Originally posted by: katheriene
Just read the 10 parts in one go
What a beautiful piece of writing
Your writing is flawless, loved the description of each character especially Shiv, Rishabh & Prerna
Finally the stubborn PreRish understand their feelings
Shiv is a brilliant character
I am in this forum for the beautiful ff, os & ss. Not interested in the show
Waiting for next
Thank you so much. Means a lot.
The show is absolute trash. I'm here for Bajaj only.
RESERVED
BUT YES YES YES YESSSSSS
EDITED:
ohhhhhhhh kayyyyyyyyy where do I begin first I need to fan myself because phew lorddddd. That kiss. Those kisses. God the need to be so close, to be together so bad, but she needs to breathe and so does he before they're swept away by the current of their emotions. GOD I LOVE IT SO MUCH.
And Prerna's convo with Anurag 'I love the woman that I am with him'!!!!!!!! YES APARNA YESSSSSSS!!! Phew I hollered. Look at her initiating all the kisses and finally getting her way just as was intended! Ugh I am so happy, I'm gonna go back and reread it a few more times and update my comment accordingly!
Also good luck on sessionals! You're killing it girl I know you are (:
THE BIGGEST OF HUGS,
Nor ❤️
"All I know is that I love the woman I am when I'm with him. And I can't let go of that. At any cost."
That says is all while she was married to Mr Bajaj all she wanted to do was escape in to Anu loving arms but not realizing that she had out grown him Like a pair of shoes not understanding that her dreams her life had charter a new course setting her free she realized what was important yet was afraid to go after it now Mr Bajaj forced her out of her comfort zone and waited for her to shine now she can finally be free to choose what her heart wants and it chooses Bajaj loved the update .
Originally posted by: aryapdane
A/N: Firstly, my sincere apologies for this delay in updating. I have my sessional test this week and the next so there's virtually no time for me to sit and write.
Secondly, thank you for all the comments and likes. That kept me motivated. Especially Komlika, whose comments gave me a boost. This chapter is for you.
I penned down this update in between breaks during classes and that sort of hard work would've been unlikely if I didn't have the support and love of you all.
All disclaimers apply.
Please read and review
Chapter Eleven-- Unshackling
Move on, we're not seventeen
I'm not who I used to be
You say everything's changed
You're right, we're grown now
~ Slide Away, Miley Cyrus
Somewhere a mobile phone's quiet buzz rips his paradise into pieces. She jolts out of the circle of his arms, taking away his equilibrium with her. Rishabh battles against the ensuing disorientation by keeping his eyes closed and hands curled into determined fists. He wills himself to find the centre of his gravity, wills the room to stop spinning around him like a top.
It takes another long moments for the realisation of the source of the persistent buzz being his own mobile phone to catch up with him. On sluggish legs, he reaches the bedside table. Mehra's name is flashing on the screen.
"What?" His voice cracks like a whip in the air.
"Sir, the video conference is in five minutes."
"What video conference?" His irritation seeps into his tone involuntarily. Mehra's tone in turn, becomes placative.
"With the Okimoto group, sir." A pause before he adds, "We've already moved the conference thrice this week."
Rishabh feels Prerna move behind him and a surge of blind panic compels him to whirl around. He catches the sight of her disappearing into the walk-in closet and feels the clench of the fist around his heart ease. She isn't leavingqq.
"Sir?"
"Ten minutes," he snaps into the phone and tosses it on the bed.
Prerna re-emerges with a black jacket draped across her arm, her eyes directed at the floor. She almost looks meek and Rishabh doesn't know what to make of it.
She stops near the study table and flips open the laptop that is lying on it, switching it on. Satisfied, she comes over to him. The muffled clicks of her heels syncopates with the beating of the rain against the window panes and the thudding of his heart against its cage of ribs and muscles. All through it, his eyes follow her, unwilling to let her out of their line of sight even for a moment. Her caramel eyes find his for a fleeting second as he looks over his shoulder when she moves to stand behind him.
