Tying The Knot With Ex's Brother

A DAY WITHOUT YOU

"Will you come home for lunch?" asked Ma.

"I think I won't, Ma. I'll inform you if do," replied Sparsh.

After breakfast, all the males of the family were ready to leave for work. Papa left first, followed by Sid soonafter. Now was Sparsh's turn.

"Come on, I'll take you back to the room," said Sparsh to Ragini.

"You don't need to. You must be getting late."

"I need to go upstairs anyway. I don't have my wallet and car keys with me."

Ragini thought she should stay downstairs with Ma as she would be lonely when everybody, including her, left.

"I'll stay with Ma. Go and grab your things."

"Stay in your room and take some rest. You've been helping me in the kitchen since morning," said Ma.

"That's an overstatement!"

"Take her upstairs. I'll come upstairs in a few minutes and we'll watch your wedding pictures and videos."

Back in their room, Sparsh took a final look of himself in the mirror, grabbed his things and said, "Take care! Don't run around."

"Sparsh, I'm not a kid. Why do you always say 'Don't run around'?" said Ragini, whining.

"Because you never listen to me." Sparsh hit her forehead gently.

"Okay, I'm leaving. Bye!"

Ragini waved a goodbye to him and soon he disappeared from her sight as he went out of the room. A few seconds later, Ragini heard footsteps and it was Sparsh who was back.

"Did you forget something?" asked Ragini.

Sparsh nodded and came forward to kiss Ragini's forehead. She looked at him in amazement and he seemed satisfied. He left for real this time after a "Bye", leaving blushing Ragini behind.

The two women spent the day watching the wedding photographs and videos. Everytime a new face appeared, Ma told Ragini who that person was and some interesting stories about them if any. Later, they prepared lunch for themselves and had it together while they gossiped about various things and then went to their own rooms to get some rest.

It was already dinner time and Sparsh was not home yet. He had not called Ragini even once. She kept checking her messages but she got none from him. Unknowingly, she was sulking and disappointed.

"He pretends to be all caring and loving but he doesn't care a bit." Ragini said to herself while laying beneath the sheets in the bed.

The door opened and she assumed it was Sparsh, but it turned out to be Sid. Ragini got out of her bed quickly. Sid locked the door from inside and walked slowly towards Ragini.

"Sid, Sparsh will come soon," said Ragini.

"I don't care. I'll tell him everything," said Sid while he gazed at Ragini with eyes full of longing and desire.

"I know we need to talk about various things, but not now. Not inside the locked door. Others will get a wrong impression. Let's meet out and talk some other time."

Ragini was aware that being harsh and loud would only make things worse. She no longer had any intentions to make Sid jealous or to make him regret and feel bad about breaking up. She now needed him to forget their past and move on.

"I love you." said Sid while he tried to hug Ragini.

She escaped the hug by moving aside and said, "I've forgotten you, completely. I have no romantic feelings left for you. Do you wanna know 'why'? Because of your brother. Because he loves me so much that I forgot my revenge, my hatred and my love for you. And you need to accept it."

Ragini went to the door and unlocked it and then came to Sid and said, "Nothing I said today was a lie." And she signalled him to leave.

"How can you forget everything between us in just one month? You're definitely lying."

"I thought you knew me better than this, Sid. I'm tired and wanna sleep. Please leave."

Sid left without any kind of retaliation which was hard to digest for Ragini as well. Ragini locked the door as she couldn't trust Sid anymore, turned off the lights and then went to bed.

There was a knock on the door which woke Ragini up. She checked her phone for time and it was 10 minutes to midnight. She turned on the lights and before opening the door, she asked, "Is it Sparsh?"

"Yes, it's me." Convinced that it was not Sid, she let Sparsh in.

After consuming a glass of cold water, Sparsh headed straight to the bathroom.

"Have you eaten anything?" asked Ragini when Sparsh came out after a shower.

He shook his head.

"You must be hungry. I'll reheat the food for you, come soon."

"Don't worry, Ma must have done it. Sorry for waking you up."

Ragini walked towards the door and said, "Follow me!"

Ma was in the kitchen when they reached downstairs. She had already served Sparsh's dinner in a plate.

"Ma, you should have called me to do that," said Ragini.

"I woke up to open the door for him so I reheated his food as well. I've been doing this for years and I've no issues with it. Don't worry. You must be sleepy too, go and sleep. You're still not completely healed."

Ma was the kindest mother-in-law any woman could ever have. She always treated Ragini well.

"Ma, lemme do the rest. You should get back to your room and have a good night's sleep."

Ma finally left when both Sparsh and Ragini convinced her together to do so.

"Sparsh, give me a call when you're home and I'll open the door for you. Don't wake Ma up. Okay?"

Sparsh nodded. Ragini gave Sparsh company while he had his dinner despite of Sparsh telling her to go and sleep.

Later when they were back in their room Sparsh said, "How was your day? What did you and Ma do?"

"We gossiped and had fun. It was nice spending time with her," replied Ragini.

"You didn't miss me? I was out all day."

"Why would I? You didn't care about me, so why should I be bothered?"

Sparsh tilted his head a little and said, "What do you mean? We had been sticking together for so many days and this sudden separation from you, I genuinely missed you."

"Oh really! Is that why you sent me hundreds of texts and called me a dozen times? Liar!"

"What did you just say? Were you waiting for my calls?  For my texts? Really?" said Sparsh with a silly laughter.

"I didn't say that!" Ragini realized what she had said and wanted to take it back or pretend as if she didn't mean that but it was too late.

"I wanted to call but didn't wanna bother you. But from tomorrow, I will. I promise."

"You don't need to do so."

"But I'm still gonna do that, afterall, you waited for me to do so today."

"No, I didn't."

Ragini didn't admit that Sparsh was right till the end, but he knew it very well. They slept with genuine smiles on their faces, realizing that the things between them were eventually getting better.