TejAng: Alone Protects Me

Chapter 1

Satti was doing her usual chores in the backyard of Sandhu House. She heard from Dilraaj that Kushbeerji and Gurpreetji came to visit them. She started to make tea and served it with snacks.

KSV told to the Sandhu family that they are leaving for Gurdaspur and to visit the Gurudwara. He asked Rupi to join them.

" Trip bhi accha lagega jab hum sab ek family ki tarah jaaye. Teeno ke jaane ke baad ghar soona soona sa hogaya hai.' Gurpreet requested.

Rupi replied, " Ji zaroor ." He looked at satti to know her opinion

Satti said," Do din mein Dilraaj ke exams khatam ho jane ko hai. Kya uske baad hum jaa sakte hai?" 

KSV and Gurpreet nodded and informed to be ready. They will plan rest of the things and left the house.

**** Maan Mansion***

Tejo never told Angad how much she was thankful to him,  his presence and support during these past few weeks helped her clear her mind and decide what she wants to do next. She knew that moving on for her would be 2x difficult when compared to others. By introducing her to the local MSME owners  Angad solved problem at both sides. Local woman learned from Tejo about the scope of market and they also learned that they can sell their products online. 

Though for the first two weeks she always felt restless. He diverted her attention to other things. But today was a different story.

Tejo was restless. She was so tensed today for Angad. For the first time in few months her mind is completely occupied by something else otherwise it was either Jasmine or Fateh whose thoughts kept her busy.

 Today is hearing for Riya's custody for which Angad was so anxious. She knew he couldn't have slept for a blink of a second. He was not in his zone since morning didn't speak to her much. He just looked at her once with a weird expression which she could not understand.

"Kya hua Angadji. Kya mai aapki kuch madad kar sakti hoon?" She asked. 

" Nahi." His voice was broken and he left the house to attend the session.

She wanted to go with him but he told her not to come. There is nothing much he could do too.

****

Fateh left to his work earlier than usual. He got a job in the nearby hotel of Gurdaspur Gurdwara. It had a small convention center for people. The hotel owner was an Old Lady who was attacked by goons, he helped her and she requested him to join the hotel as a manager.  He refused the role of manager keeping in mind that he will return to his family in few months but he said he will be happy if he could be a receptionist.

Fateh repented for his mistakes. He understood how badly he treated Tejo while she was giving her full effort to make their relationship work. 

He always questioned himself if he actually loved Jasmine? But if it wasn't love what made him do such nasty things. He hated himself for that. He unintentionally made everyone's life complicated.

He used to share room with bartender name Sunny. He helped him during his initial days here. 

" Veere bas do din mein meri behen ki shaadi hai Gurudwara mein tujhe aana hi hoga." Sunny told Fateh. He felt so happy for him. 

***

Jasmine got herself into a con job. It did give her a lot of money but she didn't understood the underlying problem with such jobs. She was just increasing the list of enemies.

Being a dumb head she was she took up a high risk case. The instructions were simple, to get in touch with the guy in the photograph handed over to her earlier and drop an earring into his coat pocket and hand over the other earring to the client.

She asked for address and it was  Hotel Palm. She was told that the party was high profile and she must be dressed in the same way. The party was scheduled for tomorrow evening so she had enough time for shopping.

********

Tejo called Rajat about the judgement, her said the case isn't strong enough from their side and Riya's grandmother has chances to win the custody. Before he could go into details his call ended abruptly.

" Rajat maine kaha tumse ki kuch bhi mat batana Tejoji ko. " Angad was angry.

" Sir, par aapki engagement se iss case bahut strong hojayegi humari side se," Rajat was interrupted by Angad.

"Fake hai. Woh engagement Jo Moga mein hua woh sab acting tha. I was just helping her in that situation." Angad said.

" Par sir aapko dekh kar hum sab ko laga ki aap ma'am se pyaar karte hai aur isliye shaadi ko haa kiya. " Rajat told sincerely.

Angad didn't reply to him and simply left. After being alone for years he only learned how to make others laugh and smile and show them how sorted and happy he was but never shared what he actually feels. Yes he is loud and a bit too much to be with sometimes but deep inside he always felt alone.

With Tejo and Riya under same roof he felt like family. Time and again he reminded himself that these two wonderful people are not his'. Tejo has her own family in Moga and Riya was his niece whose custody he might lose today.

"Ye waheguru!" He sighed and entered the court to listen the judgement.

He lost Riya's custody. Court was not wrong. He was a happening businessman and with actually no one by his side to support him to take care of Riya in his absence. He was never in relationship with anyone to atleast consider his statement but he was allowed to visit her at her grandmother's place two days in a month.

He felt awful at that moment. That Little girl was taken away from him. He kissed her on cheek and made a promise that he will visit her as soon as possible. Riya was too small to understand what was happening around her but she started to cry as she had to leave her Poppins.

Angad returned home past mid night. He wanted to avoid questions from Tejo. He felt she would have slept by then and entered the house. But to his suprise she was waiting for him.

" Kya hua? Kya kaha tha judge ne. Riya kyu nahi aayi." She asked him.

He felt like a loser when she asked him about Riya. The bottled up sadness just poured out in form of tears. His heart felt heavy and his head started to spin he and ears started to ring while he slowly collapsed on the couch. Tejo was taken aback by this she called Angad's personal doctor who was on speed dial.

*To be continued*