Missing Piece 

Summary: Swara finds a home with unlikely people. They all fit together like missing pieces that were always supposed to come together and fit. 

.....

Sunny is folding paper butterflies. Swara allows the vision to wash over her, how his little face is flushed with focus and how his little fingers fumble over folds and creases. The first butterfly he makes is a little lopsided, but still Kaveri Roy gives him a warm hug and a genuine clap of hands.

"Well done!" she says, gathering the boy to sit on her lap, over his hair she looks at Swara and smiles. "You should take a little break too beta, those books will wait, bhaag kar kaha jaayenge?"

Sunny looks up at her with widened eyes.

"Books can run away?"

The two women laugh simultaneously at his query, but it is Kaveri who answers.

"Of cause they can. Not just books, pencils, pens, tables, chairs all of them can. You know once there was this boy one day everything he owned started to run away...do you know why?" She taps Sunny's nose with a finger.

"Why?" Sunny asks genuinely curious. He couldn't imagine what he would do if his beloved sneakers with owls painted on it and his Micky mug ran away. He would probably run after them.

"Because he refused to have a bath," Kaveri said with a laugh. "He was a lazy, dirty boy who refused to take bath day after day after day. So he became so dirty that even his pillow and bed ran away one morning!"

"Ew," Sunny pinches his nose with two fingers for better effect. "Ew."
"Exactly," Kaveri said approvingly. "Now if you don't want your stuff to run away young man you should allow this old Naani to give you a bath."

"But..." Sunny thought it over. He had been putting it back so his Mama could end her work and give him his favorite bubble bath. That had always been their ritual. But then Kaveri Nani looked a very good substitution too. She was kind, she was fun and she was full of stories and games. It was a pity she did not have her own grandkids, she would have been such a fun grandma to them and Sunny too would have found someone around his age to play with. Also, thought the little boy, he didn't want his things to run away.

So he nods, after giving a questioning look to Swara and having received her approving smile.

"Challio then," Kaveri, picks him up puts him on his feet and places her hands on his shoulders. "This train is leaving to the washroom, all aboard!" She throws a good natured smile at Swara over her shoulder. "Take a break beta. I've kept the water to boil you can pour yourself some tea. Use the Tea Leaves in the yellow tin by the boiler. It helps with weariness at the end of the day."

Sunny pauses as he always does at the back of the room, looking at the smiling girl in the photograph hanging over them.

"She is happy today," he says.

"Isn't she always?" Kaveri asks a little wistfully, little nostalgically. After all Kavita in that picture is always smiling. She liked this little game Sunny has made up. He did not even know who that girl is, still everyday he said something different about her mood. Something that Kaveri could always associate with the girl that she raised. It brought a little peace to her, made her feel a little closer to the child she lost and also endeared her all the more to this strange child.

Sunny shakes his head now.

"No," he says. "Today she is happy because it's going to rain. You can smell the scent of rain getting mixed up with that of boiling tea. And she is happy because you are happy Naani. Aren't you?"

"Indeed I am," Kaveri kisses him soundly on his hair and off they go, making a very noisy train down the hallway.

Swara watches them go and leans back on her chair. There are few knots behind her neck and few on her shoulders. Slowly with tender fingertips she works them out. The kettle whistles, sending jets of steam into a mirror hanging on the wall. A strong fragrance of vanilla wafted out from the oven, where cupcakes were slowly being baked. Somewhere upstairs, a clock ticked lazily and just as Sunny predicted the skies rumbled.

She closed the book and shut the computer finally. The rest of it she would complete the next day, which, she remembered was going to be a Sunday. She had half expected Sanskar would come, as was his routine weekends. But he had not. While Kaveri was still confused why not, Swara felt guilt ridden, she knew - or could make an educated guess as to why Sanskar did not come. She had basically placed the weight of so many deaths on his shoulders that he might never be the same man.

The kettle whistled again and the rain fell at its earnest. Swara stands up then, knowing a tea perhaps would do a world of good to her sore arms. The lights flickered once. Then again and went out.

Sunny screamed before Kaveri's calm voice hushed him. Swara smiled at their exchange before Kaveri called her.

"Beta did you find the candles? They are up front under the counter. The shop might still have few emergency lights on. See if you can find them. This happens every time it rains..."

Her voice carries over as Swara makes her way according to the directions given. The shop front is lit in a ghostly amber light of that emergency lamp. It blinks rather ominously from the counter top. Swara goes there and retrieves the home made candles, with herbs molded into its mixture. They smell just like the tea of the shop, nostalgic, earthly and floral. Swara smiles to herself. She could see the appeal such candles would have on the atmosphere if there were customers.