Prerna holds the jacket for him and Rishabh allows her to help him out it on. His heart stutters in his chest when she takes extra care to not disturb his right hand. Now she moves to stand before him, her hand smoothing down the lapels of the jacket. Her touch burns him through the layers of clothing. He wonders how it would be like to feel her touch on his bare skin.
Her hands drop to her sides but she remains standing where she is. Close enough that he is breathing in the air that she is exhaling. And for the first time since they met, the oceanic distance that used to stretch between them feels bridgeable. They are standing before eachother without the plague of any living ghosts or shadows of past life coming between them. It all seems like a gossamer dream he has concocted in his head. It might just be one.
And still, she won't look up at him. The weight of her gaze caresses the exposed hollow of his throat. He wants to feel the caress of her lips there instead and going by the sudden change in her breathing, he can guess that she's thinking along the same lines.
His heart pounds loudly in his ears when her fingers rise to examine the weave of the tweed, just over the stupid organ that is threatening to tear itself out and present itself to her. Time tick-tocks around them, intent on its cruel march. He has five minutes perhaps, maybe less. Not enough time to regain control over the riot of his thoughts. And definitely not enough time to prepare himself for the meeting with the Japanese.
"Prerna..." Minutes, hours, a year and a half worth of longing simmers in that single word. He gets nowhere however as her fingers busies themselves with the task of straightening his collar, now they smooth down his shirt front, over the terrain of muscles. Her touch scalds him like an hot iron brand.
She presses herself to his body then, her breasts crushing against his hard chest and her face finally upturned for his examination. He sees no regret, only unabashed want and that is perhaps what he has been dying to see on her face. His left hand rises to cup one side of her heart shaped face as she rises on her toes to brush his lips with her in a chaste kiss. It calms the tempest that was raging in his soul. He deepens the kiss, seeking more of her sweet taste. He'll never get enough of it.
The phone starts buzzing again.
Rishabh curses into her mouth, eliciting a chuckle from her. His chest vibrates with the rythmn of the sound she emanates.
"We'll talk later," she says.
Rishabh nods and pours all his will power into taking one step back from her. It is one of the most difficult things he's done.
Foolishly, out of its own violation, his hand captures her wrist in its hold and he spins her closer to himself, to face him.
"Promise?" He tries to temper the termity of his sentimentality with a smile.
Her answering smile is all sunshine and warmth. His eyes are riveted by the small depression on her cheek, until she moves. This time she stands on her toes to press a kiss on the skin of his throat, his collarbone. A second passes. Then two. He shivers under her lips. She buries her whisper in his skin so he feels the words than hear them.
"I promise."
His eyes stare after her as she walks out of the room.
*
One step at a time, Prerna tells herself. Place one foot before the other. And don't, don't for the sake of everything holy turn back.
She listens to the whisper of his footsteps from outside the room, where she is leaning against a wall and forces everything in her to stamp down on the urge of running back into his arms. Of touching him and feeling him tremble under her fingers. Of getting high on that feeling. Of kissing him again. And again. Till she has taken back all the breath that he steals from her lungs with his carefree smiles and chuckles. But she doesn't want to come off as clingy or needy.
And then, there's another thing. She needs to see Anurag.
So she makes herself go back the way she had come.
The drawing room looks like a site of explosion.
Furniture pieces are in the process of being moved to the far corners of the room by half a dozen staff members of Shiv's household. Screens and spools of cloth are lying on the floor and standing in the middle of it, in a dark Huntsman suit of impeccable cut is Shiv Randhawa intoning instructions between sips of champagne, like a colonial taskmaster while Tony dutifully hands him different flutes for approval.
Shiv cracks her a smile before turning to his faithful butler. "This one," he says, pointing to a flute with golden pink liquid. "I trust that you'll be able to manage the rest."
Tony nods his assent.
"Prerna, you owe me big time." There's no rebuke in the words as one might expect. Instead, Shiv's eyes are twinkling with mischief. "I had to do your job for you."
