"That Christmas tree needs to be decorated soon." Shree says as she sips the cup of tea. They both settled down on the couch just after they finished having dinner. Shree reheated the lasagna she and Olivera made for supper. Madhav was surprised to find out Shree could cook now, however her knowledge on cooking was only limited to European cuisine.

"Let's do that as the first thing in the morning." Madhav agrees as he looks at the bare tree.

"Actually, I was thinking of going down to ASDA to get a few groceries after I finish my assignments and the laundry." Shree says shaking her head. "I need to get some eggs to bake more cookies. We need to do a few deliveries to customers too. Also, Madhu is running out of diapers and she needs a bib."

"Did you check the evening newspaper for discount coupons?" Madhav asks.

"I have a dozen for dairy products at ASDA, a few for vegetables at Sainsbury. I usually check a few weekly newspapers and a few magazines. I snip a few from the newspapers in the faculty library. No one reads them anyways." Shree shrugs.

"I used to do that when I was in Oxford!" Madhav exclaims in surprise as he finishes his cup of tea. "They don't pay part-time waiters properly in the UK. So, I had to find other ways to buy my essentials. That's when a colleague recommended a website with great discount deals."

"I need to find someone to help me with the year-end financial statements of Happy Cookies."

"I can help you." Madhav says looking at Shree. He leans forward and tells her smilingly. "Are you forgetting I have an Accounting and Finance degree as well as a Masters in Corporate Finance?"

"That would be really helpful." Shree smiles back at him. "So how much do you usually charge?"

"Chellam, you know it's not the money I expect from you." He says only to note her face change to a quizzical look. "No, I'm not talking about sex. I meant you can pay me with a few of the cookies you make, or something else."

"Yeah, I'll make you a gift pack with one of each cookie variety." Shree says feeling awkward, as she gets up and takes her cup to the kitchen.

Madhav gets up and follows her, holding his cup. "Baby, are you-"

"Can you please go wait in the living room? I'll join you in a five more minutes." Shree dismisses him curtly and takes his cup. "I'll wash that."

Shree returns ten minutes later and sits beside him. He sits up, excitedly and smiles, inching towards her, holding her hands in his.

"That was the longest five minutes ever, chellam." He whispers, pushing her hair from her face. He came closer to her until he had closed the gap in between them, with one hand he held face, and kept the other on her waist. She was now sandwiched in between his chest and the couch. He was breathing too close to her, and his breath, his heartbeats, his warmth, made her heart bang against her chest. His eyes shone brightly as he inched closer to her, and his breath tickled her skin.

"I'm not letting you away from my sight even for a millisecond when you move back to India. I love you so much, chellam."

He brought his lips towards hers and closed his eyes passionately. He was about to kiss her red lips, when he felt her turn her face away from his.

She could feel the pulse pounding in her temples and she held her breath, trying to muster courage from within. She sat up straight and cleared her throat.

"Actually, about that, Madhav. I decided to stay somewhere else when Madhu and I return to India." Shree says calmly. "We aren't going to stay with you at the RK mansion nor in our apartment."

"Wait, what?" Madhav asks confused sitting up, narrowing his eyes and his eyebrows creased. His mind was not able to fully absorb what she just said.

"I'm hoping to stay elsewhere or with Amma when I return."

"W-w-why? Don't you want to live with me?" He asks her. "Do you still hate me for what I did to you?"

"Please listen to me Madhav." She softly tells him. "It's just that I love how free I am right now. With you, it's like living as per your rules. 'Wear this', 'Don't wear that', 'Eat this and not this', 'Do this', 'Don't do this' I don't like that, honestly."

"Okay, I'll stop being a control freak." Madhav concludes. "You can do anything you want. ABSOLUTELY anything! But please don't say you don't want to live with me. I love you, so much! I'll do anything to keep you from moving away!"

