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Sahil's POV

By the time I caught the wind of her words and finally dragged my sorry ass out of the office, the day had already slipped into melancholic darkness.

Sahil Shrivastava.

My name was all I stood by today, but what good was it when there was no one to give two shits for the man behind the name?

Does anyone know not just the heartless billionaire but Sahil who felt and breathed emotions, who had once known how to love and be loved. And had long since disappeared.

Whatever I was then had turned into a shell now, holding without purpose, devoid of life.

I had been clinging to keep afloat alone with my twins when my first love left me, widowed by a cruel twist of fate, something I had no control over.

But right now, my fate was punishing me for my own choices, my own stubbornness.

Today, I was losing the only one I had left—the woman who had tried to bring light back into my life.

My wife.

Pratiksha Naik.

More dedicated to me than I had ever been to her in the five years we'd known each other. She had carried burdens that weren't hers to bear, yet she shouldered them without complaint, simply because they were mine.

As the car pulled up to our home, a sense of foreboding washed over me. The familiar sight of my front door loomed before me, but it felt different tonight. The usual sounds of laughter and light-hearted conversations, the warmth that Pratiksha had brought into this mansion, were missing. The house or so I would like to call it without her felt empty, hollow, like a dream stripped of its hope.

She had insisted on moving into this house, saying it was to help me in her duties as my assistant, but I knew the unsaid truth.

She wanted to be close to me, to be a part of my world. And I, blind and foolish, had gone along with it, ignoring what it meant to her.

I treated her as my assistant, not my wife. I kept her at arm's length when she deserved to be held close.

As I walked inside, it felt even the walls were holding their breath, waiting for something to break the tension. I found my twins in their room, huddled with their caretaker, their innocent faces lighting up when they saw me.

But there was no sign of Pratiksha. She was gone already, and I hadn’t even thought to ask where she was. I was so wrapped up in my own fulmination and frustrations that I hadn’t seen the toll it was taking on her.

Soon enough, the children abandoned their activities and rushed towards me, their little arms wrapping around my legs. I crouched down to meet them, their warm embraces bringing a temporary solace but even their love couldn’t extinguish the guilt burning inside me.

These innocent lives had no idea that their father was a failure, that he had pushed away the one person who loved them as much as I did. The one person who had become the sole anchor of our fractured family.

When the kids were done with my company, they looked expectantly behind me, their eyes wide and innocent, filled with questions that I dreaded answering.

"Where's Mama?" Neel and Nyesa’s small voices cut through the chaos I was feeding upon, filled with concern. "Didn't she come back with you today?" Their simple question was like a punch to the gut. The weight of it pressed down on me, almost suffocating.

Pratiksha was their world. To them, she was their mother.

They had been barely a month old when Aavya passed away, leaving a void in their existence that Pratiksha had filled with her love and care. They called her 'Mama' first, a title she had never asked for but had earned with every sacrifice she made for them. And I...I hadn’t even called her my wife, not until today, not until I realized the gravity of my mistakes.

"Your Mama is with her parents." I managed to say, my voice barely holding steady. I pushed Neel's curls away from his face, trying to mask the turmoil inside me. "Her father isn't feeling good, and she's there to look after him."

"Uff, Daddy!" Nyesa grumbled, throwing her arms around me. "You should've told her to be okay too." Her innocent complaint was laced with a wisdom that belied her years.

"Yes, Daddy. Mama cares for everyone else but forgets about herself." My boy added.

God, even the kids could see what I had been too blind to acknowledge. The woman was always giving, always putting everyone else before herself. She had given up so much for us, for me, and what had I done in return? I had taken her for granted, pushed her away, treated her like an afterthought.

I was a fool. A selfish, ungrateful fool.

I pulled them into another hug, their small bodies pressed against me.

They were so pure, so full of love, and I had been too encased in my own misery to see the pain I was causing them, causing her.

I had let my demons tear apart what she had built for us, and now I was paying the price by standing in the ruins of the life we could have had together. I had to fix this, I knew. I had to make it right. But how? How do you apologize for years of neglect? How do you make up for the pain you’ve caused the one person who gave you everything without asking for anything in return?

I had no answers to that, only regrets.

