Sun Saiyaan

"I'm sorry that I'm not sorry."

. . .

Chapter 19

"I'm sorry, I was selfish and obsessed. I didn't let go even after you told me to let go. You faced all the hate and backlash alone, when it was. . ."

"Nothing was your fault Ragini." Sanskaar sensed Ragini was about to blurt the truth out about her being involved too and he didn't want that, he was happy to receive the hate all on his own.

"It is! You told me to stop loving Lakshya but I couldn't. I started to hate that him and Swara were getting married. I still hate the fact they were together. I hated that he chose her and not me."

"Shh, Ragini it's okay."

"It's not okay. . ." She cried and sniffed, "what's okay?" She sounded so done with Sanskaar, she was starting to find herself feeling frustrated because he was being too kind.

Durga Prasad, Annapurna, Ram, Parineeta, Adarsh, Uttara and Sujata glanced at Ragini upsettingly and helpless, feeling bad that Ragini had to feel that way while Lakshya looked on.

"I still don't wish good for anyone who didn't see my pain and happiness. . . I still wish bad upon them. So how is that okay?"

He wiped his tears while Sujata wiped hers too, she felt thankful to Ragini for taking a stand for Sanskaar.

"You don't have to be good to anyone else, just don't be harsh to yourself and, be good to yourself!" He answered back and she felt frustration boil inside of her, she couldn't take his kindness anymore, she found it unfair.

"Stop being kind!" She shouted and broke the hug, "you took all the blame for what happened on your shoulders, you faced it all alone, but I was. . ."

"Shh Ragini, calm down." He held her by the shoulders and shook his head negatively but she scoffed, ignoring him, "I was in this plan with you!"

Sujata gasped at the revelation that she did not want everyone to hear, while Annapurna, Durga Prasad, Lakshya, Adarsh, Ram and Uttara widened their bewildered eyes.

"You must've felt so lonely, it wasn't fair and it still isn't. How can they hate you more and not hate me at all? I was involved too! I supported you in your plan. . . I was the one who. . ."

"Ragini!" Sanskaar raised his tone, making her jump and shook his head at her, signing her not to speak anymore.

Lakshya stormed towards them, "what?"

Ragini refused to face him and merely blinked at Sanskaar, Lakshya aggressively grabbed her by the arm and forced her to face him.

"What did you just say?"

Ragini blinks at Lakshya with glassy eyes, "I already said what I needed to say to you."

Lakshya grit his teeth and took a deep breath in, "you ruined mine and Swara's life? You supported him in his plan! You. . ." Lakshya was soon interrupted by Sanskaar who freed Ragini from his hold.

"Talk to me, leave her out of this. She had nothing to do with this." Lakshya clenched his fist in anger and then held Sanskaar by the collar, "you two ruined my life!" He screamed and then punched Sanskaar across the face.

Ragini, Sujata, Annapurna, Uttara and Parineeta jump in shock and gasp by the sudden sight.

"What did I ever do to deserve this?" Lakshya questioned, with tears falling out of his eyes.

Sanskaar stared at Lakshya with glassy eyes, lowering his gaze. He felt so apologetic towards Lakshya that he couldn't hold the eye contact anymore.

"Lakshya. . . Leave him." Sujata walked towards them, trying to free Sanskaar from Lakshya's hold.

"Not today!" Lakshya yelled, starting to drag Sanskaar by the collar.

"Leave him." Ragini stepped in between, stopping Lakshya from dragging Sanskaar any further.

"I will deal with you later!" Lakshya threatened with pure hatred in his eyes, he couldn't believe the audacity of the two.

"LEAVE HIM!" Ragini repeated again but this time in a stern tone, she wiped her tears and held Lakshya's hand, pulling him away from Sanskaar.

"You're the reason I did this! You played with my feelings and hurt me so badly!" She screamed at him and let go of his hand, "I regret it! I regret every single second and minute I had feelings for you! I regret the day I met you! I regret everything! You ruined my life. You ruined my peace and my happiness. You broke my heart! You made me insecure! You made me evil! I wish I had never met you! YOU made me a MONSTER!" She yelled on the top of her lungs, blaming him and he looked on, startled by her words.

"It wasn't Sanskaar. It was you! Sanskaar only tried to free me from the monster that you awakened! But it wasn't only you, it was everyone! All of you had pushed me to become a monster. If it wasn't for Sanskaar and Sujata Aunty then I don't know what I would've done. The monster inside me would've eaten me alive." Her tears started flowing out again and she closed her eyes, touching her chest. "When. . . Everything and everyone around me broke me into pieces, it was Sanskaar who collected those pieces and tried to fix me, while all of you were laughing, and enjoying! Did you guys not even feel apologetic towards me? Not even once?" She opened her eyes while questioning everyone in the room. Sanskaar felt overwhelmed and lowered his head, he was grateful towards Ragini for supporting him but more at ease knowing she knew he was always there for her. He was at ease knowing Ragini never truly hated him.

Durga Prasad lowered his head and Lakshya scoffed, "the audacity to do this drama when. . ." He stopped after he felt his cheek sting and his head pushed to the side with a force, he was confused until he processed what just happened. Ragini had slapped him across the face, shocking everyone.

