Author's Note: An underlying theme in this tale is reluctance, but it doesn't fall under the non-consent theme. Thus I'm posting it in the interracial category. Still if you don't approve or adore sexual reluctance, please avoid reading it.
The story is a pure work of fiction, all characters and events in this tale are fictitious. Although, external stimuli also influence human imagination and motives. In my case, someone has always been a muse to my imagination. So, the story is again dedicated to her... heart unfold before whom, like a flower
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Mostly beauty changes with time and weather. Sometimes — beauty carries her own weather with her. She tranquilized the evening, as Sneha walks into the hotel lobby. The dull golden of the setting sun submerged on the dusk of her cheeks with the silver of clouds. She blushed looking at him—and everything exploded crimson.
Pawan rushed holding her in his eyes, Sneha was in a stylish outfit of loose top, only expressing the overwhelming curves and skin-tight pants at her narrow waist—groin, upper thighs loosening into pleated pants, embodied with frills. A loose multicolor scarf was encircling her head, shoulders and breasts. The scarf was never a part of her regular dress, but she preferred it today, to see her ex-boyfriend, Pawan. It was just a casual lunch date, yet Sneha ensured that her dressing didn't convey any expectations, all she wanted was to see him, for once- after long years.
His heart skipped a beat and another as she approached him. Despite that modesty in her dressing, Sneha had turned out to be a beautiful princess of the Mysore dynasty, augmented with her dark eyes and fairly dusky skin. Pawan, recollected with uncertainty whether she is looking good now or before with her conservative sarees, where only the tightness of wrapping would squeeze her curves, her lovely figure with full bosom and shapely hourglass frame.
Her scent filled his head, triggering memories. The entire decade flashed in front of his eyes—from the first meeting of their eyes to their rueful parting. It was a more affectionate friendship, then a romantic love. When Pawan first proposed to her, she neither accepted - nor rejected, but she hung out with him. It was more out of her sense of insecurity in the University campus where a goon union leader was up for her panty. His relation with Sneha was yet far from a platonic attachment. Their bond was just calm, friendly, and foolish enough, more emotional than carnal. He always wanted to marry her—and perhaps her too. Somehow Pawan always had this feeling of not being her instant choice.
"Hello Sneha...!" Pawan waved his fingers in front of her eyes. "I'm here." His lingering gaze and twinkle of adoration in his eyes were enough admiration of her charms.
Standing against him — Sneha was also gapping into the vacuum. The past seemed as a candle at a great distance: too close to let her quit, too far to comfort her. How sad, and bad yet mad it was - but then, how it was sweet. She shivered—his voice unfamiliar to her as if it was coming from an acquaintance of many years.
"Hello Pawan..." Sneha giggles. "Good to see you."
They sit, surrounded by glossy tables in the luxury dining hall of Marriott. Her hands started shaking. Pawan noticed. "It's just lunch." He smiled, assuredly.
Sneha nodded, trying to dab her glistening forehead with the back of her finger. She let herself really look at him for the first time. Time- cruel time had taken anything, a lot of his charms and a handful of his hairs—leaving with more fats. He still looked handsome.
Pawan reaches across the table for her hands. He smiles, and Sneha sees the boy she once was to marry — in the man across from her. She shakes head and sits on her hands in hopes they'll stop shaking.
"So glad to see you, Pawan," Sneha broke the uncomfortable silence between them. "It's been 10 years since we last saw each other?"
"Eleven," Pawan smirked.
"Any good in adding an extra year of agony?" probed, Sneha, looking away.
"Let's talk about pleasant things," said Pawan. "How is marriage?
"Almond," Sneha sighed, "a bitter almond."
"Do you love him?" Pawan leveled her with a frank gaze and waited for her to speak. When she didn't, he asked, "Do he love you?
"As much as you love your wife," Sneha giggled, leaving his hand.
"But, we were really in love." Pawan also dodged her question. But, somehow, his question sounded like a newsflash.
"We're young, Pawan..." Sneha smirked, "Probably we didn't know what love is."
"And yet, we were in love!" Pawan gleamed.
