Her Past

Before one year, a minister was admitted in the hospital with heart attack. I was assigned to attend the case. I asked him to go through a few tests. After seeing the reports, I found that he was pretending the heart stroke to escape from a rape case. I gave report against him and called the police and the media. The minister was arrested.

After a week, I got a call from an unknown number.

"Hello, Khushi madam."

"Who is this?"

"My name is not important now, but do you know Vidya?"

"Vidya? what happened to my sister?"

"So far, nothing has happened to your sister, but if you don’t reach room number 104 at hotel Vema within fifteen minutes, anything could happen to your sister. It's all in your hands. Come alone or you may find your sister in the way which you can never imagine."

I hurried from there to the Vema hotel. Abhi saw me and called me, but I didn’t stop. Abhi followed me. I went to the said place. There I found minister's son. He tried to molest me but Abhi fought and saved me.

The minister's son locked me in the room and called the police. The police arrested Abhi and me. Our photos came in the newspaper as per the minister’s plan blaming my character.

Shockingly, Vidya was safe and she was not abducted. So, I failed in proving my innocence in the court. Both of our parents decided to get me married to Abhi. I didn’t accept for the marriage, but Abhi convinced me. I accepted for the reputation of both the families.

"Khushi, I know that you love Shajan but he changed a lot these days. The main thing is that he won’t understand the situations. He won’t trust you. After all this, definitely he won’t marry you. I am not forcing you but to make your parents saved from the words of the people around, I think we have to accept this marriage," Abhi said.

"But we don’t love each other."

"I am sorry to say this but I love you from our college days. As I know you and Shajan were in love, I didn’t say this to you until now. Let's marry but I will never force you to accept me. I will wait until you love me and until then let's be friends. If you can’t accept me forever, it's ok for me," Abhi said and I agreed for the marriage.

Shajan didn’t know this and even if I say, he wouldn't trust me. I was frightened of Shajan’s anger. I don't know how cruel he will become now.

Shajan opened the door and asked me to sit near him. He was smoking and left the smoke on my face. I coughed hard and my eyes filled with water due to severe coughing.

"Until now I didn’t smoke at home as I know you are allergic to smoking. But today I am smoking just to suffer you," Shajan said.

I got up to go away but he caught my hand and made me sit on the bed again.

"Don’t try to escape, because wherever you go, I will follow."

Saying this, he caught my palm and burned it with cigar. I shouted with pain and he left my hand. I cried out of the pain.

"Shout more. I am experiencing more pain than this because of you and Abhi."

Shajan held my hand and threw me out of the house.

"Shajan, please understand me," I said.

"Shut up. Stand here for the whole night. The weather is too cold and awesome. Enjoy it.

Don’t try to come in and don't move even an inch from this place."

Saying this he closed the door. I stayed there for the whole night crying. He opened the door in the morning.

"Good! You stood in the same place. You should have that fear for me. I am happy to see you in this condition. Come in and get ready to start the work," Shajan said.

I followed him silently and was about to enter the room.

"Stop there. From today you are not allowed to enter my room. You are going to stay in the room assigned to the maid. You must follow the same rules framed for them. Whenever I am talking to you, bend your head and never rise your head before me. Fold your hands before me and behave like a servant," Shajan said.

I went to the maid’s room. I got fresh up and prepared breakfast for him. Shajan had breakfast and threw the remaining food outside ordering me not to have food. He locked me in the maid’s room and went off.

His anger reached to the peak. He made my situation more horrible. What should I do? Somehow I must prove my innocence to him. But how can I prove my innocence without going out? Somehow I must convince him to allow me to prove the truth.

Shajan came back home within an hour. He saw me crying from the window and went to his room. I heard the sounds from his room and understood that he threw all the things in the room.

"Shajan, please open the door. Please allow me to come out," I said and Shajan opened the door and went to his room. I went to the room and found everything thrown in the room. I saw Shajan and he is in tears. I observed his hand bleeding. I went near to him.

"Didn’t your anger went off after burning my hand? Why did you hurt your hand again?"

Saying this I tied the bandage to his hand and Shajan hugged me.

"I really want this love to be true. I love you, Khushi. But I don’t understand why you love Abhi that much. How could you hide such a big truth from me? If you had accepted your mistake and told the truth, I would've forgiven you. But you betrayed me by hiding that you had physical affair with Abhi before our marriage."

"Shajan, I didn’t have any affair with Abhi. Please, trust me. At least give me a chance to prove the truth."

Shajan broke the hug and caught my hair.

"Even now you are not ready to accept your mistake. Get out of my sight."

Someone knocked on the main door. Shajan opened the door and signaled me to go off. I went from there to the kitchen and Shajan came there.

"I invited those business delegates to the home for lunch. I forgot it because of your bullshit. Make it fast and prepare lunch sooner. I don't spare you if you do any mistake in this," Shajan said. I prepared the food and served them.

"Shajan, food is very tasty. You are so lucky to have such a wife," one of them said.

"She is not my wife, just a maid," Shajan said.

I thought to leave from them as I couldn't stand there anymore but Shajan stopped me.

"Don’t you know that you shouldn’t leave like that without the completion of guest's lunch?" Shajan said and I stayed until they finished their lunch. I was in the maid's room resting because of tiredness. Shajan came to me.

"Khushi, Until now I have a habit of listening to my mind. But today I want to listen to my heart. I am giving you a chance to prove yourself. But you shouldn’t go anywhere alone and I will be accompanying you. Prove it within a week. If you can’t prove it, lifelong you will face the same torture and insults from me. If you accept your mistake now, then I will stop all this and will forgive you.

But for that, you should accept that you lost your character and had an affair with Abhi. You should beg me for forgiveness."

"I can’t apologize to you if I haven't made any mistakes. I will prove the truth."

"Until then stay in our room and you will be treated as my wife, but only for a week. Failing to prove makes your situation the worst."