Page 43

Story: Tainted Bride

"Aashi…"

“Papa… I am waiting for you from now on; please come soon.”

'Okay, my love... You eat well, sleep well, and Papa will come tomorrow but not today, so there is no need to worry today.”

“Okay… I love you, papa."

‘I love you too, my sweetheart."

Prakram has a very wide smile on his face, and he doesn't care about anything. Armaan also goes out, smiling. Prakram tucks his hand in his pocket and looks outside. He is still smoking a cigarette. He stays for some time. He closes his eyes and again sees Divya's smiling, innocent face. He immediately opens his eyes, drops the cigarette on the ground, and starts crushing the cigarette butt very brutally.

.

.

.

*She looks at him smiling, and he immediately holds her hand and kisses her knuckle. Upon witnessing his smile, Avishka finds herself smiling even more. He is driving the car very smoothly and carefully, but before she can say anything to him, the car stops with a jerk because a car has stopped in front of it.

“Rajeev…”

“Avi, no need to get out of the car. I'll see who it is.”

Before Rajeev can come out and talk to them, they start beating him while dragging him outside the car, causing Avishka to suddenly panic and run out of the car, because she is unable to control herself after seeing her husband being beaten like this.

Rajeevvvv….

But suddenly, the people who were beating Rajeev turned and looked toward Avishka. They turned towards her, pulled her hair, and forcefully made her fall to the ground on her stomach.

“Ahhh…”

Rajeev tries to free himself, but that person smiles and kicks at her stomach.

Rajeeevvvv…*

Avishka sits with her eyes wide open. Her hand is on her stomach, and there are too many tears in her eyes. Her tears are continuously flowing, and she is constantly trying to feel something by caressing her stomach. Her breathing is going up and down a lot, as if she is not able to breathe. She quickly takes a gulp of water from the nearby glass, refills it, and continues to drink. She then adjusts her scarf and steps outside to catch a glimpse of Aashi.

“Aashi…”

She comes to Aashi's room, but Aashi is not there. Seeing an empty room, she starts getting more nervous. The tears that were flowing from her eyes have started flowing even more because she is continuously searching for her sweet doll, who is not here. She immediately starts running down the stairs. It is dark all around. She is well aware that it is already midnight. She is frantically searching for Aashi, but she is nowhere to be found. She is unable to see Aashi, which causes her to hold her throat, start breathing properly, run back to her room, and call Padma. It is midnight, and suddenly, when Avishka calls, both Padma and Vishnu wake up, and Vishnu immediately picks up the phone.

"Avi…"

"Baba Aashi, I can't find her anywhere."

The nervousness in her voice is obvious, and since the phone is on speaker, Padma can also hear her voice very well. As soon as she hears her voice, tears start forming in Padma's eyes. She knows that she has seen some scary dreams again, which makes her nervous and prompts her to ask for an explanation.

"Avi, listen, my daughter... You don’t remember, but Aashi has been sleeping with her grandparents ever since her father left.”

Aviksha takes a very deep breath, as if this breath were stuck somewhere, and then, with a sigh of relief, she starts smiling because she really did not remember that Aashi sleeps with her grandparents in their room.

“Yes, I had forgotten..."

“You wait there; I will come quickly to you; don't cry. I am coming, my sweetheart.”

Avishka is unable to say anything to Padma and just starts looking around silently, as if even the walls are scaring her. Within a few moments, Padma had come running there because of the way her breathing was labored, telling Avishka that she was just running to her. Avishka immediately gathered herself into her arms, like Aashi, and started crying.

"Enough, my child. Who knows when you will stop having these nightmares? Go to sleep. I'm not leaving you anywhere. I am with you. Sleep comfortably.”