"Drama?" Ragini scoffed and then stared at him in disbelief. "Me expressing my emotions is now drama?" Lakshya was too shocked to reply and Ragini continued "when is it never a drama for everyone? When I have emotions it's a drama and not valid but when all of you have emotions it's a whole different story. Why? Are you all only humans, am I not?"

Hearing the silence she then stared at Durga Prasad who raised his head to look at Ragini. "You were the one who started this. Not only with me but with Sanskaar too. You made him a monster without taking any accountability for what you did. Then you sent Lakshya to me to break me. How can you only blame Sanskaar? Does he not have a heart? Why do all of you keep abusing him?"

Sanskaar held Ragini's hand and she turned to face him, he shook his head negatively. "Why? Why shouldn't I say the truth? Why do they keep attacking you and never admitting their own faults? At least we're better than them, we admitted we were wrong and we apologised, but when we try to explain what went wrong they say we do DRAMA!"

"Ragini. . ."

"No Sanskaar, not today. It's enough. It's enough of us only hurting. It's not fair! And I won't ever regret speaking up. They made us like this. They ruined our life. They made us hate them and now they blame us? If they had seen us as humans with feelings then would we have been standing here now in this situation? I'm sick and tired of them! I'm tired of trying to explain when they clearly don't care about us. We were never important for them, it had always been Swara and Lakshya. Sanskaar and Ragini shouldn't have existed, right? What's the point of having a family like them when they only suffocate and abuse us? I hate my family too. I used to respect my Daadima but after what happened to my Mumma I can never forgive her. I can never forgive Shekhar Gadodia and his family. The love I yearned for I saw him give it to Swara but now it makes sense why he never loved me properly, because he always felt apologetic for killing my Mumma. Swara was his love child and I was his unwanted child. I could've had a mother like Sujata Aunty who would've protected me, but Shekhar Gadodia took her away from me. . ." Ragini stopped speaking and started sobbing while covering her face.

Durga Prasad, Adarsh, Annapurna, Ram, Lakshya, Parineeta and Uttara were flabbergasted after hearing Shekhar killed Ragini's mother. Sujata felt apologetic towards Ragini, she wanted to do something but didn't know what to do to ease her pain. How hard must her heart be breaking thinking about her mother. Despite not being her mother Sujata wanted to now fill that role.

"Ragini." Sanskaar leaned in front of her, moving her hands away from her face, "shall we run away together? Away from everyone who hurt us? Shall we build our lives again? No more Maheshwari's, no more Gadodia's, just you, your family and me and my Mom and sister?"

Her heart skipped a beat after hearing him and she opened her eyes, blinking her wet eyes with smudged mascara at him.

"Then we can meet again. When we're no longer hurting." He further added and she looked on, she thought he meant that they should start a new life together as a family rather than separately.

She nodded her head at him, and he curved a small smile over his lips, "we have a flight to catch." He forwarded his hand and she looked down at it, holding it and both of them start running out.

She felt a warm sensation around her heart and scoffed at their silliness, they had ran away amid a serious conversation, leaving the rest confused.

X X

Somewhere near Chennai.

Raghav was sat on the desk on his laptop in his room, furiously typing on the keyboard. "So what if I can't go, that won't stop me from helping Akka!" He mumbles to himself and finishes typing, rereading what he wrote.

He was pleased and then pressed the submit button on the page, curling a smirk. "Now no one can save them."

"Save who?" Raghav turned around and watched Dhruva walking into his room, "them. . ." Raghav replied and swallowed his spit, standing up from his chair.

Dhruva creased his forehead and then realised who Raghav meant when he said them, "what did you do?"

"I wrote a complaint to the Kolkata police saying that Shekhar Gadodia and his mother Parvati Gadodia forced their daughter Ragini Gadodia to get married without her consent. It was a forced marriage which is against the law."

"You what?"

"I couldn't just sit here and watch, I had to do something so I did that. That was the only way I could help." Raghav argued back and Dhruva sighed, he put his hand over his hip and looked at Raghav, "good job!"

Raghav sighed a relief, "hopefully now they'll go jail and Akka will be free from that forced marriage."

"But how did you do that online?" Dhruva asked as he was curious and Raghav showed him the laptop screen, "the police have their own websites where we can report crimes online so I used that. I also emailed the NGO for women just in case. But it's really the end for them now." Raghav proudly uttered with a smile over his lips and Dhruva smiled too.

"Finally! Once they get arrested we can revoke the restraining order and get Ragini here with us." Dhruva was relieved that tears formed in his eyes, he couldn't express how grateful he was right now for this moment. As much as he had tried he couldn't get anywhere near Ragini due to a restraining order put against him and Ravi, but now this opportunity to revoke the restraining order knocked on his doors after years, he was over the moon.

"We will get her divorced too, I'm not letting her sacrifice her happiness and stay in that baseless marriage, only to be abused by her husband the same way Amma was abused by her husband." Raghav uttered and Dhruva nodded his head positively, agreeing to Raghav. "I'll go share this news with Appa!" Dhruva exclaimed and Raghav nodded his head.

