Read Online My Last Love Story by Falguni Kothari - Free Book Online

get any sleep?” I asked in a low tone so that I wouldn’t disturb Zayaan, who’d bent his head in respectful sajdah to Allah for the next segment of prayers. I might have lost my own faith, but it didn’t mean I’d disrespect another’s.
    Nirvaan gave me a lazy smile and flopped his head from left to right in a no. Even with little to no sleep, he didn’t look tired or rumpled. He seemed pleasantly torpor-ish. Zayaan would be, too, I imagined. He’d probably showered already, prepping for sajdah . At the very least, he had splashed his face, hands, and feet with fresh water while I looked like the massacred thing the neighbor’s cat had left on our front porch last week.
    I wasn’t exaggerating. I’d seen myself in the bathroom mirror not five minutes ago. My eyes were glassy and felt as if I’d rubbed sand in them, thanks to crying myself to sleep. My hair was a nest of knots, and my wonderful peach-like complexion was sapped of color because I’d tossed and turned fretfully all night, warring with a phalanx of subliminal dreams.
    If that wasn’t proof that Khodai had it in for me, I don’t know what was.
    Nirvaan wiggled his foot under my hand. He winked when I looked up, as if he could see inside my brain. I scowled because he probably could.
    His smile expanded, and he sat up to rumble in my ear, “Guess what we were up to all night long?”
    “Nothing good, I suppose?” The fine hairs on my body stood to attention when he brushed his lips across my cheek and took a gentle bite of my jaw.
    Nirvaan was such a tease.
    He gave a sinister chuckle. “Depends on who you ask.”
    I leaned back a fraction and stared into the twinkling depths of his eyes. “You did not take the Jet Skis out without me!” I exclaimed, forgetting to whisper. I would’ve heard the commotion of the motors, surely?
    Nirvaan tried to look guilty. The failed antic gave up his game because I knew him well, too. I buffed his shoulder with a fist and rolled my eyes, sure now that they hadn’t ridden anywhere in the dark. Nirvaan rocked back against the lounger, his shoulders shaking with quiet mirth. He, too, was mindful of keeping mum during Zayaan’s prayers.
    “The photos have been scanned and uploaded, Simi.” He took my hand and brought it to his lips, gloating with accomplishment.
    “What? All of them?”
    I was impressed. On Nirvaan’s request, a few months ago, his parents had brought back a suitcase full of old photos from India. They were pictures of Nirvaan mostly, from his birth onward, but maybe a thousand of the three of us were bundled in the lot. I’d been sorting them out in chronological order for the past many weeks and getting damn frustrated by the sheer volume of the task. Plus, critical and unimpressed by my younger tomboy self, I’d threatened to burn the ones with me in them. I’d been joking, but Nirvaan wasn’t taking any chances, so ever since, he’d housed the suitcase in Zayaan’s room. I wasn’t aware he’d been doing something with them.
    “Is that what you’ve been doing on the nights you don’t come to bed?” The borderline accusation in my question gave me pause. I sounded jealous, like a shrew-wife pissed off at her husband for spending more time with his mistress than herself.
    It had been my job to sort out the photos, and I hadn’t done it. It was my job to make my husband happy and comfortable, and I wasn’t managing that either. Couldn’t I do anything right?
    Nirvaan gave me a sharp glance but chose not to answer. He groped for the tablet hidden beneath the blanket and switched it on before handing it to me. The pictures hadn’t only been uploaded but sorted, dated, and organized into albums, too. He’d even made movies from some.
    A funny, fluttery thing awoke inside me when I tapped an album titled, Jab We Met . The title was stolen from a blockbuster Bollywood rom-com. The album, not the movie, was about the summer the three of us had met. I’d fallen asleep thinking