Page 32 of Driven By Desire

“ I want Max.”

That was the battle-cry his family seemed to be rallying around. Fatigue had him dragging his feet as he entered his home. Dropping his laptop bag to the ground, he stared at the supposed patient. Folding her arms mutinously across her chest, Pooja glared back at him. “I want Max.”

So, do I. The pain that stabbed through him at the thought wasn’t new but it hurt like a bitch every single time.

“Chanting that a hundred times a day isn’t going to make her magically appear.” Miserable, exhausted and heartbroken, all Krish wanted was a break from the unrelenting waves of pain.

“Will it make you disappear?” Temper and grief glittered in her eyes as she glowered at the brother she held responsible for all her current pains, physical and otherwise.

“Pooja, don’t.” Sitting down on the edge of her bed, he buried his head in his hands. “Just don’t. Please.”

Remorse stabbed through her at the defeated set of his shoulders. Unwilling to completely forgive him for making her favourite person go away, she muttered, “I miss her.”

“So do I.” The almost inaudible whisper had her creeping closer.

“You do?” Hope welled in her as she waited for him to say something but he didn’t. Looking up, she saw her other two brothers framed in the doorway and watching them. “Then why did you send her away?”

The confused question had Krish exhaling raggedly. “I thought it was the right thing to do.”

“Was it my fault?” The small voice had Krish wordlessly reaching to drag her into his lap. He’d never forget the horror of that night. The bone deep terror that he’d lost his sister the way he’d lost his parents.

In a moment of carelessness. A moment of negligence. A moment of selfishness.

He hadn’t taken the extra moment to check on her that night.

Just like he hadn’t taken the extra moment to fill the fuel tank he’d emptied before his parents left that night.

They’d been driving out of the petrol pump when the truck hit them.

A moment, a thought. That’s all it took and they were gone forever.

His arms closed convulsively around Pooja and for once she hugged him back just as tightly.

“It’s okay. I’m here.” Her childish voice penetrated the suffocating weight of guilt and brought him back to the present.

“We all are.” Chirag’s voice joined hers. Gripping Krish’s shoulder, he squeezed. Adi laid his hand on Chirag’s a second later in a silent show of support.

“We’re here because of you. You’re the linchpin this family turns on.

The choices you’ve picked, the battles you’ve fought, the sacrifices you’ve made and continue to make.

That’s what has allowed us to stay a family.

You’re the reason we are who we are, Bhai.

” Chirag’s even words had Krish fighting to maintain his famed self-control.

Dropping down next to him, Adi said, “Which is why we think it’s time you lived a little.” When his eldest brother turned to look at him, he added, “For yourself. Be selfish. This time do what’s right for you.”

“What’s right for me is to make sure nothing happens to this family. That all of you are safe and happy.”

“Who died and made you God?” Chirag’s incredulous question startled a laugh out of him.

Before he knew it, the three of them were laughing like a bunch of lunatics.

If their laughter had more than a tinge of hysteria to it, they decided to ignore it.

After a confused moment, Pooja asked, “What’s so funny? ”

Nobody could catch their breath long enough to answer. Furious at being left out of the joke, Pooja sniffed and muttered, “Men.” Which only set them off again.

Still chuckling, Krish mused, “Would be nice to be God for a day like in that movie with Jim Carrey. Krish Almighty. Has a nice ring to it.”

“Please.” Adi snorted. “Even if God was considering it, Mom would be axing that plan. I can just see her shaking her head and going ‘No, no. He needs to learn some humility. No more power. Enough.’”

Grinning as that sounded exactly like their mother, Krish chuffed Adi gently on the head before ruffling Pooja’s hair and setting her to one side. Standing, he scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I have to head out to the office. Chirag, what time do you head into work?”

“One.”

“Adi, will you manage till I get home?”

“Sure.

“Use the time to finish packing for college.”

With that he turned towards the door only to come to an abrupt halt when Pooja piped up, “And Max?”

“Yeah, what about Max?” Chirag drawled.

“Yeah, Max.”

Turning at Adi’s addition, Krish asked, “Yeah, Max what?”

Grin faltering in the face of his brother’s formidable scowl, Adi said, “I want her back too.”

‘Why?”

“You smile more when she is around.” When no one said anything for a whole minute, he added helpfully, “It makes life easier on the rest of us.”

