Chapter 2: Unfulfilled Dreams

"Same...um.." Arnav said trying to decide what he should call her.

"Singhania, Lavanya Singhania" Lavanya replied back with pride of saying her name now that she was a married women. Arnav swore that he had heard that name before, but couldn't think or where.

Arnav was lost in his thoughts as he stepped out of the house. Not knowing where he was going, he accidentally bumped in to someone. His body clashed with the one infront of him. But he was too lost in his thoughts to even care who it is. "Sorry," he mumbled back without even trying to look at who he had bumped into.

"Hey! Listen!" he heard a voice behind him call, but Arnav had already made his way to the car and sat inside to drive out of the driveway without glancing back.

*flashback*

"Arnav, I want to get married to my Prince Charming one day," Lavanya said, who was only 9 at that time

"And who is he?" Arnav questioned her

"I don't really know who it is yet...but..." Lavanya pondered, " hey! why don't you be my prince! We're already best friends, so it won't make a difference when we get married."

"Are you kidding me?!" Arnav asked her with a questioning look on his face.

"No I'm not, please please please!!" Lavanya kept on repeating as she nudged Arnav's arm constantly.

"Ok, why not" Arnav finally said giving into her requests.

"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" Lavanya replied back with a wide smile in her face

As they grew older, they actually began to believe that one day they would get married and live a happy life. Who knew that when they grew up, it would be Arnav who still wanted to keep this promise, and Lavanya the one who would end up breaking it.

*flashback ends*

Arnav had arrived finally arrived outside his house and got out of the car. As he stepped out, the ring box from his pocket slipped and fell causing for the ring to fall out. The ring he had bought to propose her with. The ring that was the reason he'd been smiling at for the past few days. The ring that would've made home the happiest man alive. The ring that no longer had any value in his life anymore. As Arnav made his way towards the front door, he made sure to step on the ring, reminding him of the fact that he needed to move forward with his life and not live in the memory of others.

Before he could even ring the doorbell, he saw his sister opening the for with a huge smile on her face.

"Arre Chotte tum?" Anjali questioned as her smile faltered a bit, but not completely

"Yea Di, who did you think it would be?" Arnav questioned her, very well knowing that she was probably waiting for his Aman Jijaji to get home from his trip to Goa he had been in since the last two weeks.

"Who else other than her husband," came a reply from behind Arnav. Arnav glanced back and found Aman standing there with a smile on his face; he slowly came forward and enveloped Arnav in a hug.

"Nice to have you back brother," Aman said into Arnav's ear as they were still hugging

"It's great to be home Jijaji," Arnav replied back patting Aman on the back as they made there way towards the living room.

"So where were are you coming from right now?" Aman asked Arnav

"Woh...um...I had jus gone for a drive around the city trying to become familiar with it again and went to invite the Kashyap's for Akash's engagement tomorrow night," Arnav replied back hoping they wouldn't ask him for anymore further details than that.

"Oh yeah! Wasn't Lavanya suppose to arrive this morning? Did you meet her Chotte? How was she? She's probably grown a lot? Does she still talk a lot?" Anjali bombarded Arnav with questions

"Di! Hold in! Jus wait a minute and let me answer one question at a time, I'm not a robot or anything," Arnav replied back to his Di while rolling his eyes at Aman who chuckled a bit knowing that his wife talked way too much

"Lavanya is fine. She said she was really happy to be back and missed everyone..." Arnav started off

"Are you going to asks her?" Anjali questioned him

"Ask he what Di?" Arnav replied back trying to make a confused face but knew exactly where she was getting at.

"You know...propose to her? Just like you had dreamed of in your childhood?" Anjali said

"Di please! We were kids back then! We were jus joking around with each other and weren't serious at all," he replied back trying to not sound affected at all

"But I thought..." Aman started off

"Whatever you guys had thought was wrong, there was nothing going in between us, we were just good friends. And by the way, she's already married and has a 3 month old daughter," Arnav said while trying to look anywhere but at them hoping they wouldn't see the sadness in his eyes.

"She's married?!" Both Aman and Anjali exclaimed at the same time.

"Yea, now you see that we were never serious about this. And if you're interrogation is over now, can I go sleep?" Arnav asked them trying to get always out of here before he broke apart. But before they could answer, he was already making his way up the stairs to his room.

"Chotte! At least eat something" Anjali yelled behind him

"I'm not hungry Di!" Arnav yelled back while slamming the door behind him. The tears he had kept from rolling out, now made there way down his face. He lunched the wall and threw the books off of his bookshelf. Finally he leaned against the wall and slid his way down as his knees became weaker and weaker. Why was this happening to him? What had he done wrong in his life?

After an hour of sitting there, Arnav called Hari Prakash to come and clean the room while he went to sleep. The next morning, Arnav woke up with the suns days beaming on his face. He yawned and stretched across the bed before getting up and going for a jog. He had a lot to think about. After he returned from the jog, Arnav had decided that there was no way he was gong to live in the past. He WILL move forward with his life ad if nothing that happened in the past 24 hrs. There was no way that he was going to let Lavanya ruin his life. He would move forward and forget she even existed.

Arnav took a shower, got dressed and made his ways down to the living room.As he came down the stairs, he noticed all these people hanging flowers and making decorations. What the?! He thought to himself

"Hari Prakash!" Arnav yelled out

"Ji Bhaiyaa?" HP said as he approached Arnav with a basket of flowers in his hands

"What's going on?" Arnav asked him, his eyes still wondering throughout the entire mansion looking at the decorations

"Well, preparations are being made for Akash Bitwa's engagement," HP said.

Oh Arnav thought to himself, is could he forget, "teek hai, carry on" Arnav said as his phone began to ring. Still having his attention on his phone, Arnav wasn't paing any attention to where he was heading.

"Arre, watch where you're going!" came a voice from a worker above who was on a ladder with a flower basket in his hands. Just then Arnav felt himself bumping in to something, or was it someone?

___________________________________