"Can you promise to never hurt me again?" Shree closes her eyes, breathes and opens them again. "I have been getting hurt ever since we got married. You hurt me and broke my heart repeatedly, again and again, until there's nothing left to be broken. I may look calm and composed, but underneath I am a ruined castle. I wish you could see the damage you have done! The walls have crumbled, the pillars have fallen and the entire foundation is gone!"

She finds it difficult to swallow and she her voice sounded more pained than anything. "I am hurt! Ever since I cut you off I have been trying so hard, putting those broken pieces to make at least a small chamber, so that I can raise Madhu. That's when you walk in and offer a chance for me to get hurt again! I can't crumble now, Madhav."

"Shree, chellam. Love has the power to heal." Madhav says soothingly as he holds her hand. "Living with you taught me that. Love is the greatest healing power I know of. It can heal even the deepest and most painful memories because it brings light and life to the most darkened and ruined part of us. There's nothing love cannot fix."

"There's nothing love cannot break either." Shree adds shaking her head. She furiously tried to blink the tears away. Her little eyes tried fighting away those tears, refusing to break into sobs. She tries to repress her tears, her throat became dry, making it difficult to utter a word.

"Please listen, darling." He pleads. "The important thing is, I love you and I don't want to live without you in my life, anymore. I finally realized that my life has no meaning without you. I'll do anything, I'll mend my ways and be the man you want me to be. I'll do anything you ask of me. As long as we are in love, we need not worry of crumbling again."

He inches closer and holds her face in his hands. "We'll be fine. Most importantly, you will be fine." He hugs her. "Everything will be fine as long as we are in love."

"It's been ten months, Madhav." Shree says sadly, her lip quivering and she was on the verge of breaking into an endless sob. She pulls away from him. "I'm not sure if I have the same amount of love I had for you. I don't know what you deciphered when I let you into my apartment, or let you have a warm shower, or even decided to give you something to eat. It wasn't because of love. It's because of humanity and also because we are family. It wasn't out of love. Madhav, it's going to be difficult for me to love you the same way after all what happened."

"But we shouldn't live apart. You might not need me, but Madhu needs her father. Growing up without a father is very difficult. You would agree. You probably would have wanted him by your side when you passed your 12th, when you graduated, when we got married, when you gave birth to Madhu." He holds her hand. "And of course, a mother can fill the absence of a father. I know you can do that for Madhu, but I don't want that for our daughter. I don't want her to grow up without me. She deserves everything, chellam. She needs her father, just as much as she needs her mother."

Shree had tears pooling in her eyes.

"It's okay if you don't want to continue as husband and wife. But we need to be together, under one roof, in some form or another to raise Madhu." He intertwines his fingers with hers. "Can we be friends instead?"

"Friends?" Shree asks tilting her head.

"Yeah." Madhav shrugs. "Like Rachel Green and Ross Geller from FRIENDS. They had a baby together, and they continued to live together, under the same roof as friends to raise their daughter Emma."

"I haven't watched that." Shree says.

"You haven't? Sivaji and I used to go crazy for that show, especially Jennifer Aniston." Madhav asks amused, chuckling slightly. "Okay, that should be the first thing we should do as friends."

"You should watch Ishqbaaaz and Kuch Rang Pyar Ke Aise Bhi." Shree adds, wiping her tears. "They are great TV shows and I don't know why you refuse to watch them."

"Because both are Indian television serials. Do you know how lame and illogical they can be?"

"These are exceptions, Mr. Ramakrishna." Shree tells smiling. "You'll love them. If you don't then I'll..."

"Grow your hair a tad bit?"

"You don't like my hair?"

"I do. It's nice but I think a bit longer than shoulder length would do. Shyaam is growing his hair and pretty soon he'll have hair that's longer than twice your length." Madhav says and notices Shree laugh.

He looks lovingly at her, his eyes fixedly on her as she laughs.

"So, are we friends or not?" he asks.

"Yes." She says smiling. "From today onwards we are friends."

* * * * *

It was almost 2 AM when they decided to go to bed. "I'm so sorry the guest room is a mess. We packed an awful lot of cookie and didn't bother cleaning up because we weren't expecting guests."

