Rishaan, the good man

The thundering noise of the thousand cameras presently going off in the great hall reverberated off the gaunt white walls of what once was the headquarters of the Indian Diplomatic Party. The somber faces among all present today, dressed stingingly in white, was well constructed and if Diya hadn’t known the true faces of each of the member now maintaining their calculated downcast eyes, she would have never guessed that they had come here because society demanded them of it, uncaring of their now dead leader.

Diya, on the other hand, had not bothered to dress in white. She wore a black top with simple jeans, her hair tied back and oiled, as she masterfully carried a camera. She brought the lens to her eyes but her forefinger levitated an infinitesimal amount above the button; unlike the others here, her presence amongst the crowd was personal and intimate, and the camera that she held but did not shoot was meant not to capture light but to hide her tears, which silently crawled down her full cheeks.

Presently the priest murmured the last sermon, in remembrance of the late Rishaan Yogi. Almost immediately all men rose. Diya wondered how they remembered Rishaan. Walking among the crowd aimlessly, she could hear quite a few things said about him:

“Weak minded – “

“– obviously delusional. I mean, he was a great leader, no doubt about it. But in the end, unfortunate.”

“Ah, now. We are all politicians here, and we all know the pressures of being in the top. Some men can handle it; others can’t.”

“But still, to overdose on sleeping meds like that? Has to be suicide, yes?”

But then they stopped muttering, for they had noticed DIya wading through them. There were many rumors about her and the late and older Rishaan, which she had never responded to. As it is, the crowd, now realizing that Diya had actually come to the funeral, was abuzz with talk. This talk she did not try to listen to, as she walked across the hall as calmly as she could, dragging her long legs towards the door at the far end, amidst murmurs of “whore”,”slut”, and what not.

She opened the door in a hurry and as soon as the door closed behind her, she looked up to stop the stinging sensation now spreading in her eyes. Tears trickled down, unprecedented and untamed. Diya had always been this strong independent woman but somewhere down the line, she had met Rishaan, and everything had changed. She had never loved before, but now that she had, at the age of twenty and eight, and had lost him in such a devastating manner, she thought she deserved her tears.

Diya walked with purpose now, and it was apparent that the purpose was no good. It was of a

sinister nature, almost criminal, and whoever saw her pacing towards the inner rooms stayed well clear of her. She went straight to Rishaan’s study, which she knew would be occupied by one woman alone.

When she opened the door, the only greeting she received by the older woman was a sharp glance and a sigh. Kiara Damarla Yogi, now just Kiara Damarla, was a handsome woman. Everything about her was regal, possessed of such a grave beauty that people found themselves shirking away from her, rather than being awed. There was a difference between a lion in a cage, made to act in a circus, and a lion among the open fields, prancing and ready to pounce. This difference was embodied in the person of Kiara, in front of who women such as Diya looked laughable. And yet, Rishaan had chosen Diya over Kiara, had he not? Yes, it had been an affair and a short one perhaps, but there had been no love between the husband and the wife, and as such Diya had not felt wrong in interfering between them.

Diya, upon seeing Kiara’s face, went in full rage, tears now streaming down her face which she found no reason in hiding anymore. She looked at the older woman, her eyes set.

“Did you kill Rishaan?”

This question was unexpected. Indeed, Diya knew that Kiara did not love her husband, but to accuse her of murdering a party leader without any hard evidence, simply overwhelmed by emotions seemed stupid even to the one who had uttered those words. Yet, she refused to take them back, for a doubt had crept in her mind. Kiara had learned of their affair only recently, Diya knew, and a woman like her could not tolerate being insulted.

“You think you know everything about Rishaan, but I assure you –“, Kiara began.

“Did you kill him?”

“He did not love either of us. He did not – “

“DID YOU KILL HIM?”

Kiara started crying, unexpectedly.

“Yes”

In one fluid motion, Diya brought her gun out from her bag, ready to shoot but she hesitated, for the door opened behind her and a little boy of age ten looked at her with his eyes wide. He ran towards his mother and Kiara, in between her sobs, hugged him close. Diya, horrified with what she had been about to do, ran outside, her tears leaving a trail behind her.

