#1 ~FF : Untold Stories~ - Page 24

Originally posted by: kimnana

such a lovely story ranvir pain can be easily seen it makes us teary too

the way ishani praying 👏👏👏...i was taken by completely surprise today

ty for pm

Originally posted by: LadyMeringue

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Thank you so much, dearie! 🤗🤗 I'm so happy that you liked the update. ⭐️⭐️ Hehe, this is a compliment I never tire of hearing. 😳

I've had my heart bleeding for Ranveer in order to write this chapter. I had to watch some of the preleap episodes to get a better feel and my mood was natural enough to get this update done quickly. 😕😕

But yes, my Ishaani is my Ishaani. 😛😛 I could actually imagine that scene before my eyes and could feel the same desperation course through my veins as she must have felt so too. 😊😊

Falguni's part was something that I did for a reason again. I wanted to show that Falguni was uptight, not evil, unlike Baa. 😡😡

I'll try to update soon enough and my exam did go well. 😉😉

A/N: Hey there! :D :D Sorry that the update is a little delayed. :( :(

Happy Reading! :D :D

The doctor left the room and looked at Ishaani and Falguni with a small smile on his face.

"He's alright now. You can meet him. Just make sure not to stress him or overexert him too much."

Falguni smiled at the doctor and nodded her head in assurance even though Ishaani did not even wait twice before walking towards the ward. Entering the room, she saw Ranveer looking around the place in confusion, slight panic on his face.

Falguni caught Ishaani's hand and the latter looked up at the former in confusion. She gave her an encrypted look and Ishaani understood what her mother wanted her to do. She fell behind as Falguni went ahead and sat beside Ranveer, who now looked at her with a horror-struck look, stuttering.

"What am I doing here? How did I get here?"

"We found you in the closet." Ranveer gave her a stunned look, quickly turning his face away in guilt. Falguni continued in a reprimanding yet kind tone.

"You were lucky that Ishaani found you at the right time or else you could have been much more critical." Ranveer looked at Ishaani, who flushed dully. She shuffled her feet uneasily as Ranveer spoke in a frightened voice, still making sure to keep his eyes away from Falguni's stern ones.

"Do- Does Baba-"

"Yes, I informed him about this yesterday." Ranveer looked at her, bewildered.

"Yesterday?" asked Ranveer, while Falguni nodded her head gently.

"You've been asleep since yesterday morning because you are on heavy medicines. Your father couldn't be here earlier because there was a landslide yesterday in Pune. They should be here in a couple of hours."

Ranveer looked at her and smiled slowly.

"Thank you," said Ranveer softly and Falguni looked confused.

"For what?"

"For doing so much for me," replied Ranveer sincerely, and Falguni looked stunned for a moment. She gave him a guilty look before speaking blankly.

"Think of this as my apology for earlier."

"Earlier?"

"When I asked you to stay away from Ishaani," said Falguni, embarrassed. Ranveer gave her a flustered look.

"No, please don't apologize to me. You are older to me and you are my master's wife," pleaded Ranveer with a flustered look on his face, his breathing now increasing at a quick pace.

"Then you will call me Falguni Maa from now on." Ranveer looked shocked, as though he had clearly imagined it.

"I- I can't. How can I? I'm just a servant." Falguni gave him a shrewd look and corrected him.

"No, you are the boy who saved my daughter's life. I can trust you to be in her life now. So from now on, you will call me Falguni Maa, is that understood?"

Ranveer gave her a conflicted look as her statement brought back to him the memories from the last fifteen days, along with all the brutal torture and humiliation.

Ranveer shut his eyes for a few moments, suddenly overcome by a fit of coughing. Falguni quickly made him get up slowly and rubbed his back, trying to ease him up. She, however, stopped her ministrations abruptly when she noticed that he coughed out blood, quickly signalling Ishaani to get the doctor inside.

The doctor came and examined Ranveer, sending both Falguni and Ishaani from the ward, a grim look on his face. He left the ward ten minutes later and told the duo that Ranveer had to be given morphine because his body wasn't strong enough to bear the exertion still. Ishaani felt annoyed at not having got the chance to clarify anything with Ranveer but she also knew that she had to seek an answer from her mother - an answer to a question that puzzled her immensely.

