One month later
“Okay guys, let’s wrap it up.” Giya clapped and made her way towards Rehaan where he was drinking water from a bottle that Gina handed him.
“Hey Rehaan, you promised you would help me shop for the costumes. You didn’t forget it, did you?” She asked him cheekily.
Rehaan gave her a warm smile. “I never forget anything.”
“Good. How about today?”
“Sure, I’ve got no problem.” He replied.
“Aww, poor boy,” Gina smirked and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. “You shouldn’t torture him by taking him to shopping, Giya.”
Giya rolled her eyes at her. “I really don’t mind. I am pretty much used to it anyway.” Rehaan chuckled and lifted her arm from around his shoulder and twirled her playfully. Gina giggled at him.
“Okay, enough Gina. Go find someone else to give trouble. We have got work to do.” Giya narrowed her eyes at her and shook her head while her suppressing her smile when Gina pouted playfully and walked away.
After few hours both Giya and Rehaan’s hands were full of shopping bags. When they reached near her car, her driver quickly got out of the car and took their bags.
“Hey, would you like to come home for dinner? I’ll order some Chinese.” Giya asked him sweetly.
Rehaan knew Giya was going to be alone tonight. So he hesitated but then agreed when Giya forced him.
Later after dinner, both of them were sitting on the porch while enjoying beer. Rehaan was looking at the parrot that Giya kept as a pet in a beautiful cage. Giya couldn’t help but notice the sadness in his eyes.
“Rehaan, I can’t let it go. You know the theory of what happens when we set the caged bird free,” she said to soothe him.
Rehaan sighed loudly. “I know. I just feel sad for it.”
Giya nodded and took a sip of her beer. “You know, it’s strange,” she looked at him with confused eyes. “I just realized that you took me to the exact same shops which Revati advises in her blog.”
Rehaan stilled at her comment. “Umm… Really?” He chuckled nervously, “I didn’t know… My mother drags me to those shops mostly.”
“See, your mother must love Ink and Kohl, too,” Giya smirked. Rehaan nodded and took a sip of his beer. “Will you show me your diary?”
“No.” He answered abruptly.
She nodded solemnly and lifted herself from her seat and sat beside him. She draped her hands around him and shifted closer so that her face was just a few inches from his. “Is it because you don’t love me?”
“How much have you had to drink?” Rehaan tried to lift himself but she didn’t let go.
“Just one, I am not that drunk, Rehaan. So tell me what’s wrong with me?”
“It’s not like that, Giya. Let me go, please.” Rehaan pleaded.
“No. Am I not good enough for you?” Giya was almost in tears now. “Tell me, please. Tell me why…”
“Because I am not what you think I am,” Rehaan shouted loudly. He managed to release her arms from around him and stood up.
Giya looked at his back with wide eyes. “What do you mean?”
Rehaan tried to control his harsh breathing and turned to look at her with tormented eyes. “You are a beautiful woman, Giya. But I am not the man for you. No, let me finish,” He shushed her before she could speak. “I can’t give you what you want because I am a living joke. I am a fucking woman trapped inside a man’s body.”
When she didn’t speak anything after a few minutes, Rehaan let out a laugh without any humor. “Shocked you, didn’t I?”
Giya shook her head and stared at him as if she was looking at him for the first time. “What? I… How? I can’t believe that you are… ”
“Transgender? Yeah, I know. I’ve learned to hide it well.”
Giya shook her head as if trying to clear her head. “How long have you known this?”
“Long enough.” He sighed.
“Oh my God,” she kept a hand on her mouth to stop her sob. “What I just did to you… I came on to you. Oh God! I am so sorry.”
He shook his head at her. “It’s fine. It’s not your fault. I’ve known your feelings for a long time.”
“Then why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“And then do what? Huh? You would have hated me too, Giya.”
“No. I wouldn’t have hated you.” She stood up from her seat. “You should have come out…”
He laughed at her bitterly. “Then I would have been like that bird, who was set free after being caged for a long time and then his own people wouldn’t let him live.”
“You can’t be sure of that. What about your family?”
“My family… I am the black sheep of my family. My father thinks I’ve already brought disgrace to our stupid family. Do you think after knowing this he wouldn’t kick me out?” He shook his head in defeat.
“What about your mother?”
“Giya, my mother slapped me when I told her what I feel.” Giya gasped loudly at his broken voice.
Rehaan looked down at his feet as if he was ashamed of himself. “She told me never to talk about it. So when your own mother who is a psychologist, by the way, can’t help you, then nobody can.”
