The Winter's Widow (ADIYA VERSION)

Part Seventeen~

Arjun's boots crunched into the snow, footprints trailing behind him with each lift of his leg "I traced your phone to the apartment, but Noor checked earlier and-".

Not paying attention he rushed over to it with Oatie at his heel. A closed door had never meant as much before, but now he understood the meaning of shutting a door to never open it again, his wife was a soul who'd forever haunt him, slipping through the underneath to reach him once more, she wasn't the type he could ever lockout, she'd stay with him regardless of whether she was actually there or not. The second Aditya swung the cottage door open, bright lights flashed before his eyes, blinding him for a few seconds till he found the strength to blink through the haze to see his wife with a present in her hand.

"Surprise" her smile was wide, hair pin-straight around her face that glowed with that pineapple cream he favoured. Placing the gift down, she rubbed from the elbows downwards, cupped her baby blue shirt sleeves, then dug her hands into her jean pockets. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you where I was, I wanted to surprise you and I knew if I did it on your birthday then you'd work it out" approaching him slowly, her hands slowly moved to his waist as her head tipped up "Aditya, are you mad at me?"

Blinking back tears, he shook his head lightly "No, no one has ever done anything like this for me, I" he fell silent as he took in the balloons waving by the ceiling coupled with the banner atop the table of food. "I thought you left me, I was so-".

"Urgh" Noor shoved past them, "I get you want to hug and kiss, but my baby is hungry" grabbing a handful of crackers she shoved them into her mouth.

"Excuse my wife" Arjun huffed for the millionth time that day, her pregnancy hormones meant their romance was either all there or all not, now she was bombarding someone else's couple time and that really wasn't okay, "She has no manners" scowling at her, he looked between the two women. "Noor, did you know where Zoya was?" He was no fool and knew just how fun she usually found this kind of thing.

Swallowing the food painfully, she looked down so her curly hair would cover her face "Well, maybe, listen I only sent you on a wild goose chase because you took the ice cream off me last night and Aditya is all Zoyafied and I thought why not get my own back" she shrugged, moving to hide behind Zoya.

Her husband shut his eyes tightly "You were on your third tub" he screamed, he should've listened to his mother and got a divorce, she was going to cause him an aneurysm at this point!

She gasped "You let them believe I was missing?"

"Haha, yeah, why do you think I picked the code 'I'd like to report a missing person'?" Noticing the glares thrown her way by the two men, she fell onto the sofa. "Don't look at me, the baby loves drama, none of this would have been possible without me kicking Sheila out, you should all be saying thank you". Sighing again, she blew her hair from her face "You're all so ungrateful, when you annoy me I get more hungry, so don't blame me if I eat all the food".

Zoya giggled into her husband's chest "Noor, I made you your own cake" she pushed the plate towards her, "Enjoy".

Her eyes twinkled as she jumped into her arms "You're the bestest friend ever, you don't know how much I love you, I love you more than anyone" she almost wanted to cry as she rained kisses all over her face. "You better keep her around, big bro or I'll beat you up".

Aditya smiled "Looks like you have a fan" cupping her cheek, he ran the pad of his thumb over her bottom lip. "I'm so lucky to have you, Zoya, sometimes I think that my life isn't real, because nobody gets it this good, but you make it good, you make me good". He was the kind of man that knew how to run well, he didn't know how to stay put and surround himself with people capable of loving him, but his wife made him want to change all of that, he wanted to stay for her, stay for him, he wanted a family, the good kind, but had given up long ago searching for something he never expected to find, then again the best things tended to come along when you least expected it and when you stopped searching for it. Life wasn't a word search, yet somehow he'd managed to find a word he never expected to, a word he'd once vowed to never feel again.