In His Custody ✎ | (MaNan)

✰ 62 - an invisible tie

Alexa, please queue "Mirrors" by Justin Timberlake, "Laal Ishq" from Ram-Leela and "Ishq Wala Love" from Student of the Year <3

Also, Nandini is wearing the Mahiyaa dress okay? And Manik is also wearing his Mahiyaa outfit :")

Okay, now roll on, readers! Please don't forget to drop your feedback and votes! :")

Word count: 4577

⭒

Nandini

I went into a washroom cubicle, latching it, and put my lab coat over the door... operating entirely on autopilot. A weight slumped against it from the other side.

"You never told me anything about him," Inaaya mused as she guarded the cubicle door.

"Who him?" I asked blankly, staring into the glass at the version looking back at me. She was smaller, wearing a school uniform and ponytail high above her head, a happier, and hopeful girl. My hand rose to touch her, and the vision disappeared just as quickly as it came... dissociating into a numb form of the woman I was now.

Inaaya rolled her eyes and said, "Who else Nandini, of course, Manik. There's something there, why else would he after all these years come all the way from Mumbai... that to just to see you? No, I trust my gut feelings on this. I can see it in the way he looks at you."

I paused as I undid the zip of my kameez. She wasn't really wrong. For all this while, I thought winning his love was sufficient... that just in his love alone, I could be happy. So why had reality been something else? Why had I been disappointed by the confession? Why had I seemingly expected more? 

The garment came off me, meeting the same fate as my lab coat. "It's not all how it seems, Inaaya." As I flung it over, Inaaya promptly swapped its spot for a maroon dress.

"In denial, I see. I'm surprised though, how come nobody else told you this before, not even in school?"

Slipping into the long satin gown Inaaya arranged for me, which had a slit along the thigh with hooks on either side to seal the gap if I desired, I sunk in her question.

Seven years ago, I was at the dining table of my Mumbai home, arms crossed, with my exhausted head slumped in the centre.

"Nandini, is... is something going on between you and Manik?" Abhi gently asked, precisely six days after our breakup, as he drew out a filter and poured me some tea. The mention of his name alone sent me down a whirlwind. I urgently sat up, and shook my head to the ground as Manik placed my teacup on the dining table... just like the day he came to see me in the hospital. Alarmed, I looked up. No, it was not Manik.

It's Abhi, my brain reminded... wearily. 

I sighed, drained beyond belief at the perennial headache that had consumed me for the whole week. "Why –?" I wanted to finish the sentence and ask him why he thought so, but saying anymore would have easily given the truth away. Swallowing a painful gulp, my eyes turned hot with fresh tears.

"Nothing, maybe I'm just imagining... I thought I saw something, in the way he looks at you. But anyways... that's a relief to know," he smiled, swooshing against his beverage in a long exaggerated sip. 

I had already spent most of my childhood relationship lying, deliberately hiding the news of my relationship from my well-wishers as much as the rest of the world. So I started to confess to Inaaya the dilemma that I was in: that I was in love with him but we still couldn't be together, when I quickly remembered my first interaction with Manik at Rishu's SPACE orientation event, on that terrace. When he accused me of telling the world things only he and I should have known.