Road to revenge

Next, when she stood before the Arya residence, she had the entire Arya family, including the ones who didn’t live there, memorised. Reema Arya was an attractive lady with good number of grey hairs and smile wrinkles around her lips. She almost always wore a saree, at least outside the house and was too careful to look at strangers. The homemaker wife who left every day at 11:00 a.m. for grocery shopping from farmer’s market at the other end of the city. It seems she doesn’t trust any of the twenty-five hired help for fresh food that could only be identified with her sharp dark eyes. Only a driver accompanied her but Aashia didn’t want to eliminate the possibility of a fire arm just the way she didn’t want to eliminate the idea of her being involved in everything her husband had his dirty hands in. Not that it mattered. She wasn’t there to hurt his wife.

Khatri market, the beloved market place of Reema Arya was most crowded between 11:00 a.m. to 04:00 p.m. and that’s when Reema preferred to make her arrival at two holding a blue umbrella over her head and a man in driver’s uniform holding empty basket in another hand. A woman of her order among common folks walking with her shoulder stern and eyes dulled as if joy of life has been depleted off her a long time ago. Her eyes not looking at anyone straight but wandering cautiously at the pile of vegetables and fruits as if no one was worthy of her attention or she wasn’t brave enough to look them in the eyes. Her steps were slow and limp implying age related knees issues.

He also had two sons and a daughter. The youngest was the son who was also an outcast. He left the house as soon as he finished his degree and now has a job in some Australian bank. He only visits once every year a few days after Diwali, meets his mother solo in some restaurant away from the house and leaves. This major plot was luckily broken by the couple who run food stall nearby the house. Apparently, most of the house help ate there quite often and people love a little gossip. Aashia wanted to know what shit went down in their family to have this tier of division but it was none of her concern and not something she wanted to distract herself with. Unless her primary plan fails, this information was useless. Oldest son was on the path of his father, the young politician. His identity was nothing but a puppy reflection of his Harshit Arya. It was pathetic to watch him even from the distance that Aashia did. On the higher note, he was getting married.

Other than that, he went to farmer’s market every few weeks inconsistently to talk to one particular vendor. Always the same one with watermelons. She was so far unable to get in on the secrets they exchanged as the conversations were often under the breaths with head far down into their neck. The vendor was smart too or just smarter than her. He didn’t not budge when she tried to get his to say just one new statement about Mahiraj other than how good of a politician and human he was. Apparently, his parents were ill and he was helping with the financial needs which Aashia couldn’t believe. A man so who was no more but a puppet of his murderer and what not father can’t sympathise with a common man. She tried following the vendor but just like most, he lived in a small ghetto and she didn’t find anything more than that he lived with a wife and two sons.

Daughter, Anaya was the most confusing character of the entire household. She did not live with them but she visited often, she wasn’t into politics but she was close to her father and mother but she was distant from both her brothers. She loved travelling though. Last foreign trip was to Italy just a month ago and Aashia learned this by not so secretly following her from the flat she shared with two of her friends to their college. She sat five meters away from them in the café and walked behind them in malls. If anything, her own life has taught her, adults are no smarter than kids, in fact they are worse. No one looked at her twice as she followed their group of often seven or eight every day for a week wearing different wig and makeup to hide majority of her real look every time. She wasn’t surprised. It was always like that for her, always the invisible one even if she was the part of the group. She guessed it was her average height and size twelve benefit to always be the nonthreatening live statue of the room, something she loathed about herself for so long, now it was time to thank it. There was still a lot to learn about their family but a little more than a month of practical research gave her enough about where to start and solidify the mask of gone grief in front of Simi, Abhi and entire neighbourhood. Mr. Raj was unconvinced. He insisted she go for grief counselling but that’s not what she needed. She did not want to make peace with her sister’s death, she needed to avenge it. But despite her determination to do so, it was almost impossible to get inside their home. She didn’t expect it to be easy but it annoyed her.

“I got hold of Milan today.” Simi placed the dirty dishes in the sink and wiped off her hands before approaching the table again. Abhinav’s eyes were unflinchingly focused of her meanwhile Aashia continued scraping her plate. “I told him about Basha. Not everything. He can’t be back before next week even if he tries the hardest so that may give him time to calm down a bit. I don’t know what to do to help him but I guess I owed it to him to not delay anymore.”

“You did right thing. He deserved to know as soon as possible.” Abhinav assured. “Did he not insist to know how it happened?”