“That is so not fair.” She let out a sob while Rehaan controlled his own tears. He was taught men don’t cry. But was he allowed to cry if his heart was of a woman?
“Show me your journal.” Giya looked at him with pleading eyes. Rehaan sighed in defeat and nodded. He didn’t know if it was right to finally reveal all of himself like that but he was damn tired of hiding. He took out two journals from his bag and handed it to her.
“There are few more at home. I’ll show them later.” Rehaan added and Giya nodded in understanding. She took a seat on the bean bag nearby and started going through the words she had seen him scribbling down so hard on those pages as if putting every ounce of himself into it. She had seen him getting lost in his own world where nothing but his ink and this journal exists.
She couldn’t help but cry when she read his poems. Tears started pooling into her eyes and then started tumbling down her cheeks of their own accord. Every word was like a dagger to the heart, so painful. As if it was Rehaan had used his own blood instead of ink to write those words. It was as if he was bleeding and all his pain was pouring down in the form of letters in front of her.
When she started reading the second diary, she was shocked. When she finally finished reading it, she looked up at him in a daze.
“You are the person behind Ink and Kohl!” She squealed.
Rehaan chuckled at her gaping mouth and said, “Being Revati was the only way I could be the real me.”
“Oh my God! The famous blogger is my best friend.”
When Rehaan didn’t join her excitement, she gave him a serious look. Understanding dawned on her at that moment. Now she knew why Revati had no profile picture on her blog and neither much information about her. “What do you want to do?”
“I just want to live as me.”
His simple answer broke Giya’s heart. Suddenly an idea popped into her head and a determined look crossed her face. “Do you trust me, Rehaan?”
When he didn’t answer immediately, she spoke again. “You have to come out.’
“Giya, I can’t…”
“You can. Because you are not alone anymore.”
Rehaan took a deep breath and looked at her. “Yes. I trust you.”
Giya gave him a sly look and said, “Good. Because now you would do as I say.”
“You wouldn’t molest me again, would you?” he laughed nervously.
Giya blushed and said, “No, I wouldn’t. Just give me extra tips on outfits.” She winked at him.
***
Two weeks later
Rehaan was nervous to go on the stage. They have just finished their play to which the audience appreciated with a thunderous clap. He was marvelous as Draupadi and all the whistles were proof enough. But now he was to perform alone. He was going to run what Giya called a one-man show. Or in his case, a one-woman show.
“Hey, you can do this.” Giya rubbed his back to ease him.
He simply nodded and started walking to the middle of the stage. Behind him on the screen, many examples of famous people who are transgender were going to be shown. The stage was blackened except for two spotlights. One was on him and the other was on a giant golden cage inside which Gina was going to act on his poem. A dance act of lyrical contemporary style that he and Gina practiced together for this finale of the show. She gave him an encouraging look and he turned to face the audience. A minute of silence then words started pouring out of him.
“There’s one body, there’s one soul,
But they don’t belong together,
It has one mind and a beating heart,
But neither of them cares for another.
The body can’t accept,
What it has gotten for free,
The soul longs for something,
That it is not supposed to be.
Nature plays such games against us,
Someone tell me how is it fair?
The body has clothes to cover it,
But the soul remains bare.
This is the life that one is living,
Two halves of each other that cannot be whole,
This vain, the burn, how can one endure?
When one’s not even allowed to hide the pain behind the kohl.
A body speaks hundreds of lies,
Thousands of secrets, it cannot reveal,
A life of truth and one hidden wall,
That’s what all, the soul wants to unveil.
The world has eyes which are blind,
Around it, a layer of deception is wrapped,
Amidst the great rules of living,
Inside the body, the poor soul feels trapped.
In the battle between truth and lie,
Neither the body nor soul is wrong,
This is the song, sung by hundreds of men,
A cry for the plea that will be chanted for long.”
When the lights blasted the auditorium, Rehaan looked around. He was shocked to see tears in almost everyone’s eyes. His eyes went to a corner where he knew his parents were sitting. Shame and anger filled his father’s eyes whereas his mother was barely controlling her tears.
For the first time, Rehaan didn’t look down. He kept looking at his father until he stood up and left the room. His mother followed behind him and Rehaan let few tears drop. The tears were not of shame but pain that in this new journey of his, his family wouldn’t be there.
As soon as the curtains were closed, Giya and Gina ran towards him and hugged him. “I will always love you.” Giya sobbed at his chest and at that time he realized that he was not alone. He still had his best friends by his side. He felt free for the first time. Freedom and a little bit of love, that’s all he wanted. And now that he had it, he would finally live.
***
Perfect one😇
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