Entangled

Part 21

Now that the charity event was over, both Manik and Nandini began to focus on what they had to do next.

        Nandini contacted the office staff and got the details she wanted.

        Nandini : "This will make things easier for me. I should be able to figure out who it is soon and then I will have to think of how to approach her. Also, I have to thank Manik for this."

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On the other hand,

        Manik : "This is going to be a difficult task. First, I will have to tell them that I have backed out of their plan. They are going to be furious at me, especially Mukti. When it comes to this, they will gang up on me. Then, I will have to convince Mukti..."

        He thought for a while.

        Manik : "It would be better to get Cabir on my side first and then we can figure out together as to how to tell the others."

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        Manik asked Cabir to meet him alone later during the day.

        Cabir : "You have been so busy from the past few days that we couldn't meet often like we did."

        Manik : "I had to volunteer more often since there was an event. Now it is all done and I won't be volunteering anymore."

        Cabir : "That means that you succeeded in our plan as well."

        Manik : "No, I didn't. I couldn't get myself to continue with it, so I backed out of it sometime back. I didn't tell you all because none of you seemed to understand my point of view at that point of time."

        Cabir : "What? You who wanted to win at everything you committed yourself to, backed out?"

        Manik : "Winning usually brings a sense of achievement, but in this case winning would come at the cost of losing my peace of mind."

        Cabir : "Then what were you doing there all this time? .. Volunteering? .. From when did you gain interest in that?"

        Manik : "I have no interest in volunteering, but I couldn't back out when the event was nearing and put all the load on Nandini, so I stayed back till the event was over."

        Cabir : "What? You had to make her fall for you to take revenge for what she did to Mukti, instead you backed out from it, and stayed back to support her."

        Cabir was in deep thoughts and Manik let him be.

        Cabir : "OMG! In the process of making her fall for you, did you end up falling in love with her? Why didn't I think about this aspect earlier?"

        Manik : "What?! .. How did you even get such an absurd idea into your head? There is no correlation between what I have been saying and what you are interpreting."

        Cabir : "That's how it happens in the movies. The hero tries to make the heroine fall for him as a part of a bet or a revenge, but he ends up falling for her."

        Manik : "This isn't a movie, it is real life. You know very well that I am against love. I wasn't even ready for this plan, but I agreed only for Mukti's sake."

        Cabir : "Movies may be exaggerated but they are inspired from real life. .. Movie starts with hero not believing in love, but he ends up... "

        Manik : "You have seen that in the movies, but I see the aftermath of it in real life every day. There is no way I am going to fall into it after seeing my parents arguing every single day."