"It's okay, I can sleep in the couch." He says.

"No, you don't need to." Shree says. "It's really cold. Why don't you sleep with me in my room?"

"Are you sure?" He asks.

"Yeah. One hundred percent." She says and walks into her room. She opens the cupboard and pulls out a big blue blanket. "I don't have a blankets that are big enough for two grown adults, it's just these." She says giving it to him and walks towards the nursery bed.

"Oh my mata, you woke up?" Shree softly chuckles as she picks up Madhushree. Madhu coos in Shree's arms as she grabs a fistful of her hair. "Oh no here we are again." Shree sighs defeated as Madhu starts to chew on Shree's hair.

"May I?" Madhav asks and Shree lets him hold the baby.

"Okay, my dearest kannama, amma's hair is not food." He says softly bouncing her on his shoulder. He looks at Madhu's face, her eyes were wide open; a perfect replica of his eyes. She puts her fingers inside her little mouth and starts to chew on them. She giggles as Madhav looks at her. "Well I guess you can chew on your fingers."

"She's hungry." Shree concludes and caresses Madhu's back. She takes her from Madhav and goes to the bed.

"Do you want me to leave or-" He says as Shree sits down and starts to undo the buttons of her cardigan.

"Come sit next to me." Shree says as Madhu clams her mouth on Shree's right breast. "Dr. Knight said the husband should be there during breastfeeding. She thinks this is a great opportunity to for both the parents to develop a connection with the baby."

Madhu makes tiny gulping noises as she swallows each mouthful of milk. It is one of the most precious sounds Shree has ever heard. Shree smiles as she ignores the burning vibrations against her breast. No one told her that it'd hurt, until she first tried it in the hospital. Madhu's little hands hold Shree's breast as she keeps on looking at Shree and Madhav. Madhav looked at Shree for a few seconds and saw how this moment filled her with an inner beauty he could never describe.

"Notice how she's looking at us?" Shree softly asks Madhav and he nods. "It's moments like this that brings the baby closer to the parents."

It was a picture of serenity. Words died away and the long quietness was punctuated the soft lullaby Shree hummed.

Madhav notices Madhu's tiny eyelids starting to droop down from being so intensely satisfied. He presses a kiss to the top of her head.

He caressed her soft curls, his fingers brush against Shree's. Shree blushes as she starts to feel a spark of lightning as he rubs his thumb over her knuckles.

"Motherhood has been a metamorphosis. You changed beautifully." He says and Shree smiles.

Madhav takes Madhu into his arms and gently rubs her back. Shree adjusts her cardigan. "I'll put her to sleep." He says and starts to hum a song he was familiar to.

"Is that one of your mother's songs." Shree says covering herself with her blanket.

"Yes. Aayarpadi Maligayil. She used to sing it to me as a lullaby." He says swaying Madhu slowly rubbing circles on her back. Shree smiles and watches adoringly as Madhav hums their baby to sleep.

To be continued....

Glossary 

Chellam- Darling

Kannama- a girl (mostly baby) with cute eyes.

The part where Shree nurses Madhushree is directly taken from one of my earliest collaborated works "Product of True Love": A Mahabharat fanfiction that I wrote in 2015. It's on this writing platform called AO3 (Archive Of Our Own)

Stay in touch! I'll see you soon with Chapter 39!

Keep the votes and the comments flowing!

This chapter is named The One With The FRIENDS because 

a) it has a reference to the American sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S. 

b)because Shree and Madhav decide to be friends

Are there any fans of this show? If so comment and tells me which was your favourite scene from this amazing sitcom.

Today is also the birthday of two amazing people. 

a) One of them is a leading actor in South India: Ilayathalapathy Vijay

b) Second one is our very own Madhav Ramakrishna who turns 37 years old today chronologically.  

Happy birthday to both of you!

Here's the link to the song Madhav was humming to at the end of the chapter 

By the way any fans of Ishqbaaaz or KRPKAB?