"Choti choti kadiyan kabhi kabhi kuch bade raaz khol jaate hain"

~ Meher ~

Mumbai, India

After Maan left, Kabir was in a daze. Surprisingly, it wasn't rainy today and the kind of person he was, he loved being latched to the balcony. His thoughts consumed him and forgot everything around him.

It was something scarce.

And something that I had never seen.

I realised I knew nothing about this man. Our lives were completely different even when we stayed under the same roof as teenagers. We ran in different social circles. He was the popular guy in the school and I was just a normal student. The limelight was always on him.

Hatred was such a poisonous feeling, I realised. That poison consumes you as a whole and drives you to the edge, leaving you with absolutely nothing.

You would feel surreal in the beginning but in the end, you become nothing.

I never had any particular reason to hate him. I hated him because he hated me first. The moment our eyes met back then for the first time when we shifted to Mumbai, I knew he did not appreciate my presence. And that look in his eyes, the feeling of not being liked by him gnawed at me every single time he looked at me with those blazing onyx eyes.

I wanted to go to him, stand by his side and try to solve the puzzle named Kabir Raizada.

But he was so engrossed in himself that I was scared to break the bubble, a fear slowly started creeping inside of me if we would go back to what we had before.

So as the intrusive thoughts consumed me, I stayed frozen in my position and just kept on watching him until almost an hour later, he turned and his eyes met mine.

Onyx against hazel.

Blank against anticipation.

Kabir's empty dark eyes bored into mine as he traced his steps towards my direction. It was funny how I clumsily straightened myself, almost tripping over my own feet.

"You did not come in," he pointed out when he had reached close, his tall frame towering over mine.

"You looked like you could use some alone time," I told him, playing it off. "Anyways, I am off to sleep, good night," I hurriedly turned around to leave when his hand came wrapping around my wrist, stopping me. "Stay," he mumbled, pulling me to the balcony.

We stood by the railing, silently watching the nightlife of Mumbai. With the busy roads, and the never ending blaring of horns, it felt like the day had never ended.

Warmth filled me from inside as I felt his chest slowly brushing against my back as I felt him move closer. His hands wrapped around mine and then closed around my stomach, pulling me to him.

Adjusting my head over his chest I sighed, his solace was comforting.

What were you thinking so much?

It was a question I wanted to ask, courage I didn't possess, at least yet.

His heartbeats aligned with mine, the rhythmic contractions and relaxations were in sync.

"You seem quiet," he said as his fingers gently ran into my hair, massaging my head. I blinked.

He noticed.

"Nothing much," I tried to wave it off, but it didn't seem like he wanted to let it go.

"Doesn't seem like anything," his soft voice was enough to melt me and made me want to tell him everything.

"Kabir," I hesitated, "I-I feel like you don't let me in, still, I feel like you don't trust me enough to tell me things."

His arm around me felt like loosening for a moment but he tightened his grip on me. "What made you think like that?" his voice was soft, there was no anger in his tone.

I shrugged. "Female intuition?" I felt his chest vibrate against my back as he silently laughed. I scrunched my eyebrows, frowning at him. "You find this funny?"

"No?" he sounded amused as he tried to control his life. "It is just that I find you to be very cute."

"Cute?" I tilt my head back to look at him. "Cute?" I repeated, raising an eyebrow.

Kabir's fingers came to the side of my face as he gently rubbed his thumb over my head. "It is endearing that you're asking me this, Meher. It has been a long time since someone asked me this."

And I knew he was referring to Radhika. I didn't say anything.

"I was just thinking about Mom and Dad," he finally told me.

I paused as I realised he was treading on a grave topic. I adjusted myself, while I was ready to listen to whatever he had to say.

"It's hard to be so distant, Meher. Although I am almost thirty, there are times that I crave for that parental embrace, which you and twins go and demand as it's your right. I have the right too, but I cannot bring myself to do that," he sighed and didn't say anything further.

I felt guilty and no matter how much I tried, I wouldn't be able to forgive myself. "Kabir, whatever happened back then, I am so so—" he put his finger on my lips, shushing me.

"Say no further Meher," he told me. "We are starting everything afresh and there's no place for bringing the past between us. It was raw and ugly and somewhere even I was responsible for how you reacted back then, even now. If I hadn't gaslighted you, you probably wouldn't even have reacted."

"It was my choice, Kabir, don't sugarcoat it," I tried to say but I don't think he was in any mood to hear.