There is a knock at the glass door, loud enough that it rattles the frame. Oh well -

She sticks her head out and begins,

"Sorry we are - Sanskar?"

Leaving the candles at the counter itself, Swara goes to unbolt the door. He is drenched. Sanskar runs a hand through his wet hair and leaves a puddle at his feet. Looking closely she could see how weary he looked. There were circles under his eyes and he looked pale, overworked. She had caught word of the investigations probing into terrorism funding being initiated into Maheshwari Group but the press narrative had been so tightly controlled by the PR team and Maheshwari legal and she could guess very little of the actual tangles inside. Instead, looking at this man now, she could very well guess what kind of a pickle he might have left behind at the Maheshwari group.

"Don't stand there," She tells him instead. "Andar ajjaiye, Sanskar, what happened to your car?"

"Karab hogaya beech raaste - I'm returning from a site visit," he sighs wipes a hand over his face. "Poocho mat."

He follows her without much protest, carrying a trail of water all the way into the back of the shop where the kettle is still whistling. Sanskar sniffs at it gratefully.

"Please tell me that's coffee," he says, peeling off his dripping wet coat and dropping it in a mindless slump. Swaara watches disapprovingly at the mess he makes of the gleaming floor and presses her lips.

"It's tea. Choice of Kaveri Ma." She walks over to open the yellow tin of tea leaves and sniff. "I'd say it's Chinese and has a dash of camomile and maybe lavender. Aise kya dekh rahe hain aap?"

"You call her Ma?" His voice is thick, and oddly unsettled. Swara keeps down the tin and gives a surreptitious glance at the photo hanging on the wall behind her. Kavita was happy today, she remembered Sunny's words.

"She asked me to," she replies softly. "Yahaan ek aisi apnapan hai, joh humein apni ghar mein kabhi mehesoos nahi hui."

The air Sanskar slowly exhales fills the pause she leaves out. Swara picks up the tin again, allowing him a moment to mask his emotions. Of cause he understands what she meant, maybe only he would. Swara didn't doubt Sanskar felt the same belonging, same calling here. Both of them, in a sense, where birds caged in that glided gold cage called Maheshwari manor and the invisible chains of Maheshwari family. He after the death of his mother and she after the deaths of Ragini and Lakshya. This place had the scent of freedom, of open sky.

"Aap ke liye bhi bana doon?"
Sanskar scrunches his nose.

"Hum phool peete nahi hai," he tells her. "Lavender and camomile really? Florist ho?"

He shakes his hair to get rid of the water just as Swara lights up the candles she brought over from the shop front. The herbs burn giving out a thick aroma of summer afternoon. The light catches him artistically and her eyes are drawn to him. Sanskar Maheshwari with droplets of copper and ruby hanging from his hair, streaks of gold trickling a path along the sculpted column of his throat looks like a mythical hero come alive. Swara gulps. She did not want that thought in her head.

"Do you have a change of cloth here?" She asks him instead.

Sanskar raises an eyebrow at her.

"I have a room, don't I?" He says rather matter of fact -ly. "You two are staying over there. That wardrobe you can't open - I have the key to that."

Swara's mouth falls open forming a little Oh.

"Ji," Sanskar tells her rather bemusedly. "Don't tell me you picked that lock or something Miss Bose."

Swara turns away, hiding her coloring cheeks with help of shadows.

"Toh phir jaaiye," she says. " You are turning the kitchen into a swimming pool. Go and change - and Sanskar, take that puddle of a coat you dropped down as well."

The ease of that banter makes him laugh. Swara had that easy way of working out tangles in any conversation. The warm friendliness that she radiated, like the call of a flame to a moth, made anyone gravitate towards her.

"Okay mommy," he says rather mockingly before disappearing into the hallway with picking up the discarded wet mess of his coat.

He doesn't reappear for the longest of times that Swara finishes brewing tea and goes looking for him with the flowers she was determined to make him drink and a candle balanced on the tray. On second thoughts she had made milk for Sunny as well, as he usually had a cup after his bath.

The shrieking laughter tells her where both Sunnys are. She wonders where Kaveri Ma had disappeared to and thinks that maybe after dealing with Sunny for one long evening she had retired early for the night. Sunny shrieks again as she enters. Sanskar is tickling him, blowing air on his stomach. Sunny waved a towel in his hands, one that maybe he had dried himself with and offered to dry Sanskar's hair with.