***

It had now become midnight, and Diya poured finely aged whiskey into a wide brim glass, put a few stones of ice and drank it in one go. This would be her sixth glass now, and she felt she had just started. The tears had run dry a long time now, leaving only black mascara tracks behind. All this could not be seen, for her face was hidden amongst shadows the moonlit patterns cast upon her face, streaming through the open window.

She played her favorite memory of Rishaan again. She was a budding journalist writing for the Times. She was to cover a story on IDP’s leader Rishaan Yogi, then going to attend a party in Goa. Quite boldly, the young journalist had simply approached him and asked him if she could follow him around and take notes, and Rishaan, being as amicable as ever, agreed.

She remembered how, in the flight to Goa (where Diya had gotten a seat next to the politician couple courtesy of the influence of Rishaan), as Kiara slept in the seat right next to her, Rishaan talked about many things, the topic inadvertently shifting from politics to his own personal life to his marriage. Diya learned a great deal, and she wanted to learn more of the man who had, almost single handedly, brought a party from nowhere to ruling the state.

In the middle of the flight, Kiara had woken up, causing the other two to stop their conversation quite abruptly. Not noticing the dynamics that had developed between the two in the past hour, the sleep deprived Kiara returned from the washroom and Rishaan shifted his seat, now seating right next to Diya, while Kiara took his seat and promptly slept again. Rishaan spent the remainder of the flight talking with Diya and making her laugh softly, who now felt an ineffable constriction around her chest. In all her years, she never had developed an attraction for anybody. At one point, their hands met, and it was as if her heart could not remind itself to start.

She could feel the palpable tension in the air. Something was about to happen in Goa, something she could not quite explain, something she knew was wrong but felt ever so increasingly right. And looking at the fervor in Rishaan’s eyes, she knew he could feel it too. She knew he wanted her, the same way she wanted him to want her.

A loud knock interrupted her trail of thoughts. She ignored it. She wondered whether what had happened in Goa that fateful day had been right, and then she cursed herself for thinking so. No, she knew Kiara and Rishaan had not loved each other, and therefore, she argued, it had not been wrong. Kiara and Rishaan had been together only in marriage, but separated in love.

Yet she remembered what had occurred in the morning. She remembered the question she had asked, and the reply to it, for Kiara had cried true tears then, and in her eyes Diya had seen her grief and her helplessness. It was not the sight of the gun that had alarmed the older woman to tears, but the reply that she had given. Had Kiara Damarla, the coldest person she knew, truly been in love?

The rapping at her door increased now, and was followed by a statement this time.

“It is me”

Diya considered for a moment, then finally opened the door to let Kiara in.

She walked in smartly and ignored the pungent smell of alcohol coming off the woman standing in front of her. She walked towards the whiskey bottle standing on the table, and motioned towards it.

“May I?”

Diya brought her another glass and they sat down, with Kiara sipping at her drink regally and Diya downing her glass and pouring herself another. For a woman sitting opposite to a person who had attempted murdering her this very morning, Kiara was oddly very composed.

“You loved him, did you not?” Kiara asked, a ghost of a smile upon her face.

Diya did not reply, preferring to down her glass again. Kiara opened her mouth to speak again, but Diya interrupted her.

“How did you kill him?”

Kiara sighed.

“That is precisely why I am here. I suppose you require some closure. I do not think you knew Rishaan as well as you thought you did. He isn’t always the good man he portrays himself to – “

“Rishaan was a fine man, a very good politician who cared for his people!”

Kiara looked at her quizzically, before continuing.

“A good politician, perhaps. A good man even. Not a very good husband. Though I equally share the blame. At one point I gave up on our relationship and so did he…”

***

It was February in the year of 1998 when Kiara and Rishaan married. The circumstances in which they married were not the healthiest one for a relationship. Rishaan had married her simply because her family held quite some political influence, and as such Rishaan did not quite give her the importance a man’s wife deserved. On the other hand, it was public knowledge as to why Rishaan had married Kiara, and that was both insulting for Kiara and docile. Even so, Kiara maintained the role of the goodwife for Rishaan and his political image, and in return Rishaan officially made her his advisor in the party. In that, Kiara found her calling, taking on more and more party responsibilities. In all honesty, the party thrived because of her, but that was unnoticed by everyone, and she settled to take credit only in supporting her husband, who remained the firm face of the party.

