BUILDING BRIDGES ( A Sisters Story) (ON HOLD)

Chapter 3 - Truth

"The Truth is said to always set you free right? But, that statement couldn't be farther from reality when you really think about it"

Prachi thought to herself as she blankly stared into the distance.

"The reality is, that the Truth is heavy.... it's ugly and painful, and Like a burden one carries on their back it weighs you down like an anchor. What is my truth? What is my anchor that I've concealed in the deepest darkest part of my heart? That one stain on the perfect image I have worked my entire life to build and maintain...... "

A teardrop escaped from on of her eyes as she sunk deeper and deeper into her thoughts.

"I've spent my entire life being a good girl, always being kind and considerate towards others... thinking of everyone else's happiness before my own . it's funny.....I told myself that I do this because my happiness comes from seeing those I love happy, or that I do it all to make my mother proud... because that's the kind of person she is and I wanted to be just like her. But no matter how I try to spin it or twist it, at the end of the day I am simply Overcompensating in my desperate attempt to hide all this burning HATRED I feel inside."

Her eyes were brimming with tears. Tears of deep sorrow and rage that was slowly bubbling up to the surface, that she could finally let flow a little in this moment of solace.

"This hatred that eats away at my conscience every single day is the reason I have tolerated that Rhea all this time. The reason I have turned a blind eye to all she has done to me. not because I am afraid of her but because I am afraid of myself, after shahana told me all she said, my fear has crippled me. Rhea, Rhea is the human embodiment of all the rage and hatred I feel inside.....she-she is what I fear I might turn into because of this bitter hatred.

How long? Lord? How much longer will I have to fight these demons?...... I'm slipping more and more everyday, I am reminded of it every time I look at her, every time I hear her silent sobs that she tries so hard to hide from me in darkness of night, when I lay in her embrace and feel the wetness of her tears on my skin......it grows even more. The scars that faceless, nameless man left in her soul have not healed in the slightest way.....if it was my pain alone I could have handled it with a smile as I've always done when people called me a bastard, a mistake or a sin...as though it was my fault that that man left me...that he did not want me. All those things I could handle, but not when they looked at my mother in disgust as we walked in the streets, when they whispered filthy things about her and called her a prostitute, a loose woman....all because of that fucking bastard pig that called himself her husband. I will never, ever forgive you for what you have done to my mother, and I swear that if I ever meet you in this life I will pay you back for every single tear she shed because of you ten times over."

In this moment, Prachi felt as though there was a barbed wire coiled around her neck, so tight that even breathing was becoming difficult for her as her chest heaved in rage and her eyes full of tears reflected a chilling anger. This was the extent of the buried trauma she had ran from for all these years.

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Second ran into minutes and minutes to hours as the clock hanging on the wall ticked away into the night. this dark abyss that conceals and swallows the secrets of the world had suddenly burst open and all it's secrets poured out at once like a tsunami, all the the secrets and truths hidden deep in their souls had surfaced to reared their ugly heads.

Here on the cold wooden floor of her bedroom laid a defeated Pragya, emotionally, psychologically and physically drained as the tears endlessly flowed from her eyes. Her mind clouded with a billion thoughts that she could barely process as the events of the day replayed in her mind....from Prachi's accident to Rhea's confession and to the earth shattering revelation of her and Rhea's true  relationship. It all seemed like just on long lucid dream, how could this all happened in the span of a single day? How could her entire world just crumble to dust in the span of mere hours?....what kind of cruel joke was God playing in her?