"Mama Bachaao!" He screams when he notices Swara.

Swara giggles. She places the tray securely down and folds her hands.

"Kya chal raha hai yahaan?"

Sanskar turns to her, his wet hair sticking in all directions make him look adorable and very much like Sunny. Swara finally realizes why Lakshya had insisted on this nick name. They do look very much alike.

"Ma went to bring an old storybook from the attic. Something about a boy and running away books," he looks confused. "And this gentleman here was afraid of darkness."

"Mama -" Sunny pipes up with his own version. "You should dry bade papa's hair, he will catch a cold. Dekhiye na," he rises on his knees and pulls at wet streaks of Sanskar's hair. "It's all wet."

"Bade papa is a big boy na baby," Swara tells fetching Sanskar's tea cup for him. "Woh kud karlenge, you come here let me dry your hair."

Sanskar sniffs at the cup and scrunches up his entire face.

"Flowers," he says.

"Think of it as a medicine and drink it up," Swara doesn't even rise her eyes from her task at hand as she tells him. Sanskar sips at the cup slowly and her lips tug upwards. "See - it's not that hard."

He takes another gulp and then another just as Kaveri reappears.

"Yeh chamatkaar kab hogaya?" She exclaims as she comes. "Sanskar - drinking floral tea, with a straight face?"

"Don't rub it in my face Ma," Sanskar says moodily. "I'm actually cold. Aur aapki yeh nayi beti jo hai ek besahara insaan ko ek cup coffee nahi peela rahi."

"Oh your antics Sanskar," Swara rolls her eyes before handing him the towel and making her way off the bed. Kaveri's eyes gleamed with good humored laughter. "You won't die if you drink some dried flowers in your tea. Shut up and finish it."

"Swara," he calls after her as she makes a move to remove the tray and leave. "Aap se kuch baat karni hai..."

"Hmm," she says and picks up the tray. "I'll be in the kitchen."

Kaveri catches his eye as she leaves. Sunny is already excitedly checking the illustrations of the book she had brought. Kaveri promises to read him to sleep and then looks at Sanskar.

"Toh mil hi gayi na," she says laughingly. But there is such warm happiness in her words. "Caffeine addiction dur karne wali?"

*

Swara is taking the cupcakes out of the oven by the time Sanskar makes his way to her. The baking pan slips from her hand and she puts her finger in the mouth hissing.

"Ouch, ou!"

"Jhal gayi?"

She jumps and looks at him.

"Haan toda," she says but turns to put the cupcakes on cooling racks next. Sanskar sits at the chair she had vacated a while before and checks over her half done accounts.

"Stick our hand under running water Swara it will ease the burn." He says as he flips through the pages. Swarta nods absentmindedly and finishes with the cupcakes. "Arre -" Sanskar says snatching her wrist. "Kabhi kabhi humari baat bhi suna karo," he turns on the faucet and holds her hand to the running water. "Dardh ho raha hai?"

Their eyes meet and hold, he looks mildly irritated and concern colors his gaze. Swara finds herself caught numb. She shakes her head dumbly in a mute no. "Ab teek hai?"

"Haan."

Sanskar shakes his head at her.

"You have a very diminished sense of self care you know? Daal thi rehethi ho kudh ko katre mein."

"Aur zinda mehesoos karti hoon," Swara replies. She doesn't intend to say it but the words escape her. "This sense of danger make the numbness go away." She pulls her hand away and shakes off the excess water, sprinkling Sanskar with some in the process. "Achcha yeh bataiye, did you find anything about our glass princess?"

"I checked the CCTVs for the car that dropped Sunny off. Can you believe it is registered for some Nirvana branch?"

Swara takes a moment to digest that information.

"It's strange yes. But not very surprising. That woman whoever she was must know she was getting caught in CCTVs. And Nirvana is a hotel, hotels have cars that they lend the customers. It is rather easy to get your hands on one."

"But at the same time it should leave a record of you somewhere -" Sanskar tells her. "I have made inquires on that. Apparently no ladies took any of the hotel vehicles that day. We have a list of seventeen men to go through. One of them is a decoy working for our glass princess."

Swara nods thoughtfully.

"Ek aur baat hai," Sanskar says after a pause. "Mr. Durga Prasad Maheshwari has a request for you."

**

I'm updating from a borrowed devise so, give me some time to do the proper editing. Meanwhile Enjoy the chapter!