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Thanks for Meera and Ravz for proofreading and Ravz for suggesting the title!😳 Enjoy!
Chapter 1
It was a fine Monday morning in Ludhiana city, Punjab India. The birds were humming loudly and at their usual morning hours. The people were busy being stuck in the tracffic or bombarding fly overs to reach their usual destination -work. But one house stayed the same. The Juneja Mansion. Big, white bricks, the front metal gate to die for. The tall pillars that guarded the mansion. The big wooden enterance gate to welcome you, once you were inside the metal gate. The long way from the gate to the door, filled with flowers. Roses. Lillies. It was a dream house, and in that dream house, lived 8 people. Mr. Devraaj Singh Juneja, with his wife Mrs. Sukhdeep Juneja and thier kids, Mr. Lalit Juneja and his wife Mrs. Gayatri Juneja, and then thier kids, Mr. Prem Juneja and his wife Mrs. Heer Juneja and the youngest and newly weds Mr. Preet Juneja and his wife, Mrs. Meher Juneja. Despite this being a big family that anyone would ever dream of, only one thing remained. Their heirs. Prem, Heer and Preet, Meher's children.
"Heer didi! Abhi yahaan ayeye!" Meher yelled at the top of her lungs. Heer came quickly running to Meher to see her standing thier with her pregnancy test tool and a feeling of happiness, yet scariness shown over Heer's face. Happy that this house will get it's first heir from the son's and sad, that if this dream wasn't a reality, then everyone would be disheartend. Heer quickly ran, worriedly, and placed her hands around Meher's shoulders.
"Kya hua Meher?" she asks, not bothering to glance at the tool. If it was a sign of happiness, she wanted to hear it herself and if it was an indication of sadness, like her 1st pregnancy was, then she didn't want it.
Meher smiled and cupped Heer's face. "Don't worry di! It is good news!" Meher says, beeming her eyes, and then showcasing her eyes to stare at the ground. Blushing.
"Oh my god Meher! You don't know how happy I am for you!" Heer says. Smiling and unable to control her happiness for her sister, and her baby sister was finally going to become a mom and take on all responsibilities! Heer had so much to teach Meher. She had to tell her what to eat, what to drink, what time to wake up! Everything! After all, Heer was trained at it...A shadow of sadness, hatred and anger spread over Heer's face. Sadness, remembering her first child that had turned out to be dead after giving birth. A dead body. Her baby didn't even get space to breath in this world, before it was tagged dead. Gone. She missed her. She missed Prem's daughter. She missed her daughter. Anger on herself that she had not been able to do anything to save that little baby of hers. And Hate. She hated her life. She hated being taunted by everyone that she was not able to provide the Juneja's with a waaris. A waaris. But didn't anyone care about her? She had seen her baby go away! Her stomatch come back to the same old size as it was before. As it is now. She was the one who felt the changes occur. Hmph! Everyone was soo sure that they would get to see that little smiling eyes. Those tiny hands, those tiny feet, even her. But nothing like that happened. Everything stopped as it was and everything changed. Despite the Juneja's trying to hide the fact of that one single accident, Heer knew that they missed Prem's baby and somewhere, they thought Heer was responsible. Hate it.
Meher let go off Heer's face and gave her a tight hug. "Didi! I am sorry!" Meher started to say, tears rolling down her eyes. I could just feel it. Cursing herself for having one before me. I hugged her tightly and closed my eyes. Seeping in my pain. Gently, I pulled Meher away from me, and recited a poem, that I had written a few years ago. One of my favourite.
"Sorrow,
It is sad,
It makes me mad,
seeing you cry and
making big puddles of
tears slide down
your eye"
-(c)*Shifali*
It is sad,
It makes me mad,
seeing you cry and
making big puddles of
tears slide down
your eye"
-(c)*Shifali*
"Meher, do you know what this poem means?"
Meher smiles. "Yes. It means that you would not want me to start crying."
Heer nods her head and gives Meher a big bear hug. "Now chale? We gotta give this news to the family. I am sure everyone will be mega-proud and love you to bits!" Heer says, trying to boost Meher's confidence. She quickly turns around and gets a grip on her wrist and starts to drag Meher out of the washroom, when Meher stops in her steps.
"Ek minute didi. Before we go and talk to the family about my pregnancy, I want to talk to Jiju." Meher asks polietly but a message of some hidden mission inside.
Heer freezes in her steps and turns to look Meher straight in the eyes. "Why?"
