Page 32 of Mrs. Pandey
I clutched the pen in my hand so hard I thought it would break or maybe pierce my palm beyond repair. It wasn't just his words; it was the look on his face that truly twisted the knife. A mix of accusation and disgust.
"Aryan didn't reject me!" I said, though the lie sounded weak even to my own ears. My chest tightened, a sharp, familiar pain building inside.
"We... we just had a...it never worked out. And you, Prashant, never said anything about a future with me after you came back from your mission. You became a ghost, roaming our lives, touching no emotion!"
He mocked me without even a hint of humor. "And what did you expect, Ira? A red carpet and a proposal when you rejectedme three years ago? You clung to me like a lifeline when your beloved Aryan was gone, and then abandoned me when he reappeared?"
"That's not fair!" My voice cracked, choked with emotion.
"You were different! You left for three months and came back... broken! I tried, Prashant. I tried to reach out to you, but you kept pushing me away. I cared about you...I always did."
"Cared?" he repeated, his eyes narrowing, flashing with a sudden, dangerous intensity.
"Is that what you call it, Ira? Because from where I was standing, it seemed so convenient. A soft landing until your real life began again." He took a step forward, his presence looming, oppressive.
"You used me to fill a void, didn't you? And now that that void is back, you think I'm a convenient solution again."
My breath caught. His words were arrows, each one hitting its target with brutal precision. He was right, in a way. The thought gripped me, ripping away the last shred of hope I'd been clinging to.
"You know nothing," I whispered, my voice barely audible. "You don't know what I felt, what I suffered."
"Oh, I think I know exactly what you felt," he retorted, his voice dripping with ice.
"You felt comfortable. You felt safe. You felt like you had a backup plan. And now that your Plan A has collapsed, you'redesperately trying to activate Plan B. But guess what, Ira? I'm not a plan. I'm not a consolation prize. And I'm definitely not a rebound."
He turned his back to me, the hard line of his shoulders speaking volumes.
"Find someone else, Ira. Someone who fits into your carefully constructed life. Someone who isn't burdened by debt and family expectations. Someone who can give you mansions and jewels. Because that's what you really want, isn't it?"
The silence that followed was deafening, broken only by the sound of my own heartbeat. Every word he'd spoken was like a hammer blow, shattering the last vestiges of hope, leaving me bereft and bloodied. The man who had once looked at me like I was the only woman in the world now looked at me with disdain.
And the pain of that the harsh, cruel reality of his rejection felt worse than any headache or hangover.
It felt like my very soul had been ripped apart.
Prashant turned, made a quick, decisive move, and left. The soft click of the door closing resounded in the sudden, cavernous silence of the room.
My gaze fell to my palm, where a thin line of red, surprisingly bright, had begun to seep into my skin. I had pressed the pen so hard that the tip had sunk in. A hard, raspy breath escaped my lips, and I shut my eyes briefly the physical pain a dull counterpoint to the sharp ache in my chest. His words, spoken with such cold precision, had seeped into me like ink on blotting paper, forever scarring my mind, my soul.
Prashant, the man who had once looked at me as if I held the secrets of the whole milky way had become a stranger, mean and cruel.
My fingers, still shaking slightly, fumbled for my phone. I had only one call, one decision left to solidify the new, jagged edges of my reality. I dialed my mother's number.
She finally picked up, her voice the usual mix of expectation and impatience.
"Have you made up your mind?" she asked, the question hanging in the air, full of unspoken implications of security, of a future now devoid of the complexities of a love irrevocably shattered.
"I'm ready to marry that doctor, Mom," I replied, my voice a flat, cold line, devoid of enthusiasm. It was simply a statement.
Before she could begin her usual list of congratulations or further inquiries, I hit the 'end call' button, ending the conversation ending the possibility of further questions for which I had no answers.
A single, silent tear slid down my cheek. I let out a shaky, quick breath, as if expelling the last reserves of air from my lungs.
That day, in the quiet of my office, I truly understood the meaning of rejection, not the casual dismissal of an acquaintance, but the internal, heartbreaking finality of being unwanted by the man with whom I had once dreamed of building a family. A life that now seemed impossibly distant.
The irony was a bitter taste in my mouth: I had rejected him years ago, chasing the supposed security of a life gone wrong and now he had returned the favor, with brutal interest.
I wiped my tears and shook my head angrily. There was no time for that. No room for weakness.
