Something About Us- MG || (Part 51|Page 52) - Page 30

Part 25

Awesome and filled with Disappointment

Maan is truly missing Geet and now he remembers

everything about her

hope soon both meet and truly talk

and now Maan also sees Priyanka been lazy when it's crucial time to work

Part 26

Back in the present, Maan threw back the whiskey in one clean, ruthless motion. His jaw clenched as the burn scorched down his throat. Good. He needed to feel something. Pain would do.

Priyanka laughed again—too bright, too sharp, too loud for a room filled with silence and tension.

He didn’t glance up.

She rose slowly, gathering her things with performative grace. No urgency, just the illusion of it.

“Heading out,” she announced breezily. “You should really take a break, Maan. Burnout looks terrible on geniuses.”

He didn’t move. Didn’t blink.

“Reports are due tomorrow,” he said, voice flat, stripped of any warmth. “We don’t leave because we’re bored.”

She froze mid-motion, her bag half-slung. Then, a smile—tight-lipped and polished—slid across her face like a mask.

“Relax,” she purred, tone dipped in mockery. “It’s just work. There’s more to life than numbers and deadlines, you know?”

She said it like a flirtation. Like she understood him.

Maan’s gaze finally lifted, slow and sharp.

And in that single look, it was clear—she didn’t.

Not even remotely.

++

Flashback

Geet again. Brow furrowed, head bowed over a file, pen moving with quiet precision as she scrawled notes into the margins. Her voice was low, steady, all focus.

“This deck won’t hold if they press on the analytics. We need a tighter narrative—maybe bring in that Bain study from last quarter. I can stay back tonight if needed.”

Maan had looked up then, something unreadable flickering in his eyes. “You already stayed late yesterday.”

She barely glanced his way. Just a small shrug. “Doesn’t matter. The client deserves our best.”

No complaints. No theatrics.

Just quiet conviction.

Just Geet.

++

The memory slipped away as Priyanka crossed to the door, her perfume lingering in the air like a signature she knew how to weaponize.

Maan watched her go.

And all he could think was how loud her laughter had been. How it echoed off the walls that once absorbed Geet’s silence like scripture. Silence that never demanded attention—just filled the space with purpose.

The door shut with a soft click.

And the quiet returned. Heavy. Familiar.

He reached for the bottle. Poured another drink—this one careless, generous. Leaned back in his chair and took a long, slow sip. His eyes drifted toward the desk across from his.

Empty.

The chair was slightly pulled out, skewed, like someone had left in a hurry. Forgotten to tuck it in. Forgotten to come back.

His throat closed up.

He stared at that chair as though it might fill itself.

“Geet would’ve never left before the deck was done,” he muttered under his breath, the words landing like truth against stone.

His jaw locked, swallowing down the burn that had nothing to do with the whiskey.

“She never once said, ‘It’s just work.’”

Another drink. A deeper one.

The glass was half-empty now. Or half full. He couldn’t tell anymore.

Beyond the glass wall, the city lights bled into one another—smudged, watery. He didn’t blink them back.

He could lie to everyone else. Smile. Pretend her absence didn’t claw at him like a habit he couldn’t kick.

But in this room—his room—with only liquor and memories to bear witness...

He couldn’t lie to himself.

She was gone.

And he didn’t know how to be Maan Singh Khurana without her anymore.

+++

Maan’s Office — Next Evening

The lights were low again, though not dim enough to hide the migraine building behind Maan’s eyes.

A third cup of coffee sat untouched near his keyboard, its steam long since faded into the stale office air. Maan was reviewing the final draft of a product prototype strategy—should’ve taken twenty minutes. It was taking him two hours. Because every three minutes, he was interrupted.

“Okay, but tell me this,” Priyanka said from the couch. She stretched dramatically, one heel dangling from her foot, a stack of folders balanced beside her untouched. “Wouldn’t it be so much more dynamic if the launch had a Paris influencer onboard? I mean, I have contacts. We don’t have to keep things so... analytical, you know?”

Maan didn’t look up.

He didn’t have the energy to.

Instead, he stared blankly at the model Geet had first drafted a quarter ago. It had none of Priyanka’s aesthetic gloss—but it had depth. Metrics. Teeth.

She had tested it from five angles. Revised it until 3 a.m. with swollen eyes and a bandaged finger from slicing open a box of printouts. She hadn’t asked for praise. She had just fixed it and quietly emailed the update before he even arrived the next morning.

Priyanka took another sip of her latte. “This is why your brand comes off so serious sometimes. You need someone to help soften the edges.”

Maan’s fingers clenched the pen in his hand.

He turned to her slowly. His voice was flat.

“You’ve been here two hours. You haven’t opened a single report.”

She blinked. “I was giving you ideas—”

“Unfounded ones,” he cut in, sharper now. “Ideas that sound good in a cocktail party but collapse the minute numbers are involved.”

Her jaw tightened.

Her smile twisted. “Right. Because everything here has to be by the book. No room for instinct, no room for... intuition.”

A pause.

Then, casually—too casually—she added, “Not everyone has Geet’s little silent saint act, you know.”

Maan’s gaze cut to her, still and sharp.

Then Maan leaned back, eyes cool, unreadable. “What exactly is your problem with Geet, Priyanka? Genuinely curious.”

His voice was calm. