𝐀𝐀𝐈𝐍𝐀

s i x t e e n

trigger warning - panic attack
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W I T H O U T A N O T H E R
T H O U G H T Aaina began to move, her feet carrying her towards where her heart led. She felt her world shatter around her. Minutes passed, or maybe hours. Time seemed to have lost all meaning as she blindly walked barefoot over rocks and mud, taking the only familiar road her subconscious knew. There are very few moments in one's life where they feel their entire existence, the unreasonable reasons of being, and life's injustices tear down someone so much that they lose themselves to insanity. Aaina felt herself trapped in its tornado with no way out. She wanted to scream and cry and set fire to the world and herself, but the inability to that made her feel even more disdain for herself.

By the time she reached Chakradhan Hill, her face was as numb as a ghost. The gates were open as usual, but she stared off into space and kept walking. Her feet yearned to go into those rooms again where she'd been all these months, day and night, alone and lonely. They were always empty and colourless with her ransacking the cupboards and boxes all day, chasing invisible figments just to satisfy her deranged mind, she thought. She cursed herself to a degree that made her feel worthless.

The doors to the room were wide open, and Amar stood inside, fidgeting with the mess on the floor. He turned around as he heard the chime of her payal enter.

"I found the keys you were looking for"

Her attention snapped back. There he was, crouched over, fidgeting with the boxes. Those chests and bundles of papers were her prized possessions, the fruits of her laborious searches, and no one ever dared or even cared to enter that room anytime before. She felt a surge of protectiveness overcoming her.

Aaina cleared her throat. "Oh"

"I opened the boxes, have a look if you want to"

"How dare you touch these boxes?"

His eyebrows raised at the change in her tone.

No one could stop Amar from retaliating. It was his property to begin with. He was about to retort, but she sprinted towards the boxes, mustering all her strength to push him away with a force that startled him to his core.

He had never seen her like that.

Amar's fury subsided when he saw her state. Something was terribly wrong. Her hands ravaged through the chests as if she'd die if she didn't touch it. Her face was paled, and her hair wasn't in its usual do.

Aaina's eyes narrowed as she fished out a parchment and clutched it in her palm, her eyes scanning it.

She grazed the ink lightly with her fingers, shocked at what she was reading.

Hari Purohit.

Something wrested at her chest and in a tick, with no further thoughts, the tears started to fall again. Aaina could not believe she held a fragment of history in her hand. Her family's legacy, her parents,

Aaina sank to the ground, her body racked with sobs. "This is-s, that's m-my papa's writing"

The incessant beating of her heart somewhere made her feel the presence of her parents. The faintest sliver of the past, a whiff of home even for a fraction of a moment, she felt her parents. The parchment clutched in her palm became the most precious thing she ever held. For Aaina, neither the gems, the jewels in her drawers, her gold laced ghagras, nor her entire existence measured up to the value of what she now held in her hand.

"Do you see this, Amar! I was right! I found them! Hari Purohit was m-my father, you see the name too, right?"

Amar stood afroze, not knowing what to say to her. All he saw was a child weeping out of longing. Her tearful face, unruly hair, and the soul-stirring look of yearn in her eyes had him glued to his spot.