Regrets that were now too late to change.

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After tucking the kids into bed and sending the caretaker off, I found myself fixated on my phone waiting for Pratiksha.

I had sent her a text earlier, asking about her well-being and her father’s condition, but there was no response. Not even the double ticks indicating that she had read it.

The lack of communication was eating at me, leaving me caught in a cycle of worry and indecision. But what should I do?

Call her? Show up at the hospital? Or perhaps—the doorbell's sudden ring snapped me out of my spiralling thoughts.

My heart leaped with an irrational hope that it might be her. I rushed to the door, nearly tripping over myself, and flung it open.

But it wasn’t her and my father instead.

“Dad?” I blurted out, my voice betraying a mix of surprise and confusion. “What are you doing here?”

“Hello to you too, Sahil.” Swapan Shrivastava, waved in my face. “Now my boy, are you going to let me in, or are we having this conversation on your doorstep?” He asked, raising an eyebrow, prompting me to step aside while trying to figure out the reason for his unexpected visit at this hour.

“Is Mom here too?” I asked as he walked past me and made his way to the sofa in the living room. “Your mother?” Dad clicked his tongue with a weary sigh. “No, she’s not here.” He looked around the room. “Are the children asleep?”

“Yeah, they’re in bed.” I muttered, still standing by the door, grappling with incoherence. Before I could say anything else, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a bottle, holding it up with a faint smile. “Care for a drink?”

“You know I don’t drink, Dad,” I said, frowning. “What were you thinking, bringing alcohol into my house?”

“Shut up, Sahil. I know you better than you think I do. Besides, this isn’t what you think.” He unscrewed the cap, and I caught a whiff of something that definitely wasn’t alcohol. “It’s buttermilk, for God’s sake. I just brought it in a bottle I found on the way here.”

“Buttermilk?” I blinked, dumbfounded, feeling a twinge of being treated like a child. “You brought buttermilk for me?”

He ordered me to get glasses and I let out a sigh before heading to the kitchen. I grabbed two glasses and returned to the living room, where Dad was eager to pour our glasses. I sat down beside him, accepting the glass he handed over. We sat in silence for a few minutes, the only sound being the occasional clink of glass as he sipped his drink. My drink, however, remained untouched and mind a tumultuous storm.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Pratiksha, about everything that had transpired, and how badly I had messed things up.

There was something about her that had always managed to get under my skin. From the day she had walked into my life, she had been chipping away at the walls I had carefully constructed around myself.

Her kindness and warmth seeped through the cracks of my emotionally invincible fortress. I had convinced myself it was nothing more than a natural affection for someone so genuinely caring.

Yet, deep down, even during those phases of staunch denial, I knew better. I was fighting a losing battle against my own emotions, and Pratiksha was at the center of it all.

“Dad!” I finally blurted out, unable to keep it bolted inside any longer. “Can hurting someone be forgiven?” He didn’t answer immediately, staring into his glass as if seeking answers from its contents.

“It depends,” Dad began slowly, “on whether the hurt was caused intentionally or unintentionally.”

Seeing the hurt in Pratiksha’s eyes and hearing the pain in her voice had made me realize how selfish I had been.

And she deserved so much better—better than my actions and me.

“So, what you’re saying is forgiveness isn’t even an option in my case?” A bitter irony escaped my lips sounding harsh even to my own ears.

“Getting forgiven isn’t in our hands after the bridges we’ve burned, Sahil.” He pointed out with a sad smile. “But seeking forgiveness is the only way forward. And if the person and the regret are important to you, you should at least try. You owe them and yourself that much.”

After what felt like an eternity the confession eased out on my lips came out before I could stop. “Dad… I got married.” The words felt heavy on my tongue, as if admitting them made everything more real, more unforgiving than before.

“I know.” His calmness was unnerving, as if discussing my personal life was nothing extraordinary.

I sputtered in bamboozlement. “You know?”

“Shouldn’t I?”

“No, I mean—I got married three years ago. Again.”

“I know that too.” I gaped at him, mouth half-open in shock. How did he know? I hadn’t told him anything. Who else did?

“You ended up married in some forest out of nowhere, and the woman you regret hurting right now is the same one you married back then.” He glanced at me with a smug glare of resignation. “You think I don’t know about my own son?”

