Aura.. Guest Entry by Rose :)

I guess all of you have read my 'Aura series'. If not, you may like to take a glimpse at it :)

Well, here is other guest entry done by Rose :)
You can check her out at http://thecarnelianrose.blogspot.com/

To begin with, Rose, I think you've done a great work :) I loved it.. (You know it :p)

Here it goes.. :) Hope you all like it as much as I did!

It's a continuation from after the two of them part ways..

All those sayings ultimately proved to be right. Happiness cannot last forever. Had it been a fallacy of my beliefs – always fearing that the spell would be broken even as I lay in her arms seeking solace?

I don’t think I could ever forget the painful look in her eyes. However, it did not speak of longing...

It spoke of remorse.

Things were often left unsaid between us, even when it came to bidding each other goodbye. And yet, aspersions were cast. I couldn’t bring myself to believe that my love – a woman of will and resolve with an unquestionable strength of character – would quietly give in to following the tradition.

I hated myself for questioning her integrity.

It had been a tumultuous time – days of silent mourning and nights of frightful crying – a time she must have been blissfully unaware of. Much as I couldn’t bring myself to dislike her, I was unrelenting in flogging myself, utterly disappointed as to how I didn’t trust my love for her enough to keep her from leaving.

Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, months into years…I was still unmarried, despite having reached the prime age for it. Make no mistake: I did not lose faith in the institution itself. It was just so that years of watching others suffer the same way, albeit within the confines of matrimony was enough to disillusion anyone.

The wounds had healed…or at least, to my eyes they did. Little did I know that pulling the scab off them was all it would take to make the wounds bleed again.

…I bumped into her on the street, of a city neither of us was associated with. Why was she here, in the first place?

More importantly, why was I here, to begin with?

There was no time to answer unbidden questions – it was but natural that we stepped aside from our busy lives to catch up. A trip down the memory lane was warranted, after all.

…The band on her left ring finger told me all that I needed to know. Yet it served to enclose me further in an infinite circle of anguish. How foolish…I still loved her.

She raised her eyes to look into mine. Always demure and yet defiant; the valour had been replaced with a certain sense of diffidence. What had they done to her?

Her hand trembled as she reached out to hold mine. “I wish I could say I was happy.”

The days of joyous abandon and ecstatic carousing were firmly behind us. The harsh realities of life stared us in the face.

She had a more difficult life that I did. Her marriage was breaking apart.

Looking away, she whispered, “I should have known better.”

“You didn’t trust me. I wasn’t good enough.” I was surprised at how bitter it sounded.

“I can’t even say that you were younger, can I now?” she laughed, equally bitter.

My fears were confirmed. I finally knew for what I had suffered all along. I wasn’t entitled to stay.

She caught my hand as I made to leave. “Don’t. Stay. Please, for my sake.”

I sighed, “What do you want me to do?”

“Forgive me.”

I finally mustered the will to face her. She stood there, still – beautiful, fragile…vulnerable. Her charm and appeal seemed even more ephemeral. Where was the mystical lady who had lured me into seeming eternity?

I caressed her face lightly. Leaning in to kiss her on the cheek, I murmured in her ear, “We cannot turn back time.”

…Fate had dealt me a cruel blow by making me so ruthless. I still remember the weight of each step I took away from the place where I had so callously cast aside such fervent ardour. My first love…

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