Chapter 17
IRA
I agreed to marry that doctor. I even had a date scheduled with him.
I was back in two-months leave after serving for over a year straight.
I was still posted in Barmer, and Prashant was still my commanding officer.
Aryan had been transferred to Arunachal Pradesh, happily settled with his wife, Avni Rathore, who had just given birth to a baby girl.
That hit me square in the chest.
Aryan, who was supposed to be my husband, had a daughter with another woman. And I was still single and was in so much pain. I decided to give this doctor a chance, especially after Prashant rejected my proposal last year.
When I called my mother and told her I was finally ready to marry him, she arranged the perfect day for us to meet.
I had kept postponing it for months. I didn’t take leave last year, so I kept pushing the date further.
But now, the time had come. I couldn’t make any more excuses. I had to meet this young, smart doctor.
I sat at my favorite restaurant, waiting for him while scrolling through my phone.
I checked my WhatsApp as I got several texts from colleagues.
None from Prashant. Not like he ever did.
He had become more distant, more arrogant since his promotion.
I was nothing in his eyes. He had rejected me so cruelly.
Since then, we barely spoke and when we did, it was strictly professional.
I hated him like the sun hated the night.
“Ira Solanki…?” A masculine voice called from behind me.
I turned slightly and saw a handsome man in spectacles.
He wasn’t as muscular or tall as Prashant, but he looked decent in a grey t-shirt and blue jeans.
His hair was neatly combed, and his beard was well-trimmed, giving him a clean, confident look.
“Yes,” I managed a smile and stood to greet him. “Kabir Rajput?”
“You don’t look like an army officer. I thought you were a model that’s why I got confused. You’re even more beautiful than I imagined, Ira.”
He squeezed my hand gently, as if he didn’t want to let go.
“You don’t look like a doctor either, Doc,” I replied, nodding for him to take a seat. “But here you are with your charming smile.”
I sat across from him, keeping my smile on, no matter how difficult it was to stretch my lips into something that looked genuinely happy. But I wasn’t.
After a few pleasantries, we placed our order.
Kabir chose something light: salad and lemonade while I ordered my usual: grilled chicken and coffee.
Holding my coffee cup helped me hide the hurricane brewing inside.
He spoke about his work, hospital shifts, funny patient stories but I could barely register half of it.
I nodded politely, drank my coffee, and stared at his mouth, pretending to listen.
I tried to focus on this new beginning. I really did.
But every time Kabir smiled, I saw another smile flash through my mind, Prashant’s crooked one, the one he gave me when I beat him in shooting practice. When Kabir complimented me again, I remembered Prashant saying, “You’re more dangerous with your eyes than with a rifle, Warrior.”
I shouldn’t be thinking about Prashant. He had made it clear that he didn’t want me. And Aryan had moved on. He had a family now. Everyone was moving so I would too. I would play my part. I would make my parents happy. This marriage wasn’t about love. It was about responsibility.
I tightened my grip around the coffee cup.
Kabir leaned in slightly. “Ira, are you okay?”
“Yeah, yeah. Just… a long week. Army work.” I forced another smile. God, he couldn’t possibly guess how uncomfortable I was feeling or how uncomfortable I might be making him feel.
He nodded like he understood, like he had seen people wear brave faces before. “You don’t have to pretend with me. We can just talk about anything. Or nothing.”
The softness in his voice caught me off guard. There was no pressure, no judgment, not even about my parents arranging this marriage. Just gentle reassurance.
And for the first time in months, I breathed calmly. At least I was getting a husband who didn’t wear a double face.
I leaned back and looked at him properly. He was kind, easy to talk to, and patient. He didn’t carry the scars of his past. He didn’t know about my reckless heart, the mistakes I’d made, or how I still sometimes dreamed of the scent of Prashant on my uniform.
Maybe that was a gift. Kabir didn’t come with baggage. He was new, clean and fresh. He hadn’t loved me yet, but he hadn’t hurt me either.
We laughed once. Then again.
When he told me how he fainted during his first surgery in the OT, a genuine laugh slipped out of me. For a brief moment, I wasn’t comparing him to Prashant. I was just there, and listening.
But then my phone buzzed.
Prashant: “I heard you’re getting married to that doctor. Congratulations.”
That was it. No emotion. No jealousy. Nothing else. Just enough to shatter the fragile peace I had managed to build around myself.
Kabir looked up. “Is everything okay?”
