Chapter 5
Three weeks.
Twenty-one days of watching Akriti fight her way back from the edge of death.
Twenty-one nights of Raghav sleeping in an uncomfortable hospital chair, refusing to leave her side even when the doctors cleared him to go home.
Twenty-one mornings of waking to the steady beep of monitors, the antiseptic smell of the ICU, the sight of his wife's battered body slowly, painfully healing.
She'd regained consciousness several times in those first few days—brief, confused moments where she'd look at him with drug-hazed eyes before slipping back under. Each time, he'd held her hand and told her the same thing.
"I'm here. I'm not leaving."
He wasn't sure she believed him. Wasn't sure she even remembered the words once the morphine pulled her back under.
But he said them anyway. A promise. A prayer. A penance.
The investigation into the bombing had revealed nothing conclusive. The motorcycle rider was a hired gun, paid in cash, with no direct ties to anyone. The bomb itself was professional but untraceable. Whoever wanted him dead had covered their tracks expertly.
Raghav had tripled security around the hospital. Armed guards at every entrance. Surveillance on every floor. No one got near Akriti without being vetted.
Because someone had tried to kill him and nearly murdered her instead.
And he would burn the world down before he let them try again.
His family came and went. Savitri brought home-cooked meals he barely touched. Vikram brought business updates he barely heard. Various relatives offered sympathies and prayers.
Alina had tried to return once, two days after he'd thrown her out. She'd appeared at the hospital with flowers and apologies, her eyes red from crying.
"Raghav, please. Let me explain—"
"There's nothing to explain," he'd said coldly, not even looking up from Akriti's still form. "You're fired. Our professional relationship is terminated. I thought I made that clear."
"You're grieving. You're not thinking straight—"
"I'm thinking clearly for the first time in three years." He'd finally looked at her then, and she'd stepped back from the emptiness in his eyes. "You need to leave. Now. Before I have security remove you."
She'd left in tears.
He'd felt nothing.
All his feeling, all his capacity for emotion, was focused on the woman in the bed. The woman he'd ignored, dismissed, forgotten.
The woman who'd nearly died because of him.
*
On day fifteen, the doctors had moved Akriti to a private recovery room. No longer critical, but still serious. Her leg was healing—the fractures would knit, though she'd need physical therapy. Her ribs were mending. The swelling in her brain had reduced.
But she was weak. So weak.
She could barely speak without exhausting herself. Eating was difficult. Moving was agony.
And through it all, Raghav stayed.
He learned her new routine. Morning vitals at six. Medications at eight. Physical therapy at ten, where she gritted her teeth through exercises that left her shaking and pale. Lunch at noon, though she rarely ate more than a few bites. Afternoon rest. Evening visitors. Night medications. Sleep.
He learned the names of every nurse, every doctor, every specialist involved in her care.
He learned to read her pain levels by the tightness around her eyes, the way her hands clenched when she was hurting but wouldn't ask for more morphine.
He learned that she had nightmares—dreams where she screamed for Mohan Uncle, where she relived the explosion over and over.
He learned to wake her gently, to hold her hand until the terror passed, to whisper reassurances until her breathing steadied.
He learned his wife.
Three years too late.
*
On day eighteen, Savitri found him in the hospital cafeteria at two in the morning, staring at a cup of coffee he hadn't drunk.
"You need to go home," she said gently, sitting across from him. "Shower. Sleep in a real bed. Just for one night."
"I can't leave her."
"She's stable now. She's safe. You heard the doctors—"
"She woke up alone after the explosion," Raghav interrupted, his voice hoarse from disuse. "In pain, terrified, not knowing if she'd survive. Because I sent her alone. I left her." His hands clenched around the coffee cup. "I won't do that again."
Savitri's eyes filled with tears. "Beta—"
"I need to get some of her things. Her clothes, her—" He stopped, realizing he didn't know what she'd want. Didn't know what would comfort her. "What should I bring?"
"I'll make a list," Savitri said softly. "But Raghav, you need to go yourself. See her room. Understand what her life has been like."
He nodded slowly. "Tomorrow. When she's sleeping. I'll go tomorrow."
*
The next evening, after Akriti had been given her night medications and had drifted into drugged sleep, Raghav finally left the hospital.
The mansion felt foreign after three weeks away. Too large. Too empty. Too full of memories of the man he'd been before the explosion—arrogant, dismissive, blind.
He moved through the corridors like a ghost, servants scattering at his approach. He looked terrible, he knew—unshaven, hollow-eyed, his clothes rumpled from days of wear.
