His & Hers . . . Hope.

Hers
She clutched her mobile tightly against her ear. It was ringing. As always, he picked up after a couple of rings. And as had become his habit of late, he didn't say anything. Not even a hello. It always broke her heart a little bit, but she shook the negativity away. 

At least I can hear him breathing... shallow yet strong. 

She closed her eyes and pictured his muscular chest, rising and falling... his strong hands holding the mobile... his handsome face contorted with anger ... his brow furrowed, his lips drooping in a frown. She could picture him running his free hand through his hair. When the silence stretched for five minutes, she said a meek 'hello?'

As expected, he didn't reply. After all hadn’t he categorically said it was over? He had left her and the house they had so lovingly built from scratch for another woman. He had told her that he didn't love her anymore but she was not ready to accept that. She still loved him, with all her heart.
"How are you?"
Silence.

"Please say something. Don’t shut me out,” she begged.

Silence.

A tiny sob escaped her lips, “I will change. I promise I will. I will give you space. I will not snoop. I will do everything you want. Please don't leave me. I love you. I miss you."
Silence.
She didn't realize when her eyes started brimming with tears. More than his absence, this silence pinched her. With every phone call, a little part of his heart broke away.
"Your silence pierces my heart. It's creating a gaping hole in my soul and every day, with every silent phone call that hole is growing bigger... and I am scared. I really am. One day this black hole would swallow me completely and I would cease to exist. I am alive but I am not living."
She choked on her sob.
Silence.
"Hello? Are you there?"
She waited for a response.
"Please. Please talk to me. It’s been a week. I need to hear your voice. Please don’t shut me out completely. Please..."
She pleaded again.

The sobs turned into silent wails. Her shoulders shaking, tears running down her face, she held onto her mobile as a drowning person catches on to straw.

"Hello?!”

His silence was making her angry now. She started crying openly.

“Talk to me damn it! I at least deserve a response! We had been together for three years! three years! Talk to me!"
Her rage got the best of her and she threw the phone at the wall, screaming in frustration. It fell on the floor with a loud clank and shattered completely. The room plunged into a deathly silence. She stared for a moment at the broken phone lying in front of her. With tears streaming down her cheeks, she hugged her knees and lay down in the floor in a fetal position, sobbing softly.
At least he is taking my calls. This counts for something. There is still hope. He will come back. We are not over, not yet.  

His
The phone call ended abruptly with a loud noise. He kept holding the mobile to his ear. The ear piercing scream was still ringing in his mind. Finally he disconnected the mobile with an audible sigh. He stared at the stranger’s phone in his hand. He had found it lying in the bushes by the roadside a week back. There had been an accident on that road in which a man in his early thirties and his companion had passed away. The police overlooked checking the bushes but he, on his way to work, had heard the ringing phone. He picked it up intending to tell the person who was calling, about the accident and then hand over the phone to the police. But as soon as he answered the phone, before he could say anything, the woman on the other line started pleading with him to forgive her. He stood still listening to the crying woman proclaim her love and requesting him to come back. He couldn’t say anything… he stood rooted to the spot.

How could I elevate her pain? How could I tell her that her lover or fiancé or husband had left her forever? How could I extinguish her hope?

Thinking all these thoughts he disconnected the phone in a panic. But he couldn't ignore the love and sadness in her voice. He knew once the police will get hold of the phone, they will call her and tell her that the love of her life was no more. He knew it was wrong but he couldn't make himself do the right thing. And now one week later, he was as confused as before.
'Am I doing the right thing?'
The phone beeped in his hand.
'I love you. I know you will come back. I am alive because of this one hope that we will be what we used to be.'
He read the message again.

If my answering the phone gives her hope, then so be it.

‘Never deprive someone of hope; it might be all that they have. - H. Jackson Brown’