Phoenix - Abhira Sharma's journey

Rishtey?

Abhira was still recovering from armaan's words. She could not believe his audacity to blame her for something she never intended to do. She was damn sure that the whole poddar family excluding few people were blaming her. She wondered where the armaan who used to stand up and always be for her disappeared.
" You're okay?" Kabir asks her. Abhira nods her head.
" I could have smacked his head for speaking like this to you" kabir tells her.
" I know but I did want to create a scene there" Abhira says.
" Listen all I heard is that you got a separate cabin. Why was he angry with you?" Kabir asks her curious.
Abhira sighs and reveals to him how she had won her first case and everything which followed after that. Kabir's expression changed from anger to happiness.
" Wow Abhira, you won your first case. This calls for a celebration. Let me inform everyone" kabir exclaims happily happy for his cousin. He messages in the family group and messages started pouring for abhira and planning for a small celebration began for her first victory. Abhira was unaware of this and sat a little relaxed and happy that at least she had some people to celebrate her victory with.

Kabir parked his car near a place, abhira was confused.
" Naira Nani's dance academy, you wanted to visit right?" He says. Abhira looks out to see they are near a dance academy. She nods and steps out with kabir.
" Swara, Nishant and Riya mami's daughter looks after this place now. She is also very passionate about dance" Kabir reveals.
Abhira stands still in the doorway, her fingers lightly gripping the frame as she took in the sight. She hadn’t expected the academy to be this untouched. The familiar rhythms of classical dance seemed to echo faintly in the back of her mind, but all she could focus on was the emptiness of it all. Her grandmother’s legacy, her mother’s pain, and a lifetime of silence hung in the air like a thick fog.
Swara had come to greet them and was speaking about the academy with full passion. As they were moving, abhira bumped into a few familiar faces: Manish goenka with swarna and surekha stood here. Manish was emotional seeing abhira but swarna and surekha stood confused.
" Kabir how are you beta?" Swarna asks him affectionately. Kabir looks angrily.
" Why are you guys here?" He asks frowning.
" Kabir is this the way to turn to your parnani?"
" No but you're not my parnani at any case, you're my grandmother's step mother"
" Kabir" Swarna raises her voice.
" Don't you people get tired everytime trying to mend realtionship with us when we don't want to. After what you did with akshara massi, we don't want to do anything with you guys. Because of you guys we lost akshara massi" Kabir bursts out remembering how the family cried for years for his massi but in the end they were left with her death news to deal with.
" Akshara killed aarohi and she was also your massi" Swarna reasoned.
" No she wasn't, she was nothing to me. I have only one massi it was akshara. I'm sorry don't expect to run charity show here and accept someone who is not even related to me as my Massi" Kabir says coldly.
" And I have only cousin sister which is abhira, who is daughter of my dead massi not that stupid victim card playing ruhi whom you guys try shoving down in our life " Kabir further adds dropping truth bomb to Surekha and swarna who looked at abhira little emotional. They were saddened by akshu's death.
" Because of you guys, none of us could met Massi alive. Dadu and pardadu will never forgive you and forget about dad and mom ever wanting anything with you guys. We all hate you"
" Akshu is death..". Swara says crying. Surekha holds her also in pain. They look at abhira who looks unaffected by their gaze.
“Abhira, hamari akshu ki baachi.” Swarna says softly.  Manish stood here, with his warm, round face, and kind eyes that held an apology didn’t know how to voice. Swara scowled at the drama this family was doing, they had hurt the elders of her family and now doing drama standing in naira Nani's academy, the same naira Nani's daughter they have thrown out of the house.
Abhira’s eyes were cold. She didn't want to be embraced, to be soothed with words that felt like empty promises.
“Is it so?” Abhira’s voice was sharp, but not unkind. “It’s been a long time since any of you cared for me or my mother.”
Manish, Swarna and surekha  with familiar looks of guilt in their eyes, shifted uncomfortably. Her gaze moved from one to another, their faces full of tension, as if they, too, were walking through a past they couldn’t escape.
“I know… we know…” Manish’s voice trembled slightly, the weight of years of regret sinking in. “We should’ve been there for your mother, but beta you need to understand that time we had to choose between ruhi and akshu"
“Don’t.” Abhira’s voice cut through the air like a whip. “Don’t use ruhi as an excuse. The choices you made were yours, and the way you treated my mother was unforgivable.”
" You did not even care she was pregnant with me and threw her out. At least you could have left her with naksh nanu but you did not because you wanted to punish her" Abhira says
" My mother died without having her family members mourn on her death. My mother could never meet natik parnanu, nanu, mami and mamu" Abhira reveals painfully. The thought of her mother, vibrant and full of life, has been dead for over a year made her chest tighten. Her mother could never know how she had another family who loved her.
“Abhira…” Surekha stepped forward hesitantly. “We’re sorry. All of us. We never meant to hurt her, or you. You don’t know how much we’ve thought about it… about her. We regret it. All of us do.”
Kabir scoffs hearing it. What will they regret do now?. Will it bring akshara massi back.
Abhira felt the pressure building behind her eyes, the weight of everything pressing down on her chest. Their regret didn’t change anything. Not yet. The past was too heavy, and the scars of her mother's pain was too deep for her.
“Regret?” Abhira repeated bitterly. “It’s easy to regret after everything’s gone. my mother had to bury herself under your contempt. You don’t get to regret it now and think that it will make up for the years of pain you caused.”
Her voice wavered for a moment as the tears she had buried for so long began to surface. But she quickly wiped them away, steadying herself. “I’m not here for your apologies. I came here to visit my Nani's dance academy and I don't want people like you visiting it and acting emotional after what you did to my mother ”
" Abhira dekho come with us beta. We are your family. We will take care of you and look after you" Manish pleads her.
Before abhira could reply, Kabir had interrupted in
" So that you do the same with Abhira that you did with akshu massi" He scoffs," you always kept aarohi aunty above akshu massi and expected her to sacrifice and understand her sister but never once you let go of aarohi aunty. You want to do the same with Abhira and that ruhi. Making abhira sacrifice everything for ruhi"
Manish shook his head, " Kabir I would never do that. My heart knows how I have treated Akshu and aaru. They were both precious to me and same goes with Abhira and Ruhi "
Swara looks at Manish with a mix of frustration and disbelief.
" Oh please we have seen your equality" swara says sharply, " when you send akshu massi to hostel and kept aarohi aunty at home and how well you emotionally blackmailed my family, Kabir's family and even rajvansh to not keep ties with akshu massi and Kairav mama telling aarohi aunty will feel alone because we will be showering more love to akshu massi and Kairav massa. Like fools the family thought about one innocent child and kept distance with the other children. The way they all regretted it after realising the truth"
Manish clears his throat getting defensive, " I did not do no such thing. Aarohi needed us more and that time she was blaming akshara for seerat's death so I thought it's better to keep both of them away "
" If you wanted to keep them away, you could have send massi with any of the families but you let her grow up in a hostel without any love and affection and gave everything to your pyaari Aarohi"
" To think that naira nani died saving such ungrateful family makes me sad and angry" Kabir's outburst hit everyone here. Manish knew whatever justification he gave, it was not going to mend the relationship between both the families. He knew in his heart he had wronged akshu very badly.

