Part 27
Mini called Mrs. Shah without wasting anytime and called her to meet in same orphanage where they use to meet on weekends. Mrs. Shah was suspicious first as why Mini is calling her on a weekday and asking her to come urgently. She was afraid whether Mini figured out her true identity. She decided not to go but then she thought it could be regarding some other matter also and even if Mini came to know about her she should at least apologize to Mini for hiding her truth for this long. So Mrs. Shah decided to go there.
Mrs.Shah came out of her car. She saw Mini was already waiting for her. Mini turned around towards her. Her expressions were not like other times welcoming but she saw confusion, curiosity and also anger on her face and Mrs. Shah knew at once that Mini knows her now. So without wasting any time on avoiding the topic she directly came on the point, “Look Mini, I am sorry I hide the fact that I am Neil’s mother from you but please try to understand. I was desperate to know about my son and somehow be connected to him. When you asked for my number in that convention I saw Neil was calling you on the phone and I couldn’t resist the urge to befriend you. I am sorry for all this but please believe me my intentions were not bad.” Mrs. Shah apologized. “I know, in all these months you never done or said anything which will create misunderstanding between me and Neil. But that’s why I am confused. What I have heard from Neil about you till now, I thought you were cold hearted mother and disloyal wife who is just concerned for her selfish desires but what I got to know about you during our meetings you seems to be strong confident woman who knows how to strike a perfect balance between her family and career. You are so mature and understanding that I used to look up to you for inspiration. How can this be possible? How you can have two personalities completely opposite to each other?” asked Mini.
“Why do you want to know? Somethings are better left undiscovered specially when it is going to hurt your loved ones.” Replied Mrs. Shah as she took a deep breath to control her emotions. “No Mrs. Shah, I am tired of hearing this. First Naeem bi and now you. I know….I know there is something more to the story…I saw divorce papers you filled in court and also the copy of FIR you filled against Neil’s dad. I couldn’t read it but please tell me….I want to know all about it.” Mini replied. Mrs. Shah was momentarily shocked by the revelation but she again tried to brush it off. “It was nothing…just a small fight between me and my husband and now that you know the truth I will advise you to stop thinking about it and stop meeting me. I know Neil will not like it if he ever comes to know and I don’t want to create misunderstanding between you two.” Said Mrs.Shah.
“Waah! Ye achha hai. When you felt like you should meet me and befriend me tab nahi socha tha ki Neil ko pata lag gaya toh kya hoga? Ab jab aapko suit nahi karta tab achanak se badi fikar ho rahi hai hamare jhagde ki and what did you say….small fight between you and your husband…really? Small fights doesn’t end up on FIR and divorce papers.” Mini said sarcastically. “Offo, tum samajhti kyu nahi? Neil par bura asar pad sakta hai in sab baton ka. Koi karan hoga na ki ye sab maine apne tak rakha itne saalo aur apne bête ki nafrat jhelti rahi.” Mrs.Shah was now frustrated with Mini’s stubbornness. “I want to know that reason only. Why a mother accepted to face her only son’s hatred but not told him the truth? And what do you think you people hiding everything from him is doing any good in his life?” Mini again tried to make her understand. “What do you mean?”asked Mrs. Shah confused. “Because of you he doesn’t believe in love. He keeps his emotions bottled up. He has trust and commitment issues. He doesn’t want to make emotional bond with anyone…not even with me. He scared of confessing his feelings. Tell me how can any woman live with this type of incomplete man. This has affected all his relationships and now this is affecting our marriage. So this is not about him anymore…this is about us. Therefore I have every right to know everything which contributed to make him like this.” Mini demanded answers.
