Not coming back home is an escape mechanism for Karan. He often stayed out rarely coming back home since he had married. He even shifted to the outmost guest house to keep his interaction with family minimal. His forced isolation is some sort of punishment for himself. Maybe a part of his consciousness wanted him to repent not that he ever agreed to it. Sometimes if anyone from the family saw him sitting in any corner of the house, they would find him there at the same point the next day. The elders have tried to get some sense in him but he would get sarcastic or downright ignorant. His wife Mahira was also getting antsy with each passing day. She won a prized husband, but he was still beyond her breaches. Her mother drilled in her that Karan will eventually kneel in front of her but four months have passed and she could count on her fingers the time she met him since she married him.
Taking his surname didn’t do anything. She knew breaking his connection with Preeta didn’t make him forget her. He gave Mahira his name but seems like he lost his soul four months back. As for the Luthra family when lectures, scolding, or kind love didn’t bring the jolly Karan back they once again started their blame game. Instead of questioning their upbringing, values, and hypocrisies, they pinned Karan’s depression on Preeta.
Karan didn't return home after leaving the hospital, which made the family agitated. Rishab informed them about the diagnosis which staggered the family. After their drama of crying, praying, and screaming they dump the garbage of toxicities on Preeta who was thousands of miles away. In their passionate hatred, they didn’t realize Karan entered the hall. He looked all messed up, with untidy clothes and a pungent smell of alcohol. The ladies were hoarding over him creasing and tending him. They cajoled him to sit with them in the living room, and like a lifeless doll, he followed behind. Their praises for Karan and Mahira and seething hate for Preeta were unstoppable. Everyone was immune to these behaviors so they didn’t reprimand each other. However, Sameer was fuming. He couldn’t understand why Preeta was accused even when she is far away from all of this cluster****.
Sameer was the youngest at home. In Luthra’s family, his situation was always awkward. He was shut out from family discussions and decisions. He knew they were discriminating against him but that was okay. It was under the veil. And with all the gratitude he has for the family, he was somehow forced into submission. People like to see him with his humble submissive persona. Hands crossed one over the other, head bowed, voice polite, and shoulders hunched. But for the last four months, Sameer was fuming. He wanted to throw up to see the vulgarities of Luthras he called his family. The men he idolized, his brothers, made him question his morality. Even now he saw them cursing the person who saved them from hell. And the irony is that no one finds it absurd. Whatever Karan is going through is a reaction to his actions. He needs to carry the baggage himself. But why everyone is throwing abuses at Preeta? Dadi and Bua with their grand DILs are soiling Preeta with words that he can’t imagine them knowing. Rakhi Chachi is always standing spinelessly listening to the crap. Rishab was moly cajoling Karan and Karan was just sitting there.
As if he was the victim. Why was he victimizing himself? Why? Sameer couldn’t find the answers to the whys. He was hurt and disappointed. He wanted them to stop. He wanted to burst at them and tell them to shut up. With every bad word for Preeta and every sympathy for Karan, Sameer lost his mind. Can they not see beyond Karan? Do they even realize what he lost because of Karan’s selfishness? They are selectively blind and dumb. When the bridge of his patience broke, he finally opened his sealed lips.
“Shut up, shut up, shut up……” He mumbled so quietly that they didn’t catch it at once. When they looked at him with raised eyebrows to know what he was mumbling, he broke out of his submission and screamed…...” SHUT UP, I WANT YOU PEOPLE TO SHUT UP”
It came as a shock even Karan looked at him astonishingly. Rishab moved and asked him what is wrong with him but Sameer jerked back. He avoided his touch as plague, leaving his brother shocked. “Don’t try to act familiar with me”,
