Lawfully Wedded

Chapter 37

Sanjana's P.O.V

I hear a groan when the door opens and am greeted with the sight of Rohan. He looks exhausted when he walks in and loosens his tie before he sets his bag down on the table and plops down on the bed.

"God I'm so tired," he murmurs to himself.

"Evening Ro," I murmur as I slide closer to him and wrap my arms around him.

"Evening," he whispers.

"Busy day?"

"God don't ask, what the fuck is wrong with the men of our generation? Every other lady that walks in our office is either assaulted by their husband, friend, brother what not, who the fuck do they trust!"

I smile as I stare at him and he catches my smile and furrows his eyebrows.

"What you smiling at?"

"Nothing, my heart just feels happy that you exist, that people, men like you exist,"

"Of course, men like me exist, not everyone is an asshole,"

"And yet when I hear cases, when I've had bad experiences, how do I know men like you exist Ro?"

"Sweetheart,"

"Why don't you change and freshen up?"

"Yeah I'll do that,"

°

"You know, other than my mom and dad, nobody wanted me, nobody wanted Sonu and me," I say and Rohan looks at me.

We were sitting on the rooftop of our house because I wanted to watch the sunset.

"Sanjana—"

"Let me,"

"Don't feel pressurized baby, I will be okay if you don't tell me anything as well,"

"I want to,"

He says nothing but pulls me closer to him and tucks us under the blanket.

"You know, I always hated my grandmother. She is a woman and yet when my mother gave birth to me, she hated my mother, my parents loved me. My grandmother just couldn't digest the fact that her first grandchild was a girl and so all of my family forced my parents to conceive another child and so 11 months later another child, oh the disappointment, Sonu was born. I don't remember the moment but as I grew up, my earliest memory is Sonu clutching my arm while mom cried in dad's arms, later my mother would tell me that my grandmother had really crossed the line that day and brought another woman into the house announcing that dad must marry a lady 'who'll birth them male children'"

"Sanju—"

"My dad will always be my superhero, you know, that day after his mother pulled that incident, he cut contact with everyone, my dad has always been there for mom and they're like this perfect couple who will fight but still mom will wait for him for dinner, they have this rare love, this beautiful relationship and I was scared I'd never find anything like that, but I have you and I couldn't be more thankful,"

"I guess it is the fact that my relatives always berated my mom that we never really saw them, so imagine my surprise when all of them show up at my 17th birthday party,"

I feel Rohan go tense and I smile up at him.

"But you know what was shocking? My only brother, cousin I mean, his friends had come too, but I wasn't concerned, I was too happy that my relatives bothered to show up, but I guess that's just how life you know, so one moment I'm very overjoyed and the next, I'm naked and bleeding while three grown naked men stand over me, I didn't know what was happening, my parents never told me what could happen to a girl like me, they thought they had protected me, that they will always protect me and so I didn't know they were raping me, all I knew was that they were doing something wrong with me,"