“Maa phir bhi aapse pyar kiya after all you people did,” Abhira whispered, as if the words might somehow fill the space that her mother had left behind. “She should have hated you guys .”
Everyone looked on in silence. Kabir and swara stood closer to abhira. Goenkas should be thanking good that meera wasn't here otherwise she would have got the guards thrown them out kabir thinks. Goenkas had wanted to reach out, to bridge the gap, to ask for forgiveness. But they were too late.
Swarna reached out tentatively, her voice barely a whisper. “Abhira, please… can’t we… can’t we try to fix this? To bring the family together again?”
Abhira turned back, her face resolute. “No. You can’t fix what’s already broken. You had your chance. My mother… she was never your priority. And you were never my family. You were always the ones who chose everything over here”
She stood taller now, a quiet strength in her posture. “I don’t need your forgiveness, nor do I need to forgive you. I’ve had to live my entire life without you. And I’ve made my peace with that.”
There was a long silence, and then Manish stepped forward, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “Abhira… we’re sorry for everything. But we… we understand if you can’t forgive us.”

“I’ll never forget,” she said softly, “but I’ll find peace without you guys. I have my family with me, the family who will prioritise me”
Abhira took a deep breath and turned toward the other hand, her heart heavy but free. The goenkas walked away , Carrying the weight of what had been lost.