Chirag’s muffled laugh had Krish shaking his head in disbelief. “You guys are really annoying.”

“We want Max back and we’re going to keep annoying you until you do.” This came from the runt with the still healing black eye. A black eye that reminded him of exactly why he’d walked away from the most incandescent experience of his life.

“You can’t control everything in life. Accidents happen.” Chirag’s words had him taking a deep breath. “Like I said, you’re not God.”

A tiny kernel of hope he hadn’t completely managed to squash unfurled itself and sent out a testing shoot. “I screwed up pretty badly.”

“That’s true.”

“She probably won’t forgive me.”

“Also true.”

Ignoring the two heads that were swiveling between them like they were at a tennis match, Krish glared at Chirag. “Are you helping me or screwing with me?”

“Both.” Grinning unrepentantly, Chirag continued, “The first step is accepting that you have a problem.”

“And this problem would be?”

“You’re a painfully serious, control freak who managed to screw up the best thing that ever happened to you.”

“Thanks. I love you too.” The dry response had Pooja giggling. “What now?”

“Now we help you get the love of all of our lives back.”

---***---

One whole month. One month of unremitting, ravaging, soul sucking pain.

So that’s what it felt like when your heart splintered into a million pieces.

It was a lesson she hadn’t really needed to learn.

The money had come in to her account within the promised week.

The man was as good as his word. Of course, now he’d paid her for work she hadn’t done so she was going to have to give the money back.

Ask for his account details and give it back.

Not a conversation she was looking forward to.

Any conversation that involved him was not one she wanted to be a part of.

How much longer before it stopped hurting quite this much?

Wasn’t a month more than enough? Then why did it hurt as much today as it had on that day at the hospital?

“Deep thoughts.” Her father’s voice broke through her gloomy introspection and had her looking up from her plate of pancakes. “Care to share?”

“Nothing I want to talk about.” Pushing her still full plate back, she pushed back from the table.

Her father took in the old, faded overalls, scuffed sneakers and hair ruthlessly pulled back in a tight braid.

She was wearing comfort clothes. And if that didn’t clinch the deal, there were the dark circles, pale cheeks and pinched face to go with it.

Not to mention the hurt and grief that never quite stopped shadowing her eyes.

It was enough to drive even the most peace loving father to violence.

“I visited Pooja yesterday.” He’d been by the hospital and Mehra residence often, while Krish was away at work, to visit the little girl who’d stolen his heart from the first time she’d sat in his kitchen and licked his soup bowl clean.

Heart wrenching with a vicious tug of pain, Max asked, “How is she?”

“Almost completely recovered.” When his daughter didn’t ask any further questions, he added gently, “She misses you, Max.”

“I miss her too.”

She missed them all. Tears she’d blocked for days now filled and overflowed.

When her father came over to take her in his arms, she turned into them willingly.

Burying her face against the shoulder that had seen her through every crisis in life, she wept her heart out.

Harsh, raw sobs racked her thin frame and had her father tightening his arms around her.

Soaking his kurta, she clung to him in a way she hadn’t for years.

When the storm finally calmed and slowed, she stayed in his gentle embrace as he rocked her like he had as a child.

Silence shrouded them in their own little cocoon until the sound of the garage employees trickling in to start work roused her.

Stepping back, Max fisted her hands and scrubbed at her eyes like a child. The hard knot of grief dissolved a little making it easier to breathe. “I should get to work.”

Knowing that work was her best bet at keeping her mind occupied and off a certain young man, Brian nodded.

“I’ll be at the garage if you need me.” Leaving her plate of uneaten pancakes in the fridge, she left with a last goodbye.

Walking over to the garage, she exchanged greetings with the handful of early arrivals.

Walking over to the car she was working on, Max propped up the bonnet.

Squatting, she placed her tool box on the ground and opened it.

Rifling through it till she found the wrench she was looking for, she straightened and rammed right into someone’s granite jaw.

Seeing stars, Max brought her hand to her stinging scalp even as a male voice growled, ‘Bloody Hell.’ Come to think of it that was a very familiar male voice.

Blinking to clear her vision, Max looked up to see Krish clutching his chin.

Heart clenching with a pain that beat anything her head was feeling, she fought to keep her breath even.