Chapter 6: After the Storm

I woke up in the hospital to the sharp smell of Dettol and the sight of a nurse tying a red thread around my wrist for shubh shuruaat. A family in the corridor performed a small puja, their voices blending with the steady Ganpati bhajans from a nearby pandal. My phone, screen cracked but still alive, showed no missed calls from Arjun.

But I didn’t feel sad. I felt—strangely—calm. Maybe after dying once, all the old pain had burned away. I pitied my old self, desperate for love, afraid of solitude. I realized my illness wasn’t a crime, and neither was loving Arjun. But he shouldn’t have used my illness as an excuse for betrayal.

I thought: Meera, ab dekh, bina in sab bandhanon ke, tu kitni khush reh sakti hai. You can be a little sun, or a black hole, but you’ll never be anyone’s burden again. For the first time in years, I smiled—a real, soft smile.