"I'm sorry, Shiv."
"Don't be sorry. Be ready. For your punishment. I want you to accompany me somewhere. That is, if Bhai doesn't need you to be here."
Her cheeks bloom red. She always did blush easily.
Shiv sly smile is like that of a cat who has got all the cream in the world. "Well, let's go then."
"I have to go somewhere first," Prerna says, the fingers of her right hand unconsciously touching the engagement ring that has suddenly started weighing a ton. "To Basu Badi."
Shiv loses his smile and an understanding expression comes over him. "Of course. We'll stop there first."
The steps leading up to Basu Badi are familiar. Almost as much as every corner of Sharma Niwas is and far more than Bajaj Mansion had ever been. She had felt like an interloper there. Basu Badi always felt like home because this is where her heart was. But not today. Today she's left her home in a room in the first floor of a mansion house in Behala.
Mohini Auntie's cold face greets her when she enters the house. Prerna's eyes scan the surroundings for the visage of Moloy Kaku and relief seeps back into her soul when she comes up short. It will make things easier she knows.
"Prerna..."
How quickly her tone turns hateful, Prerna thinks idly. The memory of a conversation from what feels like a different lifetime floats back to her.
It's a good thing you didn't marry Mr Basu."
"Really?" Prerna had said the word with as much sarcasm as she could muster.
"Yes. Mohini Basu is too territorial about her son. She'd have given you hell."
Prerna can see the truth of those words now, in the anger that is brewing in the surface of Mohini Auntie's face.
"Why are you here? Aren't you satisfied with what you have caused? My poor son's face..."
Prerna doesn't have the willpower to listen to her rant so she moves to climb up the eighteen steps of the staircase to reach Anurag's room without sparing his mother another glance. She sents a grateful look to the heavens above when Mohini Auntie doesn't follow.
Countless times, she has climbed these stairs with countless different emotions. With hope, with despair, with urgency, with the dream of friendship, with the prayer of love. Today, she has come to seek freedom.
Anurag is sitting cross-legged on his bed, a book open on his lap. If she can bring herself to overlook the angry bruise on his face, she can almost fool herself into believing nothing has changed between them. But everything has changed and there's no going backbor denying it anymore.
His eyes find her within a second, like they always have but her heart doesn't beat harder when she looks into his honey gaze this time.
Prerna tries her best to comport her face into some semblance of compassion, or of sympathy as she takes in the sight of his frown, the glimmer of unshed tears in his eyes and the brooding set of his mouth from the humiliation he's had to endure. In the past, such an expression invoked in her an intense feeling of protectiveness. Now, she only feels annoyance at this need he has to find a scapegoat for putting the blame of his failures on them. First Mr. Bajaj, then Shiv and now, her.
Not that she has been completely blameless in all of this. Standing in the doorway of his room, more outside than inside, she can see what her mistakes are. She had clung to the dream of the happiness that she had seen when she had fallen for Anurag, not taking into account that she wasn't the same person she had been when she had met him or that the dream she had seen then wasn't what she wanted anymore. Perhaps she hadn't been ready to let go of the idea of being Anurag's Prerna and had insisted on ignoring who she had become in the time that she had spent being Mrs. Bajaj. But it is time to let it go, she thinks.
She enters the room and stops when she reaches the foot of his bed.
The considerate thing would've been to wait for his recovery before she embarks on the what she's about to do but Prerna can't wait anymore. She can't go back to having a platonic relationship with Mr. Bajaj, and not seeing Mr Bajaj for the six weeks that would take for Anurag to heal is as impossible as her stopping the sun from rising.
The moment her hand closes around the ring finger of her left hand, Anurag's expression changes entirely. From mullish to alarm. It brings a sad smile on her lips.
I needed it. He had said those words without a shade of regret. Now he's looking at her as if she's being silly. And that's how Anurag has always been, she thinks. He goes around kicking hornets nests and then feels betrayed when he gets stung. She can easily take off the ring after that. Prerna extends it towards him.