"What news?" Ravi walked inside questioning after hearing the last sentence Dhruva said, Dhruva turned around and smiled.

X X

In the car.

"You two ran away leaving me and Uttara to drag the suitcases, lucky enough Adarsh offered to help otherwise me and Uttara would've fell down while bringing the suitcases." Sujata complained as she blinked at Ragini who was sat next to her and then at Sanskaar who was sat next to the driver.

"Sorry." Ragini apologised in a low voice and lowered her head, Sujata held her hand. "Sorry for what? Don't be sorry! I just said it to complain. I don't literally mean it."

"Mom likes to do that, after all that's what Moms do." Uttara uttered while sitting on the other side of Sujata, looking outside the window. She was confused for two seconds, processing what had happened earlier slowly. It was a shock to her to hear that Ragini was also involved with Sanskaar's plan, to ruin the marriage of Swara and Lakshya. She's trying to understand and assess the situation, not quite comfortable yet.

"Yes, and that's why I wanted to do that with you." Sujata curled a smile while placing her other hand on top of Ragini's hand. "I know I can never be your mother, but I would like to be your second mother. Someday if we meet again and if you decide to live with your family in Chennai, then I'd still want to be someone you can rely on and someone who will tell you off for making the littlest mess." Ragini's eyes welled up with tears and she let them drop, her heart was overwhelmed by Sujata's words, it was as if Sujata had put a pinch of her brightness inside her to defrost her ice cold heart.

"Thank you." She responded with a warm smile and placed her other hand on top of Sujata's hand, "it means a lot."

The car stopped outside the airport, "we're here." The driver said, unlocking the doors and then stepped out to assist Sanskaar, who had stepped out of the car too to get the suitcases.

Ragini, Uttara and Sujata stepped out too, thanking the driver who drove them here.

X X

Maheshwari Mansion.

It was pure silence, everyone were too shocked to process everything all at once. Ram was in his own room sat on the bed, thinking. Whereas Durga Prasad and Annapurna were in their room, sat next to each other but silent, Lakshya was in his room sat on the floor crying his eyes out. Adarsh and Parineeta were in the hall, sat on the sofas.

"Adarsh Ji, what will happen now?" Parineeta questioned and Adarsh shrugged, "I don't know Pari. It all really ended. I had hopes that it'll be fixed but now I lost all my hopes. Sanskaar is gone, so is Chachi and Uttu. We've lost them." Adarsh felt his heart sinking as he spoke, he was shattered by the thought that now his family will no longer be complete because Sanskaar, Sujata and Uttara have left them and Lakshya was abandoned by Swara.

"It's all Ragini's fault." Parineeta uttered and then closed her eyes, "but I can't seem to blame her because it's my fault too, its Papa Ji's fault too, it's Maa's fault too, it's Chacha Ji's fault too, it's Sanskaar's fault too, it's Chachi Ji's fault too, it's Swara's fault too and it's Lakshya's fault too!" Parineeta added while crying.

"I wish the situation didn't have to turn out this way, even though Ragini and Sanskaar were in the wrong, we can't blame them because we're partially responsible for that behaviour." Adarsh uttered while sighing, "there's nothing we can do now." He added and clenched his fist, closing his eyes.

"Ragini has been through a lot, she mentioned finding out her father killed her mother. What did she mean by that, did he really. . ." Parineeta was confused yet shocked as she recalled the statement made by Ragini and Adarsh nodded his head.

"I don't know, but we should find out." He looked at her and she nodded her head at him, "but how?" He curled a small smile, "leave that to me."

"Adarsh Ji. . . There's something I want to tell you." Parineeta hesitantly spoke, and Adarsh looked at her slightly confused, "what?" As he sensed her hesitation now he was curious to know what she had to say.

"I wanted to tell everyone together, but I guess that will remain incomplete. How can I say this amid this chaos, it feels wrong to celebrate it now, but I believe you have the right to know. So I won't hide it from you." She continued and then looked Adarsh in the eye, gaining courage "I'm 3 months pregnant, I found out two months ago, I didn't tell anyone because I wanted to make sure I was at 3 months, because the Doctor said there was a chance of a miscarriage so I didn't want to tell this news to everyone only to lose the child at the end of it, but now the Doctor said the chances of my miscarriage are lower than before. So I wanted to tell all of you."

Adarsh was stunned and he stood up, "you're pregnant?" Parineeta nervously nodded her head positively. "Yes."

He walked towards her and pulled her into a hug, "I don't know what to say, but thank you!" He expressed his gratitude and Parineeta curled a small smile, hugging him back. "You're not upset at me for hiding it for two months?"

"No." He softly uttered and patted her back, "Thank you Pari." He added and her eyes welled up as she hugged him tightly. 

T o B e C o n t i n u e d

. . .

✨❤️ THANK YOU FOR READING! ❤️✨

Guess who's back, back again! So I'm finally with another chapter! I'm sorry for the huge delay, I got caught finishing my work assignments.

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And signing off for today,
H 😘🫶🏼✨