrong if Kunj hadn’t done so himself. “Thank you, Yuvi!” She whispered when she got a hold on herself, and he nodded understandingly. “You should stay here now, I’ll go there.” Yuvi told her and she nodded quickly, suddenly reminded of the circumstances. Kunj narrowed his eyes at them, not quite getting that bit of exchange, but he didn’t care enough to try either. As she turned to watch Yuvi leave, she spotted Kunj at the other end of the ward, confusing her. “Kunj?” She called out, blinking to make sure her mind wasn’t tricking her yet again. “When did you get here?” She questioned when he hadn’t budged, but chose to stare at her nevertheless. She might have even gone as far as saying that he looked furious. “When you had been too busy hanging out and enjoying!” He said wryly, shocking her. “Kunj… what?” was all she was able to say, a fresh stream of tears making their way down her cheeks. That was the last thing she had expected him to say right then. “Don’t pretend to be surprised now! I can’t believe you couldn’t get before I did, although I was so far away and you were right here, in town! Yuvraj of all people had to get there to save my mother’s life?” His voice was getting louder, his insinuations pricking her heart, rendering her speechless. “Twinkle…?” They heard a feeble voice right then, making them turn swiftly in that direction. “Ma… You’re alright?” Kunj asked, dashing past Twinkle to get to Usha. Twinkle followed quickly though, smiling as warmly as she could at her mother-in-law. “How is Chinki doing?” Usha asked Twinkle, still sounding tired, but very determined, choosing to dodge Kunj’s questions for some reason. “She’s going to be fine, Ma. Fortunately, she was on the comparatively unaffected side of the car. She’s asleep under medication now. Don’t you worry, Ma. You should only rest now.” Twinkle spoke in her usual, soothing tone, managing to calm her down instantly.
Kunj stood tongue-tied beside Twinkle outside Usha’s ward. The staff at the hospital had asked them to step out and let Usha rest, for Kunj’s arguments had been loud enough for the entire floor to hear. “Twinkle…” Kunj began, feeling horribly guilt-ridden and weighed down by all that that had been happening so quickly that he feared he had no control over anything. She glanced at him sadly before looking away, her mind was definitely not prepared for any more of his charges. “Not now. I know you freaked out when you saw Ma like that, but I can’t take this discussion right now, Kunj. I’m not blaming you or anything, I just need some time to myself.” She said, but before he could respond in any way, a nurse walked over to them, asking for a “Miss Taneja”. He cursed himself as she dealt with Chinki’s admission formalities and Usha’s as well, all by herself, noticing for the first time that she had looked disheveled and tired. A heart wrenching pain took over him as he recalled all that he had said to her, her emotionless face arousing in him a fairly familiar fear – the fear of losing her.
That’s it for now, guys. Whoa, that was one roller coaster, wasn’t it? Tell me what you thought about it. Looking forward to that. Until next time, lots of love!