“I told him I couldn’t say anything on phone. Poor guy. He was so excited to talk to her. He’s been trying her phone for days. He said he tried you too Aashia.” This finally caught her attention.

"Yeah? Right. I have been around my mobile for a while. I don’t carry it to work.”

“Why?”

“I am just being in the moment, you know. Thanks for dinner by the way. It was delicious.”

“Abhi did all of it.” Simi smiled adoringly at Abhinav who reciprocated with a slight nudge to her side. Aashia remembered all these gestures of love between Basha and Milan and how she never understood what sort of pleasantries it provided to the companies involved but, she liked the ideas that Basha loved it. She loved when Milan rubbed her scalp when they all had a movie night. She loved it when he would put extra fries in her plate despite the protest. She loved burger and fries and, Milan loved her and they loved each other. Now none of it existed anymore because Basha was dead and her murderer was still alive, preparing for his son’s marriage ceremony. How can he have the pleasure to fulfil his desires of lavish wedding for his son when he killed Basha and all her dreams.

To none of their surprise, Milan landed in India and at Aashia’s home a week later, grief ridden, enraged and demanding answers. Tears didn’t stop rolling down his face as long as the story continued. Only then, they were replaced by confusion, as if he was asking, ‘Seriously! You let that happen to you sister?’

“That’s it? It’s over just like that?”

“There is nothing any of us can do now.” Aashia tried to assure, to which he disgustingly scoffed. “He is too powerful and we better stay away from them.”

“This has to be a joke. You can’t be real here. You sister was killed, Aashia and you don’t care.” It took every beat of her heart to not tell him she has not given up on her sister. That, she will get Basha what she deserved and that justice will be covered in the blood of all who took her away from them. But it was time to be calm. She couldn’t drag Milan into it. He was a travel journalist who preferred to stay out of any political sides. Unlucky for him, he fell in love with a woman who couldn’t stay away from it.

“I wish I could do something but Simi did what was best for rest of us and I think we should leave it at that. Try and get back to our lives.” Milan was rendered speechless by this response. He stayed for no longer than a few seconds which was only for the reason he was too stubbed to walk out. Aashia felt bad for him but there were more important tasks she needed to be concerned for. She considered telling him the truth once it was all over. Is that not what he would want too?

Within next week, she started to get restless about how slow it was going. She has prepared herself for everything that might come and only looking for a way inside the house. Mahiraj’s marriage was approaching and there was crowd of guests and performers going in and out of the house but everything was monitored closely by the security. She has taken the glimpse of it from outside but it wasn’t enough. She was desperate for just one opening that would let her be the part of inside crowd. Outside of it, all was set. Her friends were convinced she was past the grief and was peaceful in her life. Luckily, they saw what she showed them. She did not hear from Milan after he stormed off a week ago but she did run into him once at the gate of society. She assumed he was there to meet Simran or Mr. Raj. They had good deal of commonality of interests they shared and Simi was the nicest person ever. Of course, she couldn’t have anyone be angry at her and Milan must have seen her desperation to protect the people in her life after her best friend was murdered in front of her. Aashia couldn’t get around the idea how she took care of her after such a traumatic incident but she had seen Basha deal with their parents’ death the same way. Cooking meals for her, drowning into studies and work. Always moving and not a second of rest until end of the day body and brain gives up. Simi was not happy, it was obvious, but it seemed she felt lucky. She was alive, she somehow stopped them from killing Aashia, her father was oblivious and she had a boyfriend now. Other than a dead friend and lifetime of guilt, it was a perfect life.

A new sim card and an old class keypad mobile phone was ready with only and only five numbers saved, Simran, Milan, Harsh, Abhinav which was highly unlikely to be used and for some reason, Basha. Summers are widely hated especially in north-western region and fairly enough. Extreme heat that you can basically fry omelette on car bonnet, water scarcity and looming fear of where the next natural disaster will hit. Basha always argued with whoever was willing to, that most natural disasters were human induced and Aaisha, although agreed to every level of it, never really put herself in the middle of these conversations. She liked to stay away from energy draining human who believed in their politicians way too much. Now ignorance was no longer an option. Each day passing made her feel like she was failing Basha. She was tired of waiting for a way other than just following them from a far. A way into their home, office, wherever, just into their life. She wondered if it was time to go ahead and introduce herself to him.