JHEEL 

My father's thundering voice rings through the entire room. He is upset again, and his rage is suffered by every entity in the house. I stand outside the bedroom door, where he is shouting and throwing things. He is upset, and from his loud muttering, it appears I am rejected again by some royal man he is baiting me for. He wants a connection with royals; he wants my birth to prove his investment in finally passing his lineage towards royalty.

His rage is getting out of control. My mother is inside; I open the door and rush inside. My father's anger is still directed at throwing everything in the room until it shatters, and my mother is beside him trying to control his rage. He stops when he sees me standing at a distance.

His angry expression slowly shifts to neutral, and he lowers his hand – the dresser stool inches away from breaking the television. "Jheel, return to your room!" My mother shouts from the corner.

Jheel Chauhan. Daughter of Devendra Chauhan.

Rejected by Ekvarthya Rajput, the first man. Rejected by Sisodia. Rejected by Somvarth Rathore. And since then, my life has taken turns, innumerable times. 

The first rejects me because I don't live up to his expectations, or because I am too rich, or because he already has someone he loves. The second rejects me because I don't meet the criteria – I am too soft for him.

And the last, because his real motive for marriage is revenge, and my father has never harmed anyone’s family. But do I stop there? Perhaps not. My desperation for a marriage in royalty runs deeper than my father's obsession with it. Perhaps to earn recognition from him. Being the only daughter.

Maybe it serves as a reason after being disrespected by Somvarth Rathore, I fell for him, and I began to love him. Without even realising it, I became nothing but a pawn in his game. And lost one of the most important friends in life forever. Manyata Daiwar. 

In simpler words, in the past, Manyata and Somvarth were fiancés. And I liked Somvarth. I had approached him long ago, but he rejected me. Later, suddenly, I became someone he showed interest in, and I took the bait. He only wanted Manyata so he could take vengeance against the Rajputs and get her kidnapped intentionally after gaslighting his own friend. He set so many families and lives on fire – including mine. To make the kidnapping appear as something as small as a ransom and not his master plan, he dragged me into the flames with Manyata.  

In the last four years since returning, I have lost more than I have earned. I have lost my dignity, my confidence, my will to love anyone, and my friendship.

I stood empty-handed. And failed to serve one purpose my father had for me, one. That I marry into a royal lineage.

"Jheel," My mother warns me.

My father holds back his battling rage as he walks out of the room. My mother follows him, still trying to restrain his anger. He isn’t angry because I am failing—he is angry because I am involved in the scandal of the century, everyone is having fun discussing in the chatting group of the royals and elite that I had an affair with the fiancé of Manyata Daiwar. 
And I am the home wrecker – the reason Manyata's life is destroyed, and the reason she leaves her brother to marry a Gujrati.

Titles. My father strives for me to own the one with royalty.
And what do I become instead? A skank, homewrecker. Someone who had sn affair with her best friend's fiancé.

When I returned to Gujarat after studying outside, the one person who embraced me without indifference was Manyata, and I repaid to her love with my cruel betrayal.

Later,
Being a pawn in the game of a man. I trusted, I cared for, and didn't care for the names I was being called. I used and threw myself.
His own friend kidnapped me and dragged me to Gujarat.

I was almost raped by a man there, assaulted. I was stripped naked, left in a dungeon. I was destroyed in ways that felt there wasn't going to be a reversal.
He saved me. He returned me to my world – but to save his own reputation and name. He lied, saying he found me thrown in the middle of the road.

Leaving me as nothing but a used rag. A whore. Something filthy and too dirty for any royalty to accept anymore.
He himself refuses to own me because in his eyes – his kingdom's eyes – I was tainted and impure.

Play. A good one.

But after his sudden death, all the real stories came out. And his dead body's image was clearer than my alive one. He left and left me like a stain.

My father is struggling now to wash it off.
And even after one year, it hasn't.

And I am a shame, equally to the world and to my father. And he knows it. So that's why there is a series of rejections. His rage surfaces because I destroyed his name, the pride and honour of the Chauhans – the name they have worked hard to build.

But he can't blame me; he doesn't want to. That's why he never directs his anger towards me. I wish he would, I wish he would turn to me, slap me, hit me for sabotaging him.

 But he doesn't.

He doesn't believe in relieving me from my agony.

That's why I am left to suffer, to struggle under the paranoia of which tragedy of my life is bigger. That I lost the love of my life? Is that the possibility of finding one none? Or should I feel disrupted because I demolished my father?

~~~~

My mother stands beside me, while I put the last pin in my dress that attaches my dress closer and won’t come undone.

"You are looking beautiful!"
I nodded and gave her a short smile.
"We are going to Chandravanipur, which means the land of Agnivanshi. We just need him on our side, and everything will work out for us! Don't worry.”

"How is dad?" My question escapes me huskily, ashamed. And she catches my glistening eyes in the mirror. She rests both her palms on my shoulder. "Please let him know, Mother, how ashamed I am of what I committed. It's been almost two years, and its effect hasn't faded in society – nor has my mortification."

Her hands tighten their grip, "What has happened? We can't change it, face them without an ounce of humiliation, because whatever happened didn't affect anyone personally for them to hold it against you. Do you understand?"

It didn't.

But does society work on the idea of how much it affects one another?
Perhaps a word like gossip shouldn’t exist. Or if it does, it shouldn't hold the meaning against us that it is a compilation of words against the victim instead of the culprit.

Never.
It means everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and they can go around sharing it with anyone.
Any party involved in that topic of conversation is nullified. 

~~~~

Agnivanshis are known for so many things. But one fact about them that has made them thrive longest in the demolishing world is probably karma, because of how many people in need they have helped.

They have always taken in men from small towns, given them work, and provided a livelihood when nobody was ready to involve them in their world. They saved women from brothels and gave them a second chance at life. They saved so many rich people from running into bankruptcy by taking over their businesses. And now, in the list of many, my father is here to add to saving a woman with a tainted reputation from dying unwed.

The party is extravagant, nothing compared to anything I have witnessed.
I knew it would be a large-scale party, given that it is from Agnivanshi.

But this is more than one gathering to comprehend.
I stand in the middle of the party. My hand is clutching the glass, and nobody approaches me. Even my mother walks in circles to have a conversation and be a part of the community again.

But the people were aloof sometimes and adamant not to allow her in most times. I once again feel tears welling in my eyes. 

Two girls, my age, passed by me and muttered, "She is the one! Yes! She is! She is such a witch! Wrecked her own friend's house and then guilt-tripped everyone by acting so innocent because her vile lover died."
Their word affected the left shame in me. My eyes drift into nothingness, everything crumbling, resurfaced images and the aching in my heart. 

That day, when I was kidnapped, stripped and threatened to be raped not once, twice, but thrice. This time, what crept into my chest isn't something I can suppress. I set the glass down and rush myself outside the party.

Escaping from the back lawn and around the mansion before I am secluded by the front gate.

The lines of parked cars, I hide myself in between two parked cars and sit down on the floor.
Hiding myself. Making myself smaller.

Tears stream down my face, and I wipe them across.
Closing my eyes, reliving my truthful nightmare again.

The shivering spine, a heavy body on top of me. His filthy hands were pulling my knee for his access, and then the truck opened.

Light creeping inside the truck, stopping the cruel act.
A face came forward,

"Are you okay?"

My eyes open, and my head jerks to the source.
Same face.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So the thing is we still don't care about Jheel uptil here. Maybe Jivan will make sense to us?

Next Chapter coming forward. . .