Let Me Love You... and Lose You Too [ON HOLD]

Chapter 22: I've Always Loved You and I Always Will

Parvati contacted Anshuman, and they managed to get Sandhya to the hospital in an ambulance. Anshuman was so worried. She had never seen him so scared before. Parvati was trying to assure him that everything would be okay, but he kept on rubbing Sandhya's hand and apologizing.

"I was mean to you. I'm sorry," he kept saying to her unconscious figure on the way to the hospital. "I love you. I'm so sorry. I forgive you. If you - if you were with someone else, I forgive you. I promise I won't say anything to you. Just wake up. Please."

Parvati didn't know how she was able to deal with the grief in her heart upon seeing Anshuman in this condition, but she managed to pull through for his sake.

"She loves you," Parvati told him. "She didn't tell me directly, but she was asking how you were... and I saw it in her eyes. She really loves you Anshuman."

"I'm an idiot," he told Parvati hoarsely.

"You're not. You reacted normally. Anshuman, it'll be okay. Don't worry. She just fainted," Parvati told him softly.

Anshuman nodded, finding solace in her words. In the hospital, they waited outside the medical room. The hospital staff contacted Sandhya's family.

"What happened to her?" Anshuman asked frantically to the doctor once he came out of Sandhya's room.

"Sorry, it's confidential... but she's okay," the doctor informed him.

"It's confidential? She just passed out right, what's so confidential about that? She takes stress easily... and she doesn't eat properly! That's why she passed out. I'm right, right?" Anshuman asked.

The doctor placed a hand on Anshuman's shoulder.

"Sorry, I cannot say anything more," he answered, and then he walked away.

Anshuman bolted into Sandhya's room and Parvati walked in after him.

Sandhya's eyes were open and she was staring at the ceiling.

"Sandhya," Anshuman said, sounding relieved to see her awake.

He sat down on a chair next to her bed and took her hand, bringing it up to his lips and kissing it lovingly. Parvati watched the interaction, and with a slight ache in her heart, she turned to walk away.

"Parvati," Sandhya called out from her bed.

Parvati stopped in her tracks and turned to look at Sandhya.

"Please come here. I think it's time that I should be truthful," Sandhya told her. "I want to tell you... because only you'll be able to take care of Anshuman after I say this."

Parvati walked back up to the bed and pulled up a chair next to Anshuman.

"What happened?" Parvati asked softly.

"D - don't be upset. Try not to be at least. The truth is that I - I have chronic leukemia," Sandhya finally confessed. "It's been chronic for years. I had to fight to stay in college... and the doctors have given up hope. I don't do chemo because I refused. The doctors told me it could prolong my life a little bit, but not by much. I didn't want to deal with the hair loss and other symptoms, just to add two or three more days. They expect me to die sometime in the next year or two. Before I even finish college... to be honest, the only reason I fought to stay in college, was so I could see you everyday Anshuman..."

Tears spilled from Sandhya's eyes as she finally confessed the truth that Anshuman wanted to hear for so long.

"I love you Anshuman. I really, really do. I don't want to die... I think I can leave everything behind, but it will be so difficult to leave you," Sandhya whispered, between sobs. "You - you have been everything for me. I wish I could have told you this before, b - but I d - didn't want to take you with me. I was dying, but you would be a living corpse. I'm sorry... I'm so sorry."

She brought Anshuman's hand to her mouth and kissed it all over, sobbing, as he watched with shock, unable to register what she just said.

If someone offered Parvati a painful death right now, she would gladly accept. She would do anything to get rid of this burden on her heart. She would give up everything she had in order to avoid having to witness Anshuman going through this kind of pain.

She would lose it all just to shield Anshuman from this bitter truth where he was going to get hurt badly, upon being stabbed by a thousand knives from all angles... not from betrayal, but from loss. 

He loved Sandhya, and now he would have to lose her.