CHAPTER I
"Ashes of Who I Was"
The crimson haze of battle clung to my memory like a stain that refused to fade — a twisted symphony of blood, fire, and heartbreak. The one I loved stood before me, their eyes locked with mine, mirroring the same chaos unraveling in my soul. Around us, the world was a storm — flames dancing across rubble, the metallic scent of blood suffocating the air, heavy and sharp like rusted iron in the lungs.
I was slipping — senses dulling, breath shallow — as if each inhale dragged me closer to the edge of oblivion.
Yet even as darkness surged forward, something sparked within me…
A memory.
A whisper from a life that once held sunlight instead of shadow. A fleeting moment of laughter, a hand held in warmth, the belief that love could still mean something. That memory became my final tether — a desperate reach for a version of myself I feared I had already lost.
Because this battle wasn't just waged outside.
It was tearing me apart from within — love on one side, and the monstrous weight of what I had become on the other.
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I used to be someone else.
I was Sam.
A police officer.
A protector.
A believer in justice, no matter the cost.
The thrill of the chase, the satisfaction of slamming the cuffs on a criminal — that was my rhythm, my calling. I had purpose. I had pride.
But everything unraveled with one choice. One bullet.
The man I killed wasn't just any criminal — he was a predator, a monster who had hurt a child in ways no words should describe. I didn't hesitate. I couldn't. Something snapped inside me, and for once, the law wasn't enough. Vengeance felt like justice.
The system didn't agree.
To them, I crossed a line. My badge was stripped. My reputation burned. I was cast out not for what I'd done, but for what I felt while doing it.
And so, I became a ghost in my own skin — trading in a gun for a name tag, the badge for a uniform that simply read Shop Worker.
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But even ghosts find kindred spirits sometimes.
Remi was mine.
A German woman with fire in her eyes and sadness in her past. She had fled her country — not from war, but from a marriage she didn't choose.
We met in the most ordinary place, two exiles from different worlds, but both running from lives that had tried to define us without our consent.
She taught me to laugh again. I taught her to trust again.
Together, we found peace in the quiet chaos of America — a place that didn't know our names, and didn't care about our sins.
Yet even here, the past loomed.
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I didn't leave India by choice.
I was driven out.
My mother, Kalyani Jha, had always been soft-spoken and nurturing. But even her gentleness shattered when she learned my truth.
My father, Sathaydev, a man of pride and reputation, remained silent — which somehow hurt more than screaming.
Neither of them could see me for who I was.
They only saw a disgrace.
My "crime"?
Loving women.
Not in secret. Not in shame.
But simply, truthfully.
And that was enough to cast me out.
Even my siblings, Anand and Rahi, kept their distance. Their faces were carved with disappointment. I wasn't just an outsider. I was something they couldn't even name without disgust.
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I was good at everything they asked of me — every task, every tradition — except one.
I was never meant to live as a girl.
From the earliest days of my childhood, I rebelled in silence.
I wore my hair short. I ran wild with the boys.
And in those stolen moments of freedom, I was alive.
But tradition doesn't care about your truth.
It only cares about obedience.
My mother did her best to understand, but my father's expectations were immovable — and they were crushing.
We lived in Bihar, a place rich in culture, but choked by the weight of what people say behind closed doors. There, your name wasn't yours. It belonged to your family. Your bloodline. Your shame became theirs.
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Still, not every memory from India was dark.
The smell of monsoon on clay.
The warmth of dal simmering in the kitchen.
The weight of my mother's hand on my head as she blessed me silently in prayer.
They linger — not as wounds, but as echoes. Fragments of a life that was never fully mine… but was still part of me.
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America was my second birth.
It gave me space to rebuild — piece by broken piece — the person I was always meant to be.
It wasn't easy.
Some days I still stared into the mirror and saw only questions.
Some days, I still mourned the family that should have loved me.
But step by step, I began to heal.
And now…
Now, I stand on the precipice once again — not just of war, or memory — but of truth.
As the final battle closes in, and the sky turns to blood, I cling to what I have left:
Love.
Loss.
A name.
A story I've barely begun to write.
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To be continued...