“I didn’t know all this has affected Neil’s life in such a way.” Mrs. Shah said more to herself than to Mini. “That’s why I am begging you. Please tell me everything so that I can help him to come out of his past.” Mini implored. Mrs.Shah nodded in yes and began telling her story from the starting. “I came from a poor family. We lived in a chawl in Delhi and had a joint family. I never let my financial background come in between my dreams. I used to study hard and keep doing part time jobs. Neil’s grand mother used to come to our chawl for her charity work with some NGOs. There she saw me. I used to help in their work. One day she came with the marriage proposal of her son to my family and asked for my hand. She brought lots of gifts for everyone. My family was very happy. They couldn’t believe their luck that their daughter got marriage proposal from such a rich family. They said yes instantly. Nobody even cared to ask me. I was not ready for the marriage as I loved someone else. I loved Subodh Shah. He lived in the same chawl and we worked together. We had many dreams for our beautiful future but the marriage proposal from Oberois ruined it all. I told my parents about him but as expected they even refused to consider my choice before all the expensive gifts and riches Oberoi family could offer them.” Mrs. Shah took a pause to get a grip on her emotions while Mini looked at her sympathetically.
Mrs.Shah continued, “Soon I was married to Yash Oberoi. At starting everything was fine but then I started realizing why his parents chose a poor girl like me for him and not anyone from their society. Yash had a bad reputation in society. He was a womanizer and had every quality of a typical rich brat. His parents were tired of his lifestyle so they decided to get him married. Just like every typical Indian parents who thinks that their son will change himself after marriage Yash’s parents thought the same and decided to sacrifice my life for it. They knew their son had ego and temperament problems and lots of bad habits to deal with so not any girl can bear with him therefore bring the girl from such family which can never open their mouth in front of them and burden them with all sorts of favours. That’s what happened with me. Yash’s parents bought me for him in a way.” Mini was now horrified listening to all this. She never thought truth will be something like this.
Mrs.Shah continued her story, “Though the marriage didn’t happen with my consent but still I tried my best to make it work, to adjust according to his lifestyle but he never gave me that respect. He continued his affairs, one night stands. Whenever I used to confront him we ended up having a huge fight and many times…he…he use to…” Mrs. Shah took a pause as she wiped her tears. “….many times he used to raise his hand on me.” Mrs. Shah completed with difficulty. Mini gasped listening to her. She also couldn’t stop her tears after that. “Why didn’t you ever complained to Neil’s grand parents about it and is that the reason you filed for divorce?” asked Mini. “I told them many times about it but everytime they assured me that they will talk to him and he will not repeat his mistakes but he didn’t change. And Yes the reason for divorce and FIR was domestic violence but not at that time. I used to bear all that just for the sake of my family. Yash’s father took pity on me and suggested that I should join their office. It will keep my mind off from all the problems. I thought it was a nice idea.That’s how I learned all about business. I used to invest all my energies into it. It gave me the momentary relief from my otherwise hell of a life.” Said Mrs. Shah.
She said further, “Everything was going like that when I got to know that I was pregnant. I thought how would I handle a kid in between all the mess but I guess my baby was lucky for me. When Yash got to know about it he was very happy. He said that he would change his ways for his child. Neil was born and Yash was on the top of the world. He always used to say that he wants a boy.When he got Neil he was on cloud nine. However bad that man was as a husband but I have to admit it that he adored his son. He loved him with all his heart. And I was surprised that he actually kept his promise. He changed his habits…not all but yes many of them specially those which he thought would affect his son. Because of my son few years of my life were almost normal. I wont say that was the best time because there was no love between me and Yash anytime in our marriage but yes I would say that I was at peace for sometime.”
