Celebrity Castaway | COMPLETE | MaNan Fiction

54| The Heirloom

A/N: Hello everyone, the votes came down again, but I decided to publish anyway, because this HUGE chapter is very close to my heart. I have written many fictions and I have quite a few marked chapters that I like myself, and would even go to the extent of calling my favourite, but this is going to be my all time favourite and I just know it. There are excerpts from this chapter I will keep coming back to read, and I hope you find as much joy reading it as much as I did penning it; especially the MaNan flashback.

On that note, happy reading, see you on the other side!

PS: This is the second last chapter of this story!

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Nandini was sitting by the window sill in her bedroom, as she watched the grey clouds circling over the skies, promising a turbulent night. As the clouds rotated around an epicentre, with every turn it got darker; soon thunders followed and menacingly promised the world beneath of a heavy downpour. The news said the weather was on amber alert and a cyclone was expected; she was safe though, within the comfortable confines of her home, with a mug of black coffee nestled between her palms, although not everyone was that fortunate.

Did Manik's prison cell have a window for him to watch the skies? He always seemed to enjoy the thunderous warnings of the night that led to heavy downpour.

"What are you doing on the terrace, Manik? Come down now, there's a cyclone alert & the winds are strong!" Nandini popped her head out from the door leading to the terrace. Manik was standing with his back to her, his shoulders relaxed, breathing even and hair, flying in the direction of the sweeping wind. He seemed to be enjoying nature's raw melody, as his fingers drummed an unknown melody on the guard rails he was using to perch himself on. Did he even hear her?

"Manik?" Nandini shouted again, tentatively.

Manik sighed and slowly turned his head towards her direction, there was so much peace in the dancing of the winds and the chaos of the cosmos, that he didn't feel like turning back to the world that beckoned him, but he did, because Nandini had called.

He danced his eyebrows at her, lazily asking her why she called, as he saw the wind that was getting stronger now, playing with her locks. She was pretty, he concluded incoherently, and as his bare eyes moved down from her serene face to her soft breasts and landed on her slightly bulged stomach, a small smile made its way to his lips, before it disappeared again. No Manik, there's no child of yours in there. It is just a shell to confound the world, not you. He chidded himself.

"Manik, the winds are gaining speed, in no time rain and thunder will follow, this is a high-rise, are you mad, come on in!" her command sounded soothing to his ears. Even after all these years, she cared. A small, peaceful smile came back to his lips.

"Nandini.." he whispered.

"Hmm?" she replied, instantly softening, and he didn't miss it.

"Quit complaining, and come here and enjoy..there's still time for the rains to sweep in." Manik cajoled her, extending his hand towards her, asking her to join him.

Nandini looked at his extended hand, and Manik's hand looked like it could do with the assuring and a firm grip of another hand. He was far too lonely. Putting her inhibitions aside, she nodded and opened the door fully and stepped onto the terrace, walking towards him like he was her destiny.

As she held his hands, a bolt of lightning followed by a loud thunder ricocheted through the skies, as if heralding the impossibility of their union in outrage. One the flame, the other the moth. They had love alright, but no happy ending. The wind rose in strength, pushing the moth closer to the flame, and Nandini nearly crashed onto him, losing her balance.