FORNEVER | ✓

CHAPTER 40 - CROSS MY HEART

HIM

"Paas Aaiye Ki Ham Nahin Aaenge Baar-Baar

Baahen Gale Men Daal Ke Ham Ro Le Zaar-"

(Come closer for I won't, every time

Let me circle my arms around you

And cry - unabashed.)

I wondered. I wondered if I really fucked up - big time. Was I not a grateful child? Did I not love my parents enough? Love. Maybe it was this love that got me fucked up. Or maybe it was I who understood it the wrong way. Love for me meant to protect my family. Always. I had seen Baba always stand for us, never let any business turmoil or nemesis cause harm to our reputation, let alone us, and I always admired how people around him looked up to him. Respected him. Maybe - maybe I wanted to be like that too, you know? Stand up for my family, never let anything touch them, no matter what it would be, I'd rather die than let anything or anyone, for that matter, taint my family's reputation or emotions.

Emotions. I guess I never really cared about my own people's emotions. What they felt about my ways and methods I chose to keep them safe. When Samira was 5 and I, of course, was her senior, her classmate pulled her piggy tail amid the assembly ground, not knowing that he was being watched. Samira wiped her tears with the back of her tiny palm and at that moment, I had sworn to myself that this kid is going to end up in a puddle by the end of the day. Lucky for him, they had a class picnic that day, so I couldn't really get my hands on his cheeks to smush, but something about my sister crying didn't really sit well with me.

"Would Baba have let that boy go?" I tossed as a 12-year-old in our bunk beds as Samira snored above me, cuddling with her tweety.

"Hell no. He would have stood up for her!" I remember huffing out loud as I crossed my arms in sheer disappointment across my chest.

I was devastated by letting the chance go, thus I never let any chance slip by, to be a human shield for my sisters and loved ones. Had I only known the right way?

Maybe it was the sheer frustration of watching my best friend's sister die - while he watched and chose to let that asshole go, I made sure to make a human slump out of him. But that couldn't bring her back now, could it? She was just 7, sometimes, I still see her in my dreams, the time when she called me by my name and came running towards my open arms, and before she could confide into them-

I applied breaks out of nowhere, causing my car to halt with a screech in the middle of nowhere. Sweat beads protruded from my skin making me nauseous and uncomfortable. The empty road haunted me as I twisted the car key again precipitately.

The engine roared amid the blustering skies, as the song resumed to play for the fifth time. Did I care to switch it off? No. I liked how it made me feel - as if every single thing was slipping off of my fingers. My heart twisted as my gut wrenched, begging for it to be fed, as my head blared with words that felt like downing acid.

You thought it was your birthright to be a goon because you were Prajapati Singhania's son.

Vivaan's still eyes sprouted in my head, mocking me. The song faltered in the background, making Aditya's words ring in my ear now that the city was asleep. The dim-lit road had turned dark and now all that there was the rainstorm as if the sky decided to cry for me since I was not able to. I drove off onto the highway, my goal was to drive off into nothingness, maybe somewhere nobody knew me and I didn't know them. Maybe somewhere, where people didn't know about my past. Somewhere they didn't see me as a reformed goon or a spoilt brat or Prajapati's Singhania's pathetic excuse of a son.