#5
Screen names were long forgotten, It was Steffi and Rustom now.
He thoroughly enjoyed his every failed effort to unearth her identity. Steffi's boxed giggles over the phone conversations sparked his love for her. Often that, he narrated the beauty in the tone of her laugh. Every time that he heard her laughing, even the minute details of a gap between every giggle resonated into his ears. His love for her was not about the beauty of the girl in the photos that she showed him but was for everything she was.
That rainy night, when it was late past 11, Steffi quizzed about his love for her. Often it looked so much alienated because there were no one other than them in the sequence of incidents that happened. A virtual world that they build up for themselves. Trees and leaves in them were designed to their will, the animals and birds were chosen ones. Another human interference was never a subject of the story. Rustom, wanted him to be the happiest man in the world and so was him alone other than her, in the virtual world that they created. Waiting for a reply, Steffi reminded him of the unanswered question. Rustom dialed her to ask
"How much do you trust me ?".
"It is just me that I cannot trust", She replied!
The intensity of quiver increased as Rustom was forced to react to this unexpected reply. For the first time in four months, he persistently asked
"Is there anything that I should know ?"
Yes, that I just want to be normal again,
"The reply that made Rustom Clueless"
She continued to explain her addiction to narcotic substance and that she had gone through trying to quit. All these time she was expecting him to leave the conversation midway, not turning up anytime sooner. Love had conquered Rustom and in turn, had blinded the code of morale. All that he believed in and valued was the present and so, patiently he listened to everything that she said. He reiterated after a long pause
"How much do you trust me"
Clueless Steffi stumbled before she murmured
"Much more than I trust Myself".
The first base of their relationship was cemented there.
Steffi had something to confess for a long time now, something that she has been apprehensive about talking to her friends in college as well. The conversations that they had in the past few months clearly hinted Rustom, that Steffi had a story to say. Probably a story of grief and misery.
Surprisingly, the story started with a dream that was haunting her all through the life. A naked boy aged somewhere between three to six standing at the door with folded hands had his shadows extending to her bedside. She first saw that when she was six and that has continued to be with her until now. Neither the boy have grown older or the dream has faded away. Rustom, easily related it to be some hurtful episode of her past that she had a witness or had to be in.
She continued to say about her uncle who repeatedly manhandled her at the age of six leaving her with bruises until he went away one fine morning. No one she had to complain to. Anyone who examined her bruises accused her to be careless about falling and hurting herself. She cried out the pain and as the pain was gone, it got super impressed with her subconscious mind as an animation which remained to reiterate every time that she felt insecure.
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