my tough husband

2

The dappled light of the setting sun streamed through the luxurious drapes of Virendra Mangla's opulent bedroom, yet even the golden hues could not mask the pallor of illness that clung to his once formidable presence. Preeti Aggarwal crossed the threshold tentatively, the shadows of the room clinging to her like whispered secrets of a future she could not fathom. A familiar tapestry of her little family unfolded around the aging patriarch, his body a frail contrast to the larger-than-life figure he once was.

The man she called uncle, whom she revered for his affable charm and his capacity to love fiercely, was succumbing to the tyranny of cancer’s second stage. As she approached the bed where he lay, the memories of their shared affection and times when he was more a father than her own enveloped her in a bittersweet embrace.

Uncle Virendra beckoned her closer, his once-strong voice a rasping whisper. Each word was an effort, a treasure given at the cost of pain. "Let me speak, love. It’s important," he insisted. Her heart tightened against the urge to silence him; he needed his strength, not spent on farewells or last requests. But the imploring look in his weary eyes held her mute.

When the request came, it tore through the veils of her denial, explicit and raw; he wanted her to marry his son, Manav. The room swirled into a blur as Preeti grappled with a mix of shock and a resurgence of buried agony. To marry the enigma that was Manav — her childhood love, the man who had rejected her, whose very actions since had twisted the knife deeper into her heart's wounds.

Manav's interjection, fierce and protective, sparked a glimmer of the charm and warmth he could possess. But Preeti, caught in the storm of her inner tumult, scarcely heard it. Nor did her father's gentle inquiries penetrate the fog of disbelief.

Uncle Virendra's words met her like a crushing wave, each syllable drenched in desperation and love, invoking the image of a grandchild he yearned to see before his curtain call. The idea of marriage, tethered to the heartstrings of a dying man’s last wish, was cruel in its innocence.

Preeti, however, was haunted by the specter of an ambition unfulfilled, of dreams she hoped to convert into reality. She was not a mere asset to be negotiated for the preservation of happiness—a happiness that wasn’t her own. Bearing Manav's child, fulfilling roles and obligations that weren’t her choosing, was anathema to the fiercely independent spirit that had kindled within her from the moment she realized she could stand tall in a world that often expected women to sit quietly and smile prettily.

"I am sorry, uncle," Preeti finally managed to articulate, the words feeling more like a betrayal than the refusal they were meant to be. Yet even her protest was muffled by the palpable grief in her uncle’s eyes, a mirror reflecting the fracture of his dreams.

"What I need... What I want..." The sentences start to form, to lay out her ambitions, her desires, her refusal to be the balm for a legacy on which she had no claim, but her voice betrayed her, quivering with the weight of the moment.

Uncle Virendra's tear-laden plea clawed at her heart, as did his failing but still keen awareness of what this union meant. He had always treated her with affection, true, and perhaps in some twisted universe, his request was his last testament to that love. But Preeti couldn't reconcile the love she understood with the demand being made of her.

The turbulence of emotions finally gave way to anger, which lent her voice a sternness that matched the resolve within her. "Am I a childbearing facility for you?" The words, heavy with hurt, oozed the resentment festering in a corner of her heart.

And as if to match her storm, the room erupted with rebuttals and pleas, some hushed and some not, each one piling upon her dense layers of expectation and guilt. The announcement that Manav would marry her if it meant fulfilling his father’s wish fell on her like an avalanche, adding to the confusion and pain that rooted her to the spot.

Stunned silence engulfed her, broken only by the angelic voice of Manav’s daughter, Arya. Her query about Preeti becoming her mother was the innocent catalyst that unleashed the tempest concealed beneath the façade of calm composure. The little girl's excitement and hope stood in stark, aching contrast to Preeti's agony.

Before she could fully grasp the gravity of what was unfolding, the process was underway, and a lawyer was summoned with marriage certificates and legal bonds. The cold, clinical nature of the transaction was an insult atop the injury of her heartache. *this is the continuation of previous response*

In her imagined future, Preeti had always envisioned an Indian wedding rich in color and brimming with sentiment—an expression of love that flowed freely and unbidden, a celebration that sprang from the very depths of the heart. This sterile exchange was an anathema to those dreams, an empty pantomime parading as matrimony where her own will played no part.

Her disquietude was mirrored in the recollections of the past, as she remembered her naive confession of love to Manav — a confession made when her heart was an open book, longing to be read and cherished. To be met with ridicule and subsequent sorrow had dashed her ardor against the jagged rocks of reality, leaving her to nurse wounds that had never quite healed.

