It all started with a cup of chai...

Chai.

His weakness.

Her excuse for spending time with him.  -Sugandha Saxena (Scribedstories)

Dhriti was always a coffee person, till she met Aashiv, in fact a lot of things changed for her that day...

She had just moved from a smaller town to Kolkata for an interview for the position of project manager, nervous but she had an instinctive good feeling about this whole thing. On the first day of work for her, she was standing at the bus stop way ahead of time, not wanting to be late at any cost. She was looking around and people watching since she was bored.

That was the first time she saw him..

She didn't know why but a young handsome man dressed in formals at a chai tapri caught her attention. It wasn't just his obvious good looks, but something about his eyes that shone with his very sincere nature. The furrow lines on his forehead indicated his deep frustration and he looked deep in thought as he sipped his hot chai, his source of solace.

Seeing him like this was unsettling to Dhriti, it always hurt her to see people sad or distant even if they were strangers to her. She was kind of the counsellor of her friend group, the one her friends would always look towards when it came to voicing their problems. And with her strong intuition about people's nature, she had become a pro at finding feasible solutions to the problems of those around her. 

Checking the time on her phone, she made sure that there was still enough time before her bus arrived and she crossed the road, walking intently toward the chai tapri.

"Dada mere liye ek cup chai bana dena, aur inke liye bhi ek aur chai", asked Dhriti politely and sat down on the bench next to Aashiv. Noticing his nervous behavior and that he looked almost in tears, she wanted to do anything to make him feel better

Hoping that she wasn't sounding interfering, she put her hand on his shoulder in a friendly manner

"Aap mujhe galat mat samajhna, I don't mean to interfere, I just wanted to ask if you're okay..", she said sweetly in the most genuine tone 

Hearing a complete stranger having such care about his well being, the tears that he was fighting till then to keep in, started streaming down his cheeks....

Aashiv: (between his tears) Thank you for asking...for making me feel like at least someone cares for me. Sometimes I feel like no one cares about what I think, or what I feel. People always just take me for granted..

Dhriti: Aisa mat kahiye...you seem like very nice person, aap dil ke achche hai to aapse kisiko kya problem ho sakta hai? If you want you can tell me, main aapko judge nahi karungi. My friends say that I'm a good listener, if that makes you feel better. If there is anything I can do to help, I will surely be there for you

Aashiv was overwhelmed and broke into sobs, it felt so touching to him to hear such concern. He wasn't used to hearing such loving words, people were always around him for his status as a manager of his family's company, but he was personally very lonely. 

Dhriti made him lean against her shoulder, caressing his hair in an attempt to comfort him. She felt a strange sadness and sympathy for him, feeling tears form in her own eyes seeing him like this.

Once he calmed down, he told Dhriti about how a project he was working on had caused a big loss in his company when it failed. His partner and former friend who was working with him on the project had sold the information from their files to a rival company and framed Aashiv for it. And no matter how much he tried to convince his parents, even they trusted the set up evidence more than him. Because of this the company and him got bad publicity in the business world, defaming Aashiv in the process.