Page 26

Story: Tainted Bride

“Come inside…”

Aviksha comes inside; Prakram is lying on the bed; and Aashi is sitting on his stomach. He immediately comes to the couch with her, sits his daughter on his lap, and says this to Avishka.

"I will feed her."

When she hears him, Avishka immediately turns and walks away without saying anything. Prakram is watching her go. This girl neither turns around, asks any questions, nor says anything extra. This is bothering him in a strange way. Suddenly, Aashi says to him:.

"I don't want to eat."

"Aashu..."

"Papa…"

She starts tickling her father again, and Prakram is also laughing loudly, but he holds her hand and tells her.

"Now, all games later, food first."

"First Ashu has to play and then eat."

“Aashi is a very good girl."

“Aashi is a bad girl who wants to play."

Prakram knows very well that she will not listen to him easily, so he starts playing with her. After playing, she starts feeling tired, which leads her to rub her eyes with her small fist.

"Aashi, there is no need to do this; now eat quickly and then go to sleep."

"I want to sleep."

"Aashi no… nanny… nanny…”

Avishka was sitting in her room, searching through an old magazine for some content to read, but she was unable to find anything suitable. But as soon as she heard Prakram's voice, she went very quickly towards his room with her limping leg.

"Aashi has not eaten anything, even after trying hard, and wants to sleep. Feed her a little something quickly because she will fall asleep and then wake up from sleep and start crying due to hunger.”

Avishka nods her head and starts taking her plate of food, due to which Prakram gets angry that she will take the plate at one time and Aashi at another.

"What is this method? One time, you will take the plate, and the second time, you will take Aashi. Since I have informed you that she will sleep hungry, please feed her as soon as possible.

His loud voice scares Avishka so much that she immediately turns around, cautiously takes Aashi from him, and begins limping towards her room with the plate. Prakram's attention shifts to her leg. As a result, he begins to feel a slight sense of regret for the words he has spoken. However, he is not prone to regretting his actions, so he quickly dismisses these thoughts from his mind. With great difficulty, Avishka enters Aashi's room, sits on the bed, places Aashi in her lap, and starts cooing at her with her sweet words.

"If Ashu agrees to what I say, I will make her listen to today's very lovely fairy tale."

Aashi loves to listen to new stories, and as soon as Avishka asks her to give her her favorite thing, she rubs her eyes with her small fists and starts looking at her, which is why she drags up her scarf and keeps it only on her head so Aashi can see her properly and interact with her without any barriers, which she loves a lot. Her scarf is now on her hair bun, and she starts looking at Aashi with a smile.

"Do you want to hear the story?"

“yes..."

"So first, we will finish the whole meal and then listen to the story."

"We will hear the whole story while eating.”

"Yes, this is also possible, but you will have to finish eating completely."

"Ok…"

Prakram is sure that Ashi would be asleep by now, which makes him feel a little angry that he should not have listened to Aashi and played with her; he should have definitely paid attention to feeding her; he immediately came out of his room. He heads towards the nearby room, which is Aashi's, but his feet stop after listening to the conversations, so he starts looking inside through the window.