These wounds tore open as her brother enveloped her in an empathetic embrace, his presence a tether to reality amidst the emotional whirlwind. With his arms around her, her brave facade crumbled, and she allowed herself the luxury of tears—each one a silent testament to her unwilling capitulation to the demands of duty over personal desire.

Manav's approach and his words, somewhat soothing yet tinged with condescension, only deepened the ache that pulsed through Preeti. "I am not that bad of a person," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "I can’t see my father dying like this. So, please marry me. Isn't that what you have always wanted?"

Manav's visage blurred through her tear-streaked eyes as ancient heartaches pulsed anew. His accusation, the weight of blame he had unjustly laid upon her shoulders when Diya passed, pierced through her like shards of broken glass. "You made my life hell... do I need to remind you of that?" Preeti spat the words back at him, her fury lending her an almost fearsome aspect.

His retort, a threat emerging from eyes aflame with barely restrained ire, hung between them. The Manav before her was a potentate used to bending the world to his will, his authority in the realm of business a mantle that he erroneously thought would extend into her world, into her spirit.

He did not know the iron resolve that formed Preeti Aggarwal. She, who had forged a path through her intellect and determination, through the tireless nights poring over law books and the infinite moments of standing her ground in the courtroom—she would not be bent or broken. Preeti's spirit battled against the cold undertow of resignation. Following Manav's chilling response, she mustered the poise to confront Uncle Virendra. The elder's weakening gaze met her defiance, his wish so fervently laid bare now in the silence that had befallen the room. "I am ready for this marriage, uncle. Tell me where to sign," Preeti uttered, her voice steady, concealing the turmoil that raged within her.

As the ceremonial pen was handed to her, its weight felt disproportionate to its size, anchoring her to this somber reality. With each stroke of her signature, Preeti Aggarwal not only signed away her surname but also relinquished a piece of the future she had envisioned for herself—a future painted with strokes of professional accomplishment and personal fulfillment.

With the transaction complete, she briskly exited the room, her heart encased in a numbing shroud to endure the days ahead. The decision had been made, not by the intangible hand of fate, but by the crushing weight of responsibility and the silent, steely resolve that had become her armor against the injustices of her world.

Preeti's stride away from the anguish-filled chamber was a paradox, a blend of escape and deeper entrapment. The cold marble beneath her feet was a stark reminder that she was walking a path that had been forcibly laid before her, not by her choosing but by the whims of a dying man's final ambition and a family's unspoken expectations.

Her escape from the room did not go unnoticed. Manav, ever the shrewd observer, followed her—a specter from her past that had now firmly anchored itself to her future. His pursuit was a silent testament to his own struggle between duty and personal torment.

Their confrontation in the hushed corridors was a clash of souls, a tempest of suppressed rage and unhealed scars. His words—cold and deliberate—were a stinging slap to her already reeling senses. Preeti's retort was explosive, a surge of pent-up emotion, a cathartic release of the bitterness that had festered in her heart.

"I will marry you," she said with finality, "But once Uncle passes, our charade will end in divorce. You will not cage me in this loveless contract for a day longer than necessary." Her voice, usually so controlled in the legal battlegrounds she navigated with grace, now trembled with intensity as she delivered her ultimatum Amidst the twilight cast of Virendra Mangla's sumptuously adorned room, an air of solemnity insinuated itself into the very fabric of the decor. It was in this atmosphere, heavy with the muted symphony of life's delicate cadences, that Preeti Aggarwal found herself stepping over the edge of her meticulously constructed world into the chasm of unfathomable expectations.

In the fading daylight reflecting off the sheen of opulent furnishings, Virendra Mangla's once robust frame now lay diminished, his life force flickering like a flame in the wind. Here was the man who, with his infectious charm and delightfully rebellious spirit, had served as a surrogate father to her—a man whose affection had been a bedrock of candor amid the rigidity of military decorum of her own household. Each strained breath he took was a tick of the clock, counting down the precious time she had left with this beloved rebellious soul.

Virendra's insistence broke through Preeti's hesitance. She listened as his voice, frail yet saturated with urgency, clawed against the inevitable curtains of mortality. "Let me speak, love. It’s important," he implored, his words laced with the heaviness of impending finality. The tenderness in his eyes held her captive amidst a torrent of conflicting emotions; they spoke volumes of the days gone by and of wishes that were now desperate pleas against the tyranny of time.

With the walls pressing in on her, Preeti's mind reeled at Virendra's request—the proposal of marriage to his son, Manav: an epiphany wrought in the guise of a dying man's will. The idea entwined itself around her like an unforgiving vine, suffocating in its constrictive grasp. The man in question, her erstwhile beloved and the harbinger of her heart's greatest despair, now tied to her through his father's bonds of hope and finality. How could the chords that once bound them in youthful affection now strangle her with such violence?