I nodded slowly. “Yes. Just a message.” But inside, it wasn’t just a message. It was a jolt. A reminder. A silent scream.
“I’m really glad you came today, Ira,” Kabir said sincerely. “I know how hard this must be, especially with the kind of lives we both lead.”
“I’m glad too,” I whispered, not sure I truly meant it. Because Kabir was everything I should want. Everything that made sense.
But my heart? It was still somewhere else. Still tied to a name I couldn’t say out loud anymore.
Prashant.
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“You look happy today,” my mom said as soon as I entered the house. She quickly got up from the sofa and headed straight to me with the same smile she wore whenever I did what she wanted me to do. “How was Kabir? What do you think about him? You know he’s a doctor at AIIMS.”
“He’s nice, respectful, and decent-looking. I’ll need a couple more dates to get to know him better, and then you can decide the date of our marriage if things go as planned. I won’t give you trouble this time.”
I smiled, and my heart warmed when she pulled me into a tight hug. I let out a heavy sigh and hugged her back. I knew she loved me. She was doing this to make me happy, not my father. She was doing it for me, not for him. I kept telling myself that, even though I knew the whole truth.
My father just wanted to get rid of me.
I pulled away and headed straight to my room.
After changing, I lay on the bed and checked my WhatsApp.
My brows furrowed when I saw Prashant had just posted a status.
I tapped on it. And what I saw drained the color from my face.
He was standing next to a beautiful girl in a saree.
She looked young, early twenties maybe as she was holding Prashant’s hand, possessively and showing off a ring.
A ring?
I read the caption. “Just engaged.”
The room spun around me, the ceiling turning into a blurry sheet of white. Just engaged. The words echoed in my mind, each one like a hammer to my already broken heart.
Prashant engaged to someone else?
My hand came to my mouth, stifling the breath that threatened to tear me apart. This couldn’t be happening.
I replayed the image in my mind: her hand linked with his, the ring glinting mockingly on her finger. She was young and beautiful. She was everything I was no longer.
A cold dread seeped into my bones, chilling me from the inside out. That was it then. All this time, a small, foolish part of me had held on to a thread of hope that maybe Prashant would come back. That his rejection last year had been a mistake. A moment of weakness. But this was undeniable.
He had moved on and he was happy.
And here I was, still lying on my bed, staring at a phone that held the evidence of my complete and crushing defeat.
Just hours ago, I had been convincing myself to give Kabir a real chance. To embrace a future that was sane and stable. I told myself I was doing it for my parents, for duty, for peace.
But deep down, I knew it was a desperate attempt to escape the ghost of Prashant. To prove to myself that I could move on too.
And now he had done it first. Effortlessly.
I stared at the screen, a wave of raw, bitter anger boiling inside me.
Anger at Prashant for moving on so easily. Anger at myself for being so na?ve, so pathetically stuck.
And anger at the sheer unfairness of it all.
I wanted to scream. To throw away my phone. To break something, anything, just to let the flood of emotion escape. But I didn’t.
Years of military discipline had taught me to bury pain deep. To compartmentalize.
I took a shaky breath, trying to pull myself together. My eyes drifted to Kabir’s contact in my recent calls.
His soft voice. His patient smile.
He offered me something Prashant never could: peace without pretense. Presence without pressure.
I closed my eyes and thought of him.
He was kind and steady. He didn’t carry the baggage of my past. He didn’t leave bruises on my heart.
He offered something clean, calm and quiet. A future without Prashant.
The thought ached but strangely, there was a flicker of something else too. Acceptance? Resignation? Maybe.
I realized, with sharp clarity, that I had a choice. I could drown in misery and get trapped in this endless loop of what ifs and why nots. Or I could choose the path that lay in front of me. One that promised stability, respect and maybe, one day, a different kind of happiness.
I opened my eyes and sat up, pushing the phone away. The image of Prashant and his fiancée still lingered in my mind but something inside me had shifted.
The tears that had threatened to fall were gone. What replaced them was resolved like a newly sharpened blade.Maybe this was the universe’s way of forcing my hand. Maybe it was its cruel way of telling me, finally, to let go.
I took another breath, this one more even, more deliberate. The storm inside me hadn’t died completely. But it had retreated. What was left behind wasn’t happiness. It was steel.
I would marry Kabir. I would make my parents happy. And somehow, someday, I would learn how to make myself happy too.
Even if it meant burying the ghost of Prashant so deep he could never haunt me again.
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