"Let's not start arguing about it," he said with finality in his tone.

I turned around and faced him, crossing my arms across my chest. "So what are you going to do?"

Kabir looked puzzled. "I am going to do what?"

"How are you going to mend things, Kabir? For all the years I have seen, Dad and Mom have been trying to mend things with you and you have for all the times, pushed them away. This is your chance, grab it and unlock the door to be happy. Things are still not bad, you don't hate them, you're disappointed. If you have a chance, mend it. The thing is, they are getting old and so are we. In moments like these, all you need is to treasure every single moment you share with them. Will you do that?"

I judged his face, my eyes slowly outlining every crease that formed on his face as he was thinking.

"Yes," he smiled at me, the smile I was longing for, that one true smile.

Kabir's parents had inadvertently caused him something so painful that even now, when he was a full grown adult, it was hard for him to get things going. No matter how he showed he was strong, he wasn't. That little innocent child was always present in his eyes whenever we spoke about parents and family.

I closed the gap between us, wrapping my hands around his waist and resting my chin over his chest. "Whatever you will do, I'll be there with you."

"You won't run away, will you?"

"No more running away," I muttered.

Not from you and not from my feelings.

* * *

Sunday started with a lazy morning. Kabir was out with Maan for some trekking, and I didn't see him leave and saw his text as I woke up at ten.

So currently, I was hungry and I had to do the daily chores.

After eating a quick breakfast, I immediately started to do my share of chores, which included washing my dishes and dusting my room. Even though I was used to having house help around, living abroad made me more independent about doing things on my own.

And I don't like someone touching my clothes. It is a touchy spot.

So after putting all the clothes in the washing machine, I covered my face with a dupatta before I started cleaning up my room. The maid was on leave today, it was one of those two days when she took a leave in a month.

I hadn't realised how much time had passed until I glanced at the wall clock and realised that it was almost lunchtime.

And I was too tired to prepare any lunch.

Grabbing my phone from the side desk, I sat on the bed and started to scroll in Zomato to look for food options for lunch. I wanted to eat a lot and considering I was craving for chinese, I placed an order for all my favourite dishes and then patiently waited for the food to arrive.

I strolled inside the living room, put on Netflix and started binge watching a series that I had been wanting to watch for quite a long time. Fifteen minutes into the watching the doorbell rang.

I cross checked the time once again and I realised it wasn't the delivery as we were supposed to take an extra half hour. Pushing myself off the couch, I went over to the door to open it.

Without thinking much about it, I opened it ajar only to be welcomed by Aryan's presence.

"Aloha, Signorina!" He pushed me aside kicked off his shoes and crashed on the couch.

I closed my eyes, feeling the anger and gently shut the door. I turned towards him and walked over to the couch. "What are you doing here, Aryan?"

"I just came to see my best friend," he gave me a toothy smile.

"Best friend or just your brother's wife?" I watched his expressions falter, confusion settling on his face.

"Did you drink in the morning, Mehru? Are you high?"

I crossed my arms to my chest. "Maybe I am high enough to think that my best friend did not bother telling me that Sahil was alive."

The confusion that was on his face was now shamed with guilt and he did not look at me in the eye.

"Cat caught your tongue, Mr. Aryan Raizada?"

"How did you know?" he sighed. I scoffed at his audacity to even ask me that question.

"Does that even matter when I didn't hear anything about it from you?"

Kabir and I were sure at mending things because things weren't great between us. But Aryan? He was my best friend, my confidant. But in the end, he was loyal to his brother for he chose not to tell me the things which concerned me and rather helped Kabir.

Somewhere I knew I was being petty, but in my defence, this was the least I could expect from him— to tell me the truth.

"You didn't ask if Arya knew,"

See, right there.

This was how he was going to be petty.

"I know she doesn't know," his dark eyes met mine. "Unlike you, she doesn't know how to hide things regarding her best friend."

"Are we really going to fight over this, Meher?" he was looking at me in disbelief as if I had said the most unpredictable thing in the world. "I was doing it for your own good."

"What good did it bring to me even though I mourned his loss for months not knowing that he was alive? What good did it bring to me to think that I was losing all of my close friends? What good did it bring to me by putting me through so much pain, by making me live through all that pain again?" I shouted at the end. "Aryan Raizada, you're blessed enough to not see the lifeless bodies of those you love. I have not been through it once, you had no right to do that."