"Because didi, I know what happens between you and Jiju every single day. It's as if you two are being forced to live under one roof. And everything started with the pregnancy. Jiju was never happy with the pregnancy. Didi!" Meher clutches onto the sides of my arms, trying to explain to me, why she wants to talk to Prem. "Come to reality didi. Prem jiju and you never had anything going on. He doesn't even love you. He loves Sanjana. Whatever happened, that resulted in your pregnancy was just a mistake. Prem jiju was drunk! He never wanted that child. He never wanted this marriage. He doesn't even want you! Then why? Why are you living such a life? Hearing everyone's taunts, their comments. You don't deserve him di! You really don't! And tell me di, even if he were to stop loving Sanjana, would he be able to love you? And by God's grace you have a child tomorrow, will he be able to love that child? He married you because he was forced to, not because he wanted to! And there is a heck of a lot differnce between those 2 words."
My heart went all out to Meher. She was trying her best to see me happy, but didn't she know that I was the one who had chosen this life?
"Meher, I know that Prem doesn't love me, but what matters most is that I love him. Maanti hoon that whatever he did last year, was his 'drunken act' and he was not in his senses when we committed each others to ourselves, but believe me Meher, in that one night, I lived my whole life. I love Prem. I know he doesn't love me, lekin zaroori nahin hai ki har rishte mein pyaar ho, kyunki kuch rishte pyaar se kahin bade hote hai. Like Prem and mine. We don't love each other, well, atleast he doesn't, but there are so many things that we understand without either of us saying anything. I know he loves Sanjana. He had told me so before we married each other. He told me everything. He even told me that he won't be able to love myself, and that is why I married him. He is a kind of guy who would sacrifice himself for his family, and his friends, aur uske saamne main kuch bhi nahin hoon. He gave up his love, to keep his family happy aur agar main uss din shaadi todh deti, then I would have had the guilt of not being able to help such a thoughtful and wonderful person. Meher, mine and Prem's rishta is much more then you can imagine. Despite being married, I don't question him where he was, because I don't have to. He tells me even before I ask, or even if I don't plan to ask, he tells me. He is loyal, so why shouldn't I be loyal to him?"
Heer finally finishs off her mini speech to see Meher staring at her, in pure admiration. Heer smiles, and give Meher a lil hand peck on her cheek.
"Didi, aap itni acchi kaise ho?" she asks, blankly.
Heer giggle and ignores to answer that question, leading her the way towards the main living room, where everyone, Dadu, Dadi, Ma, Bauji, Preet, and Prem was seated. They go and stand in the middle of the circle, and giving each other a hopeful smile. Preet and Prem look at each other blankly.
"Kya hua Meher?" Preet asks.
"Are you alright Heer?" Prem asks. Heer shakes her head.
"Well, it's not me, but Meher. Ma, aapne woh sweater boona kya? Nanhe se mehmaan ke liye?" Heer says, with a bright shine in her eyes.
"Haan...lekin..Meher? KYA? Tumhare matlab hai?? Meher...Chota Preet?"
Gayatri says, unable to control her happiness. She quickly gets up and hugs Meher, and then hugs Preet, who seemed to be blushing more then Meher. After a while, Bauji did the same thing with Preet and Meher and so did Dadi and Dadu. Congratulating Preet and Meher, the would-to-be-parents. Gaytri then quickly got a hold of Meher and Preet and made them sit on the sofa together while everyone shadowed around them. Lalit got busy calling random numbers, to share his joy of finally getting another chance to become a dadu, while Gaytri was busy giving pregnancy tips.
It was such a joyous moment, something like Heer had had. A little drop of tear began to slide down Heer's eye, with eyes turning a little watery, and Heer begins to rub them off, when she sees Prem staring at her. He knew how Heer felt. Being the odd one out. He then quietly places his hand on her shoulder, and gives Heer his billion dollar smile. A sweet, hopeful smile. She smiles back at him.
"Heer, look..." he tries to reason while Heer cuts him off. Telling him to speak no further.
"Don't Prem. It is not your fault. Maybe, this was just an indication that I was not ready yet." Heer bites her lip, and runs to her room, leaving Prem confused, and sad. He smiles when Preet smiles looking for him and sees Meher's sad, eyes, looking for her sister, which suddenly turned out to be a painful smile, after she stared at Prem.
Meher knows. Prem wonders. She knows exactly what happened between Heer and him. Prem leaves the family celebrations behind, and walks to his room, to see the door closed. He opens the door, slowly and walks inside to see Heer not in there. Well, not where she was visible for him to see.
"Heer?" he calls out.
No reply, except a simple sob. Prem then searches around the room, asking for Heer, when she finally sees her sitting on the ground, in a corner, leaning her head against the wall.
~End of Chapter 1~
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