You owe me

The dark doors of heaven were open for him. He had imagined a lot of white light coming out to greet him but there he stood, still wondering how he got there when a voice rose from the dark, “You owe me” and this was always the last part of his dream. He woke up sweating. Even after a year, the voice still haunted him.

Five years back, Nikhil Taneja wasn’t the most eligible bachelor that he is now. He was just an ambitious guy, rapidly rising the steps of success. But unlike now, he wasn’t single. He had a girl who loved him, whom he loved. But as human nature goes, we ignore what we have only to run after what we don’t. But it wasn’t his ambitions that were a problem. The problem was that under no circumstance could Nikita become a priority, even when she needed him the most.

It is said that nothing compares to the ego of a newly successful person. The same ego widened the crack to the breakage point in their relationship.

Though Nikhil didn’t repent his actions at that moment but four years later, at the top of his career, he was ready to give up anything to have Nikita back to him. But she was married for two years now and people said they had a very happy married life.

Today, Nikhil wakes up again from the haunted dream to fight against the people he hated the most. He wants to repay what he thought he owed. Today is the moment of truth and he had an alternate plan if all didn’t go as he wanted.

The phone had rung a year back at his place and as soon as he picked it up, a voice transported him to another world where he always wanted to be. It was Nikita.

The sorrow that the perfect Nikhil wanted to feel didn’t show up when he heard about the death of her husband. Shobhit, her husband was an intelligence officer who was supposedly a martyr in line of work. But Nikita had found proofs collected by her husband that could convict a few politicians in a case of high level corruption involving billions.

“The people who killed your husband won’t mind harming you. I don’t like the idea and I think even Shobhit would not have liked you risking your life for something that he lost his life to.”

“Nikhil, I know you love me and I have loved you since the day we first met but this is something I need to do to get justice for my husband. I know you are the only one I can trust to protect me and I know you would help me as much as you can.”

Though most of the people would have felt elated at hearing the first part but these words instilled shame and guilt in Nikhil for thinking of starting a new relationship at the brink of her husband’s death.

He arranged for her to reveal her husband’s killers on a live TV show the next week. During this time, despite of the guilt he felt, he still cherished every moment he spent with Nikita. He felt complete with her. Every time she smiled, he pledged to do anything to keep her smiling for the rest of her life. He was in love and he knew it was something even more than what he had felt for her in the past. It was something divine.

That dreaded day, they went to a market. Nikita made him try some hats and she was laughing for the first time in these few days. Suddenly she fell into his arms. It took Nikhil a moment to realize that she had been shot. One out of the two was dying but it was the other who let out a cry of agony. Nikhil realized Nikita was trying to say something. “You owe me…..,”  she could not complete. Those were the last words Nikita said and the only words that mattered to Nikhil. That day, people saw the most successful businessman of the year, cry on the footpath with a dead girl in his arms.

Today, Nikhil walks towards court with the file in his hands, on the judgment day.

The proofs were enough for him to prove the politicians guilty but even the false witnesses, setup by Nikhil could prove them to be Nikita’s murderers. But that was all that mattered to Nikhil. So he had an alternate plan ready.

With Nikhil’s fortune, it was not difficult to bribe a few Jail guards to poison her lover’s killers. He arranged for them the most painful death and as soon as he got news of their deaths, he took an overdose of sleeping pills himself.

Before dying, while in sleep, Nikhil heard and saw Nikita dying but only this time she got to complete her last sentence. She said, “You owe me the chance to see you happy. Find happiness for yourself for me to rest in peace,” and that was the moment. Doctors are still amazed how a tear could trickle down a person who is in comma because of overdose of sleeping pills but it didn’t matter to the world as 3 minutes later, everything flat lined. The world lost an evolving business tycoon, or so did the world felt.

The world remember that Nikhil Taneja died on 11^th February 2011 but he died the day he left Nikita, only to be reborn again to die a death that nobody deserves, a death that was painless in the physical sense but agonizing for his soul as he died but he still owed her.