Unwanted [COMPLETED]

Chapter 1

Nandini

My feet pace the length of the room, the heavy bridal lehenga dragging slightly with each step.

Clutching my shawl, I repeatedly twist and untwist it around my trembling fingers, trying to make sense of the day-of my life-of everything that has spiraled out of my control.

My mother-in-law led me here a few minutes back, said something about resting after the exhaustion and excitement from the whole day of wedding proceedings and rituals. She left before I could say anything-not that I knew what I would say.

And now I'm alone. Alone in a room that doesn't feel like mine, in a house I don't know if I can ever belong to, tied to a man I've never met or talked before the wedding.

I'm married now. Married to Vikrant Sisodiya.

Married.

The word feels foreign, making it hard for me to believe I am someone's wife now. Someone's daughter-in-law.

My heart feels too heavy for my chest, the weight of it pressing down until I'm sure I'll break apart.

Isn't wedding day supposed to be the happiest day of a girl's life?

But I don't feel happy at all. If anything, happiness feels like a stranger to me, as distant and unfamiliar as the man I have gotten married to.

My makeup hides everything. The dullness in my eyes. The exhaustion etched into my face. And the fake smile I wore like armor back in the wedding hall had fooled everyone, too. They believed in what they saw, and never looked close enough to see the truth. But I see it every time I catch my reflection in the mirror. Beneath the shimmer of the jewelry and lehenga, beneath the perfect makeup, there's just... me. A girl who didn't get a say in her own marriage, her own life, her own dreams.

I look down at my hands, the henna on my palms an intricate web of designs meant to symbolize joy and love. But I don't feel any joy, any love as I stare at them. Instead, they feel like a cage, binding me to something I have no clue about. And the weight of the gold bangles on my wrists feels suffocating, a reminder of the chains I had to accept under duress.

My wedding was sudden-just a month after my elder brother's death.

No. Vivek didn't die. He was murdered.

His smiling face flashes in my mind, causing a lump to rise in my throat, but I force myself to swallow it down. I can't let myself go there now, not tonight. Not when everything else already feels so raw.

I tried to be there for my parents after he was gone. But they didn't want my comfort. They never have. After all, I'm a daughter they never wanted.

I close my eyes, and the memory strikes me like a blow, as clear now as it was eleven years back. I was just a child, barely ten, wandering into the kitchen when I heard my mother's voice.

"Subhash and I never wanted a daughter. We were happy with Vivek and would have been overjoyed if another child had also been a son. We were disappointed after knowing it was a daughter," she had said to her friend.

Her words had slashed my heart. The anguish from them made jolts of pain pass through my entire being. And if that wasn't enough, she had added, "We wanted to go for the abortion immediately, but my doctor said that due to some medical complications, it wasn't possible. That's why I had to give birth to Nandini, even though I didn't want to."

I remember standing there, frozen, my world collapsing around me as her words carved themselves into my heart.

"I had to give birth to Nandini, even though I didn't want to."