Turning to look at her mother once the doctor left, she tugged at her sari to gain her attention. When Falguni looked at her worriedly, Ishaani took a deep sigh before asking with inquisition.

"When you told Ranveer that he was the one who saved my life, what did you mean by it?"

18th June, 1996:

They always say that loyalty in a friendship is rare to find. Those who find it are truly blessed. I did not know that my fortune would ever change to the extent from being a lonely girl to that of having a friend who I could trust my life with.

One question's answer changed my life forever, and my mind is still boggled by how anybody could love me that much. It feels like a dream, a dream that I'm bound to wake up from soon. And yet every time I think about Ranveer, I know that this is my reality. A reality where life is much prettier than I would have thought it to be three months ago.

But before I get to this, I just want to let you know that Ranveer is recovering. He isn't all that well yet, but the doctors say that with sufficient love and care, he should be perfectly fine. Harshad Uncle and Ranveer's father have returned back and the former has taken matters into his own hand crisply. Baa has no say into it and truth be said, I've never seen her so tongue tied as she was today in front of Uncle's wrath. Serves her right.

And now coming to the million dollar statement - how did he save my life?

Maa tells me that twenty days ago, a bunch of the sixth standard boys had decide to bully me just because they were the high society boys and their sisters and brothers were in my class. They knew about my background and decided to have some fun by publicly humiliating and defaming me. Apparently, I had been very outspoken about my disagreement with one of the boys (who was also the ringleader of his group) and he decided to have his revenge on me.

Ranveer must have overheard the boys because the idiot actually thought he could convince them likewise. What this those creeps do? They pushed him down the stairs. My heart shred into pieces when I heard about it. But what does my friend do? He still pleads with them - he tells them that he will bear all the pain and humiliation on my behalf as long as those boys stayed away from me.

They complied.

The next few days passed with Ranveer bearing the brunt of pain that was coming my way. He bore attacks on the road, in the washroom, in the corridors, and on the grounds as well. He bore all sorts of insults for me, bore all sorts of pain for me. By the time he actually decided to go ahead to complain to the principal, one of the boys had actually the temerity of locking me in the washroom for fun until one of the teachers found out about it. The action worked well - Ranveer did not complain in fear of my well-being.

Neither did the teachers care to inspect into it, nor did anyone stand in support of him either.

Harshad Uncle and Baba left the next day of that incident and Maa rarely stayed home in those days to come, far less entertaining him after the whole incident with me. Ranveer had no one to listen to his pleas and he pushed me away lest I came to know about what was happening to him. The jerk knew that I knew him much better than he expected anyone to know him and he knew that it was about time that I came to know what was wrong with him.

And then one day, things went too far. Like any mortal being, he snapped and had the courage in him to say 'no' and stand his ground. That day, he was beaten up brutally, but he made a mark for himself as well. Only by that time, it had become too much for him to cope.

Why it happens at times, I do not know. Maybe some battles are like that - even though you emerge victorious in the end, you realize that you've lost more that you could have possibly safeguarded. Maybe that's what happened with Ranveer. He won a losing battle and it overwhelmed him.

Those three days were when he actually realized what had happened to him. When he let those dark walls imprison his heart and mind where no light could seep through while he threw himself into a darkness that was entirely new. I couldn't help him out from it, and neither could he help himself.

He did not try to end his life, but he had given up on it anyway. What good was life when every day was to be pulled off with the brutal demons of your past and the solitude of your present? What good was life when you were all alone? When your only friend was oblivious to your pain?

Maybe that's why I owe him a lot. Not just my life, but my loyalty, friendship and heart to him as well. He took the first step of shielding me from the claws of the harsh world. Now it's my turn to protect him from his own evils and from his own self.

All I need him to do is to accept me back into his life and let me enter the prison he's bound himself to.

Constructive criticism will be more than welcome and sorry for any typos. :D :D

Next chapter:
Epistle 10