He looked like a man who'd lost everything.
Which, in every way that mattered, he had.
Akriti's room was in the east wing, far from his own chambers. Far from the family's main living areas. Isolated.
Of course it was.
He opened the door and stopped breathing.
It was beautiful. Utterly, achingly beautiful.
Not in the way wealth made things beautiful—though the furniture was quality, the fabrics expensive. But in the way personality made things beautiful.
Books everywhere. Lined on shelves, stacked on the bedside table, piled on the window seat. Poetry. Philosophy. Fiction. Biographies. She'd turned this room into a library.
A violin rested in a stand near the window. The wood was aged, well-loved. He picked it up carefully, saw the wear patterns on the neck, the rosin dust on the bridge.
She played. All this time, she'd played, and he'd never heard her.
The walls held framed photographs—not of him, of course. Why would she frame pictures of a husband who'd abandoned her? Instead, there were photos of women and children, smiling, laughing. The shelter, he realized. Her real family.
Her desk was organized chaos—notebooks, files, financial statements. He picked up one of the files and his eyebrows rose. These were detailed budgets for the charity. Income projections. Expense analyses. Investment strategies.
She'd taught herself financial management. Had built a sustainable funding model. Had created something real and lasting.
Without his money. Without his help. Without him.
Then he saw the journals.
They filled an entire drawer of her desk. Leather-bound volumes in different colors, each one dated on the spine.
His hand trembled as he pulled out the first one.
Wedding Day - Six Months
He should stop. Should respect her privacy. Should—
He opened it.
*
Day 1. Our wedding day.
I married a stranger today. A beautiful, brilliant, terrifying stranger who looked at me like I was a chain around his neck.
The ceremony was grand. The families were pleased. Our parents were relieved.
But when he walked into our bedroom tonight, I saw it in his eyes—disappointment. Resentment. The cold assessment of a man who'd been trapped.
He told me it was a business arrangement. That I shouldn't expect what isn't there to give.
I nodded. Agreed. What else could I do?
But sitting here in my bridal lehenga, surrounded by wilting roses, I can't help but wonder—will he ever see me? Really see me?
Or will I spend my marriage being invisible?
Raghav's hands shook as he turned the page.
Day 3.
He left this morning. London, his mother said. For business. For an indefinite period.
He didn't say goodbye.
I waited in the temple, thinking he'd come to seek blessings before traveling. He didn't.
I prepared his favorite breakfast, hoping to see him one last time. He'd already left.
Savitri Maa found me in the kitchen, crying over cooling parathas. She held me and said nothing, which was somehow kinder than platitudes.
I'm a bride of three days. Already a widow to his absence.
He flipped forward, unable to stop.
Day 47.
I wait for him to call. He never does.
The family says he's busy. Building the empire. Securing territories. Making deals.
I say nothing.
But late at night, I hold my phone and imagine it ringing. Imagine his voice asking how I am. If I'm adjusting. If I'm happy.
The phone never rings.
Month 6.
I've started volunteering at a women's shelter. Savitri Maa suggested it—said I needed purpose beyond waiting.
She was right.
The women there have survived horrors I can barely imagine. Violence. Abandonment. Exploitation.
They're broken but fighting. Shattered but standing.
I see myself in them. Not in the violence—Raghav has never raised a hand to me. But in the abandonment. In the feeling of being unwanted. Unnecessary. Forgotten.
If they can survive, so can I.
Raghav set down the first journal with shaking hands and picked up the second.
Year Two - Year Two and a Half
Year 2, Month 2.
Priya asked me today when I'd stop pretending Raghav was coming back.
I told her he was my husband. That our marriage was permanent.
She laughed. Said I was delusional.
Maybe I am.
But what's the alternative? Divorce? Admitting failure? Going back to my parents as a rejected wife?
I'd rather be delusional.
Year 2, Month 5.
I've learned to find joy in small things.
The way morning light falls through the temple windows.
The smile on a shelter resident's face when she gets her first paycheck.
The music I play late at night when no one can hear.
These small joys sustain me. They have to. Because the big joy—love, partnership, being wanted—isn't coming.
Year 2, Month 9.
I saw his picture in a business magazine today. He looked older. Harder. More handsome, somehow.
There was a woman beside him in one photo. Colleagues, the caption said.
She was beautiful. Sophisticated. Everything I'm not.
I stared at that photo for an hour, memorizing his face. My husband's face.