Aryan got up from the sofa and walked over to me. His tall frame towered over mine as stood in front of me. "I am truly blessed that I was never in your shoes, Meher. God forbid if something like this had happened to any one of you, I would have set the world on fire. But trust me, Meher, in that moment we did it because we thought it was the best decision. You were so emotionally driven that we thought you wouldn't think straight."

"I may be emotional," I breathed, "but I am not dumb, Aryan. I can think straight even if the whole fucking world was burning down. You just underestimated me."

"And Bhai? Did you not have a confrontation with him?"

I nodded. "I did," I told him. "But that's the thing— whatever Kabir and I share, our expectations from each other are meagre. But you are my best friend, Aryan, I have so much to expect from you and sorry to say, you didn't meet those expectations. None of you get to decide what is good for me."

"Fine, I am sorry!" I flinched at his loud tone. "Maybe, I thought too much. Since you're not interested in entertaining my presence, I might as well take my leave."

"Yes, please do and also get your head checked. You're simply not getting the point," I cleared his way. Aryan stormed off, not even looking behind for once, shutting the door behind him with a loud bang.

The echo of the door closing was followed by silence as I heard myself breathe.

I walked over to the kitchen and poured myself a glass of water when the doorbell rang again.

Did Aryan leave something behind?

Shaking my head, I walked over to the door and opened it but it wasn't Aryan.

It was the delivery guy.

And all of a sudden, I wasn't hungry anymore.

* * *

After a good afternoon nap, I decided to keep myself busy by investigating the case. Opening the picture of the symbol that Kabir had shown me yesterday. It was the logo of a tech company called Code Crunch.

A start-up but very quickly climbing the charts of success. They blackmailed Kabir to back off from the deal using Arya and me but that never succeeded.

Then I started searching for Rishabh Verma, the CEO. Upon googling him, a handsome man in his thirties appeared on my browser. Tanned, with dark hair with light eyes, he looked like an exotic beauty who had accidentally landed in Mumbai. A perfect model for our magazine, if only he didn't have a stalker and blackmailing background.

I had asked Officer Mistry anyway to run a background check on him and like I had expected, it was spotless. There was nothing on his profile that could draw our attention towards him. It was bold enough of him to even blackmail the people of our family.

What made him have so much guts to even blackmail Kabir?

It was unsettling.

I started reading articles regarding his company, what work they usually did and how many projects had done so far, the company seemed pretty normal to me. But I wasn't ready to give in to this. From search engines to social media, to even blogposts, I kept on searching incessantly until my eyes stopped at a headline from about ten years ago.

College Student Arrested For Hacking Into The University Database

A small gasp left my lips. This was unprecedented. A criminal background? He sure then knew how to smartly get on people's nerves. Even though hacking seemed like a cool thing, in reality, it was an invasion of someone's personal life.

I quickly scanned the text and noticed that it was indeed Rishabh's name on the list and that he was a student at one of the top universities in our country. He was accused of hacking into the university's database, accessing some private information and even altering test results.

That was indeed a shocking result. A student like him, a possible genius, using his knowledge to commit crimes?

Why would he even indulge in such practices?

Upon reading more on the article, there's a mention of a professor who had caught him doing all the wrong. He was the HOD, Mr. Ramnath Patil.

I type the name down on the notes app, mentally making a note to contact him, if there's any possible information I could find on him.

Feeling a bit relieved, I shut my laptop and took a breath of relief.

But I guess today wasn't the day where I could feel relaxed.

My phone chimed and a text from an unfamiliar number flashed on the screen.

Tick, tick, tick. "What's the time?" She asks.

"Doom's time," I say.

Fear crept upon me as I looked around with unease. I mentally cursed Kabir for leaving me home on a Sunday evening.

My eyes go over to a picture of a rose attached to the message.

There was something about that rose that I couldn't stop myself from looking at it.

Because it was black.

Aloha readers! I am back again with yet another chapter. A two month delay and I heavily apologise for that. Being in my final year of college has been rough for me. I have been busy managing college events, honing my extracurriculars, doing multiple projects, and writing exams. The schedule has been very tight for me considering I have another set of exams lined up this week.

Hence, updates will be slow but they are coming for sure.

Meher and Kabir taking steps to make their relationship better whereas the best friends are fighting. Who do you support? Meher or Aryan? Who is Rishabh Jaiswal? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. I haven't written for a while, please do shower this chapter with lots of comments.

So, how has life been for you all?

Please VOTE, SHARE and COMMENT. Comment a heart if you enjoyed reading this chapter.

With Love,

Akii.