"I'm sorry," she says.
Anurag makes no move to take it from her. "Is this because of the laptop?" His words are muddled due to the wires in his mouth.
Prerna shakes her head and takes a seat, placing the ring on the bed, between them. "This is not about the breach of my privacy, or your attempt of using me to get back at Shiv. We have bigger problems than all of this."
"Yes, Bajaj."
A chuckle escapes from her mouth instead of a cry to let out the frustration that she feels at his reply. She is oddly not ready for a fight. Or to convince Anurag to see their relationship from the new perspective that she has acquired in the last few hours, because if she succeeded then she'd fool herself into believing that they could be saved. She also has a promise to keep.
Promise? He had asked with a sheepish smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners, perhaps completely unaware of how desirable he looked like that.
The memory brings a smile to her own face.
"Let's just say it would never have worked out between us. We are not who we used to be." She moves to rise but his next words prevent her from doing so.
"I meant it, you know."
"Meant what?"
"That I'll love you. Always. No matter what you do. No matter what happens. And our love will prevail against all odds."
Prerna can only sigh. "Anurag..."
"Prerna, please. I know I f*cked up. I know I should have trusted you. But can't you see, your boss is trying to create these misunderstandings between us. And Bajaj is in on it. Don't let them fool you. You still love me."
"Anurag, I loved you more than anything in this world," Prerna says, without the emotions with which she would have once said these words.
"But not anymore, right?" Anurag says, his expression twisted in a sneer, as if the entire idea that she can love anyone other than him or fall out of love with him can only be preposterous. "Now you love Bajaj."
Prerna considers the words, her head bent low so that her chin is almost touching her chest. Does she? Does she love Mr. Bajaj? She knows she wants him. She has never desired a man more than she desires him. She knows she is infatuated with him. He is also her friend. Someone who knows her more than she knows her own mind. But are those feelings what love entails?
She had been hasty once, in deeming her feelings for Anurag as love. Love that was intense and all consuming. So all consuming infact that it had consumed her identity, her aspirations, her dreams, her ability to see anything good in anyone other than Anurag, and lastly, itself. Is that what she feels for Mr. Bajaj? She is sure that isn't the case. With him, she has never felt the need to give up parts of herself. Can it be love then? She isn't sure. What she's sure of, she tells him.
"All I know is that I love the woman I am when I'm with him. And I can't let go of that. At any cost."
TBC.
~Aparna.
A/N 2: I know it's a short update but please bear with me. I hope to write longer and quicker updates if this crazy week doesn't end up killing me.
Thank you for writing this FF. I love your Prerna and wish we could see your version of her character on the show!
The intimacy between PRB is so well sketched out. You have a real talent - please keep writing!
Good luck with your tests this week!
You know what? I’ve always wanted a petition to save and protect bajaj but I guess we need an update and it should be #HireYouAsAWriter. Oh my god. That intensity!!!
That breakup, with her keeping her dignity intact by saying “All I know is that I love the woman I am when I'm with him. And I can't let go of that. At any cost." was beautiful.
Good luck for your exams ❤️
Saving space. Haven’t read it yet. But I will and get back to this. I can’t wait to read. Gotta read it right before I go to bed.
Finally Prerna is letting Anurag go. Can’t wait to see Bajaj and Prerna finally talk it out.
Read the last two chapters in one go. Fabulous update as usual.but plz aur thora lamba update diya karo na(making puppy eyes) how much I loved prerna's last statement....,,no sane woman could love to loose her indentity.i hope in upcoming updates she sure like this that finally she got her share of true love where she can thrive as who she is ,as who she want to be. Thanks 🙏
Beautiful update 👏
Loved PreRish's moment, loved the kisses❤️
Anurag & Prerna's conversation was nice😊
Loved Prerna's words especially the last line, Prerna is clear about her decision
Waiting for next
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