𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐃𝐇𝐈: 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐍𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑-𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐈𝐑𝐄 ♡

【60】 Library!

I’ve closed deals worth crores without blinking.

I’ve stood in rooms where people hang on my every word.

But now, in a house too quiet and a bed too cold, I’ve become the kind of man I once swore I’d never be.

The kind who reaches out to the other side of the bed at 2:17 AM.

The kind who stares at her lipstick mark on his white shirts longer than necessary.

The kind who, God help me, whispers her name into melodies I play with my guitar.

Aridhi.

My fiancée. My future wife. My every damn thought.

They told us to stay apart until the wedding.

“Rituals. Traditions.” They said.

If only someone could explain how to silence the kind of longing that tastes like her laughter and burns like her absence.

She left for Mumbai yesterday. And already, there was a kind of silence that even Delhi's chaos couldn't smother.

It wasn't in the streets or in the corridors of the Rathore mansion.

It was in the space beside me, once occupied by a woman who carried entire galaxies in her voice and built empires between sips of coffee.

My Ardhangini.
Even if not officially yet. She always had been.

Now that she was in Mumbai, building her dream project at a time, I found myself spiraling in the oddest ways.

Pausing when I heard her favorite song.

Saving reels of her book boyfriends I knew she’d smile at.

Checking flight schedules like a man on the verge of insanity.

I can hear the soft sighs she let out after finishing a book, ringing in my ears.

Damn, I am missing her long rants about fictional men who set the standard too damn high.

I used to tease her for it.

“You’re competing with characters who don’t exist.” I’d say.

She’d smirk, “Maybe. But if someone can write it, someone can become it.”

And damn it, she was right.
I can become for her.

♡

I walked into my study, once a place of work, now a place of dreams and fantasies. I knew what I needed to do.

Yes, I’m not here to work. Work means nothing when she’s not here to tell me I frown too much.

I’m here to build something for her I promised earlier.