I was at a loss for words. Pratiksha hadn’t told him, that much I was sure of. But here he was, unravelling the secrets I had kept long hidden.

“How… how do you know that?” I finally managed to stammer.

“I’m your father, Sahil.” His voice softened. “I’ve known you since you were a toothless infant. There’s not much you can hide or try to hide from me.” I sighed, shoulders slumping.

I had hurt Pratiksha with my indifference, with my refusal to acknowledge the bond that was growing between us.

I had pushed her away, turning a blind eye to her love. My fear of betraying Aavya's memory had clouded my judgment, and today when everything had come crashing down and I learnt that I was the architect of my own misery.

“If you knew… why didn’t you say anything, Dad? Why did you let me be such a stone-cold bastard to her for so long?”

“Because you never accepted or even called her your wife before today. But now, you do apart from taking your sweet time being a goddamn prick” He leaned back on the sofa, his expression unreadable. “It’s good you’ve realised it… though it might be too late.”

I shook my head vehemently, refusing to accept the possibility that it could be too late. But he remained silent, only pulling out his phone and handing it to me. On the screen was an email addressed to him—from Pratiksha.

It was short, formal, and to the point that she was quitting her job.

“No… This can’t be happening." The words blurred on the screen, but the message was crystal clear. Pratiksha had quit. Not just from her job. No. From us. From me. I felt my heart drop like a stone into my stomach. My breath hitched, and I blinked hard, as if somehow, some way, the email might disappear. As if it would rewrite itself with better news. But no. There it was. "She’s not leaving. I’ll fix this, Dad. I will go and talk to her. I’ll apologize.” I jumped to my feet, scrambling hastily for my car keys, ready to drive to the hospital, to her parent’s house, or anywhere she might be.

“What are you going to say to her now, Sahil?” Dad’s voice stopped me short in my tracks. “Are you sorry now? That she should come back to you? And if she refuses, what then? Will you just order her around like always? Tell her to forget everything you’ve put her through, just like you told her to forget the promises you didn’t keep after you two got married?”

His words were a slap to my face both sharp and stinging.

I swallowed hard, the lump in my throat growing until it felt like I was choking. I slowly turned back to him, my hands trembling as I dropped the keys onto the coffee table and sank back onto the sofa, feeling utterly defeated.

"She’s... she’s done, Dad." I muttered, my voice cracking, my hands shaking like I’d just been told my world had ended. And, in a way, it had. "She’s leaving me."

Dad said nothing at first, just watched me with those keen eyes that had always seen through my defences, knowing more about the mess I’d created than I’d ever realised myself.

His silence felt like a judgement I couldn’t escape. But I didn’t want to escape. I needed the truth. I needed someone to tell me why Pratiksha—my wife, who had stayed through every storm, who had carried the weight of our family when I couldn’t—was walking away now. Why now, when I was ready to finally give her what she deserved? Not that I did anything for her to wait for me even once.

“What should I do then?” I asked anyway.

“You wait, son.” Dad said softly. “You let her take her time away from you. You’ve already pushed her far enough to make her rethink being stuck with you in this half-hearted arrangement. Words alone won’t be enough this time. You need to show her through your actions that you truly mean it when you call her your wife. Show her what she deserves. Let her hear you, let her see you. The real you. Not with the shadows of your past holding you back but with the forgotten depth of your real feelings. Don’t give up and most importantly this time, give her the choice. Let her decide if she wants to come back.” I nodded slowly, recognizing the truth in his words. As much as I was impatient to admit it, Dad was right.

For the first time in years, I allowed myself to hope, to believe that maybe, just maybe, I could find happiness again. Aavya's memory would always be a part of me, a cherished part that introduced me to love and gave me two beautiful children, but that didn’t mean I had to live in the past and hurt everyone around me.

Every beat of my heart wanted to embrace the present and find my happiness with Pratiksha, who had given me everything she had patiently. It was my turn to give her and give everything far and beyond what she deserved.

I had to take the leap, show that I was willing to change, that I could be the man she deserved.

And I had to hope that my wife would choose me again.

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Lots of Love,

ANKITA