Love At Last Sight ✔

Chapter Thirty

Nandini Murthy

We stayed the night at Aryaman's place.

Manik didn't want to go back and honestly, I'd cuss Manik's mother out loud with every swear word I know, while keeping my middle fingers on display, if I ever saw her again. But I'll have to refrain from doing that since I am going back to pick up some things, important things.

And Wesley being Manik's father? I took it well enough to not end up in an asylum.

I can't imagine how Manik is handling himself now while still standing up for the things he believes to be his responsibilities. Like, fulfilling the promise he had made to Aryaman to get his father out of jail. To Manik, it's cruel. He doesn't hate Wesley enough to want him imprisoned. But it is another thing he has swallowed and has gone to the police station to do what needs to be done. And after it, once he signs the damned papers transferring everything to his mother, we will leave this life behind for once and all. I don't plan on being the honesty-bigger-than-brain-and-need aka the nice little girl and give away his grandfather's home to his mother.

Nope. So not me.

I can't, and won't, witness him in yesterday's state ever again. Past three in the morning and he didn't sleep a wink. He just laid besides me in a spare bedroom of Aryaman's house and didn't move a muscle until I'd fallen asleep.

Late in the night, I awoken to the cold beside me and opening my eyes, I see a shadow looming over me as the dark room shines with an orange glow. I shoot up instantly, my sleep vaporized.

Fire.

Manik.

He sits on the edge of the bed, fingertips angling the burning papers so as to not let the heat lap at and burn his hand. His gaze is concentrated, brown burning a fiery red. I scoot beside him and gently keep my hand on his shoulder so as to not startle him. "Manik?"

"No, this isn't one of my pyromaniac activities ." He informs me without glancing. "I don't think fire, or any drug, helps you beyond a certain limit. After all that went down, I didn't once think to burn something or smoke or drink. That was my limit where the drugs leave and I can only look upto a person to hold me from falling."

I wind my arm around his free one, staring at the source of heat. "I won't let you fall. I'll always hold you."

"I know," when the flames near his skin, he lets the papers fall into the steel bin positioned neatly below. "Thank you, Nandini."

I press my cheek to his bicep, leaning against him. "What were those papers?"

"Proofs against—uh, shall I call him Dad or Wesley?" His expressions are indifferent, giving away nothing but his shoulders fall heavily in defeat. "One is too affectionate and the other is too distant."

"Why don't you call him Dad whenever you remember him as a father? And otherwise, let him just be Preston Wesley." The fire begins to die down, eating away the words which were once held so much meaning. "But I'm not calling him father-in-law,"

My attempt to joke is weak and somewhere, I think I ended up hurting him with that flimsy try. He angles his head to kiss my forehead. "I love you."

"I will always love you, Manik." I intertwine our fingers. He looks at our hands and notices my bare fingers. "Where's your ring?"

Before his messed up emotions reach an utterly stupid conclusion, I answer. "I hid it when things had begun to turn worse. I didn't want your mother to take it away. That sounds stupid, I know, but I thought your Mom—"

"She is no one to me now. I don't have a family any longer."

I grip his shaking fingers. "I'll be your family,"