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The world felt a million miles away from here.
I don't know why, but I've been trained to live life my way - sharp, fearless, untamed - since childhood. Family, rules, expectations... none of it ever shaped me. I shaped myself. And surviving without them? That wasn't a game for children. It was war.
You don't just grow up in someone else's shadow. You build yourself, brick by brick, fire by fire, into someone unbreakable. Someone they can't touch.
The party was over. The endless drama, the forced smiles, the whispers and fake bows - all of it, done.
I slipped into my night dress - a loose shirt and shorts, my armor of comfort - and stepped onto the balcony. The moon stared back at me, bold and untamed, the stars scattered like scattered dreams.
I thought of the life I imagined for myself, the plans I once held close like secrets, and then I thought of how everything had changed. Twisted. Shattered. Yet... somehow, I was still standing.
Can't an independent girl have a moment of vulnerability?
Honestly, the girl life forced to be stronger than storms, to never look for kindness, to be bold, ruthless, and merciless - she doesn't get moments like that. The world? It deserves every ounce of bitch it gets, and I've learned how to give it back tenfold.
I nodded to myself, thoughts slicing through the noise. Today, I'd talk to my father. No stalling, no excuses, no fake courtesies.
I don't have time to waste here, in this glittering zoo of Singhanias and their twenty-four annual circus acts. Spoiled, entitled, pathetic. Most people live for it. Not me. I step through it like I'm untouchable, nonchalant, untamed.
I wasn't one of them. I don't belong in their shallow, polished world.
I came to India with a purpose, a plan, a goal. Every step, every move, calculated. Every instinct sharpened from living alone, from surviving a world that doesn't give a damn about you unless you bite first.
And bite I will.
I wanted to take over my father's business - the one my mother, my real mother, had mentioned in her diary. I wanted it. Every piece of it. Every corner, every secret, every advantage.
But the family I called mine... the ones who don't feel like mine but pretend to the world that they are? I had to play along. Because smart people don't just act; they calculate. They know when to wait, when to strike, when to fold - and when to crush everything in one move.
I play with a single rule: read them first. Understand every flaw, every weakness, every hidden desire. And then... strike. My turn must be deadly. Absolute. Leave nothing behind. Win so completely that survival itself bows to me.
Because in the end, what defines a person isn't the lessons they learned. It isn't the failures they endured. Victory defines you. Failure is for those who get distracted.