Sneha shrugged. "You were my best friend Pawan," said Sneha in a husky voice, her eyes heavy-lidded with affection. "You're the only friend I've waited most in my life to meet again."
"Oh, so what about all of those kisses and sex?" Pawan tried to gleam, but the sparks in his eyes faded into moisture.
"We only kissed once, Pawan," Sneha corrected him with a little blush.
"Do you still remember our kiss?" he probed, gazing into the air, like he was re-playing that kiss. "Was it your first kiss?"
"How can I ever forget it, Pawan?" Sneha smiled feebly. "That was when dad caught us, and everything changed."
"Was it your first?"
Sneha blushed—then flushed, as if something bitter had soured her memories.
"I thought it was your first." Pawan's voice trembled; as if something had died inside him. He rested his forehead on the table for a moment.
"Are you crying, Pawan?" Sneha exclaimed.
"No..." Pawan rubbed his eyes. "It's just really in this. This biryani is really spicy," he gestured to the untouched food between them.
They both laugh, which suddenly made her cry, too.
"Why are you crying?" he asked. "Do you miss me as much as I miss you?"
"I miss my youth, Pawan!" Sneha mumbled. "I'm crying because it is always my hope that I've romanticized the past. I'm crying because I'm reminded of the pain I feel—in losing my husband, despite living with him."
"I thought something better would come along," said Pawan, his voice sounding like a sob.
All at once, she had no idea what she actually expected from this encounter. She had no plan for what she'd do or say after she'd found Pawan; something like, Hi, I keep missing you and then they'd have a laugh at their awkwardness, and it would break the ice, and... Then what?
"Why are we here, Pawan?" Sneha probed, and with a shrug. "We're not here to make a scene on what we couldn't be."
"So what you were expecting?" Pawan asked, whipping his chubby cheeks.
"I just wanted to see you Pawan..." Sneha said, staring at him, as if she is absorbing his looks, to never see them again. He had become an emotional masochist, and for so long, she got hurt by association. "I've seen — and I must go now."
"Stay," Pawan pleaded, and reached across the table for her hand. "I want to kiss you one last time."
Her hands have stopped shaking now. Sneha finally knows what to do with them. "Never to see again?" She asked in a low but shrill voice, gathering her pochette.
"Deal." Pawan still agreed, readily. "But please give me a parting kiss."
Sneha didn't want to go to his room—but somehow she was convinced that Pawan was just too harmless. She couldn't see a MAN in him anymore—who could hurt her or harm her—or even intimidate her. As if there wasn't any hope left in him—but she still didn't want to hurt him, taking a mental note of never meeting with him, she moved to his room.
True to expectation, Pawan wasn't very demanding, he showed her his family album, gifted her an expensive watch and perfume and then his eyes and hands held her as fast as if he'd cradled her face with his hands.
"You still love me..." Pawan cajoled himself, fluttering eyelashes. "Don't you?"
"I better go now, Pawan." Sneha said, with a dejected face, and nuzzled him. "We're not her to dwell on these things."
Pawan quickly wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her closer. His lips found her closed lips. Her belly clenched, and a warm glow settled between her legs. The smell of his perfume was soothing, but there wasn't a manly scent about him. Pawan just smelled like Ravi. Sneha pushed him harder away from her.
"First you keep your wife happy." Sneha whispered, without realizing it may embarrass him.
"I'm not a stereotypical bull, frankly..." Pawan pouted, and began kissing her neck, her chin, her cheeks, and then he nuzzled his lips with her—with baby softness. "But, she is also modest."
"Oh-fu..." Sneha rasped. It wasn't a sound of moaning, but it was a frustrated gesture. She had actually discovered in a matter of few minutes — what she couldn't in a decade with Ravi. Now it was clear what has bothered her most with her hubby—it was this sensual cheesiness.
"Please, Sneha, I want to see what I've lost. Just for once." Pawan murmured against her neck. "I don't want to die without knowing how beautiful you're."
"Hey, buddy," Sneha probed, narrowing her eyes. "What's going on with you?"
But somehow his emotional card had worked, as she gave in to his lips again. Pawan kissed her all over — his lips baby-soft caressed her eyes, her cheeks, her chin, and when his lips pressed on her closed lips.