“Then”asked Mini now curious to know why she filled for divorce when everything settled down. Mrs. Shah continued telling her, “As they say like bad time good time also don’t stay forever. Same thing happened. Yash couldn’t change his permanent nature. As Neil grew up he again started indulging in his old lifestyle. When he saw that I am growing old and I am not good enough for him now he again got back to his affairs. And in my life after all these years I met Subodh again. He joined as a manager in our company. I found out he never married because of me and he still loved me and it didn’t took him more time to realize that I was not happy in my marriage. He approached me again. I resisted first as I didn’t want any more complication in my already complicated life but I couldn’t hold it for long. How could I? I was deprived of love all my life. I was yearning for it and Subodh was ready to give it to me. I accepted his love. We started seeing each other again but secretly. Soon I realized that it was not right. What Yash did to me I was also doing same to him by cheating him. But what could I have done? I was lonely..after all these years I got my love and I didn’t want to lose it again. Yash came to know about me and Subodh. We had a huge fight. He again hit me but this time I decided to break my silence. All these after working in office and making my own identity had given me new confidence and also I knew Subodh is there with me I am not alone. So that was the time I decided to take divorce from him and filled FIR against him for domestic violence.”
“Then why didn’t you took divorce?” asked Mini. “Whatever was happening between us we never brought that out in front of Neil. This was the only thing common between me and Yash that we both loved our son very much. But he was all grown up till when we could have hide the truth of our marriage from him? Neil was 11years old. Yash and me were having a fight. It was dirty. We were accusing each other for all sorts of things. Throwing profanities, blaming for ruining the other’s life. That’s when I threw divorce papers on his face. He became so angry that he hit me again before I could have reacted I saw Neil was hiding behind the door and watching us in horror. He looked scared. Yash tried to make him understand but he was so scared of him that he ran away. We tried to stop him but Neil was crying continuously and running far away from us. He ran outside the house and before we could have stopped he got hit by a car. He got severe head injury. We rushed to the hospital. Doctors tried their best to save him.They brought him out of danger but he went in coma. He was in coma for 9 days and when he came out of it he had forgotten past few days of his life including our fight. Doctor explained us that may be it was too much of trauma for him to witness his parents like that specially his dad who was his hero and suddenly he was hitting his mom and then all this coupled with head injury his brain chose to shut out that memory from him as a defense mechanism and we should maintain it in this way only. If he doesn’t remember on his own then we should also not try to tell him about it or else it could be dangerous for his mental health.” Mrs. Shah said and took a pause to look at Mini.
Mini was shocked to hear this. Nobody told her that Neil had such major accident in his childhood. Mrs. Shah said further, “me and Yash talked about it. No matter how much we hated each other but for Neil we decided to stay together. I took back my police complaint and also didn’t go for divorce. Subodh was really upset by all this. He wanted to spend his life with me but I chose my son over him. I broke all the ties with him. Main apne toote hue rishte ka bhoj lekar aisi hi jeeti rahi kuch saal phir ek din achanak khabar mili ki Yash died in a car crash. He was with some high profile call girl and they both were drunk.They both died in that accident. I cleared the name of that call girl from the police records using my contact and money as I was afraid when Neil would come to know about it he wont be able to bear it. His father was his hero. He idolized Yash all his life and when we hid everything from Neil when Yash was alive then there was absolutely no need to tarnish his image now after his death.
I decided I would never tell the truth to him as I could never see my son broken. Subodh came back in my life again. He was now adamant that I should marry him now there was no one to stop me. And I was also tired of fighting with my heart and feelings. I gave up this time. We decided to get married. I told Neil about it. I thought he was 16 years old now mature enough to understand that people move on from their past relationships but I was wrong. He started blaming me that I have cheated yash. If I loved him than how could I moved on so quickly after his death and he was not ready to accept Subodh in place of his father. He asked me to move out with Subodh leaving Oberoi mansion where the memories of his father resides. I had no other option. I thought he would come around eventually once the mental trauma of Yash’s death gets over but no he only grew more aloof and detached from me with time. He started hating me cut all the ties from me. He was in pain, he was lonely I knew but I was not ready to take any risk with his life by telling him the truth.” Mrs.Shah completed her story and looked at Mini waiting for her to say something. But Mini was speechless. She didn’t know the truth will be so complicated.
to be continued...
precap- Mini decides it the high time Neil should know the truth.
Edited by Anj_01 - 1 years ago
370