A few years went by, until the inevitable happened. Kiara and Rishaan had an argument about the way the party should be run and the stand they should take on the newly amended child rights bill. For the life of her, Kiara knew what Rishaan planned to say to the press would not fly, and she proceeded to say that to him, but Rishaan failed to see her point. When the party took a sound bashing in front of the whole state, a frayed and tired Rishaan returned home to his wife, angered and vehement, full of acid against his loving wife who had warned him of what would happen. He blamed her for causing emotional instability and of harrying him before the press conference, which, in his mind, was what caused the defeat.

Kiara was not one to stay silent. In their bedroom, she folded her hands and had told him that had he done what she asked him to do, this never would have happened. She proceeded on to tell him that it was not him who had made the party, but her, and he was simply a puppet to do her bidding. The sentence was phrased in a more demeaning manner and was not at all taken kindly by Rishaan, who was angered to his limits.

Kiara had never quite seen him in such a state, his eyes bulging and veins popping on his forehead. A part of Rishaan knew that what she had said was true, and that part of him smarted more than any vile word his wife could utter. A strange demon possessed him, the anger of knowing all that he had build was in fact not his, that in the shell of the expensively suited man lay a crippled pitiable being, and what Rishaan did next, to this day, scared Kiara. In one abysmal leap, he bounded the space between them and raised his arm in pure rage, slapping his wife with the back of his hand with a bear-like strength. Kiara’s legs folded away and now on the floor with her eyes downcast and her mouth full of blood, her eyes registered pure and animalistic fear resembling that of a rodent scurrying from a hawk.

As for Rishaan, he had now learned a new method to keep his wife in check. This discovery enthralled him, his mind steadily becoming a darker place and Kiara now felt a strange trepidation; she felt persecuted and harried, as if her own family had lynched her. She felt unsafe in her own home and every night she felt scared to go to the same bed as her husband. The sex that they had now felt forced; Kiara felt her being raped by her own consent.

A year later she gave birth to a beautiful son they named Aryaan. With his birth, she felt safer, and Rishaan changed considerably. He was happier and he truly loved his son, which was apparent in the amount of time he spent with him. He was as good a father as he was a lousy husband, and in that, Kiara found her trust in him increasing. Until a day came when Kiara could not pick Aryaan up from school due to some party work and Rishaan, upon hearing of this, became enraged. She shuddered with every step he took towards her, cringing when his arms rested on her shoulders, fearful for her own life. After that whatever love was left between the two truly ended.

When the Goa incident happened, Kiara came to know about it almost instantly. She did nothing and let him cheat on her repeatedly behind her back. She felt safer with her husband with another woman.

Now we arrive to the day of Rishaan’s death. That night, Rishaan approached his wife and told her honestly about Diya. He wanted to leave Diya, for he had come back to his senses. He wanted nothing to do with her and only wanted Kiara to accept him back. But Kiara was scared, afraid for herself and her son. She was hurt and wounded and when she found that their roles had been reversed and that Rishaan was now the one in her hands, she could not wait to be rid of him. She told him to leave her and Aryaan, going as far as to say that she would make the affair a public matter …

***

“ … and Rishaan lost his temper again. I was afraid, scared for my life. I did not know what to do, and in that moment of complete fear, I lost all fear. All I wanted then was to hurt him as much as I could. I told him that Aryaan was not his son.”

Diya was listening intently and knew what effect this statement would have on Rishaan. He loved Aryaan with his life, and knowing that he was not his – Her eyes grew wider and she could almost picture what must have happened. Kiara continued, her eyes now shining.

“He slapped me again, and kept kicking me as I lay on the ground. He pulled me by my hair and slammed me to the wall where I fell unconscious. After that, he committed suicide. But I can see that I killed him.”

And now she cried.

Diya was in shock. She had never known that Rishaan was a man of such a nature.

“What of Aryaan?” Diya asked.

“I lied. He is Rishaan’s son. I wanted to cause him anguish, the same way he caused me.”

Silence. After a while, once her sobs subsided, Kiara stood up to leave. She apologized to Diya for the pain she had caused her and reached for the door. Diya frowned, but she had to ask her this,

“But why did you tolerate all that? Why didn’t you file for divorce? Why didn’t you tell someone?”

Kiara looked back and smiled brokenly, and left without an answer. Diya now understood. She had been wrong. Despite all that had happened, Kiara loved Rishaan.

***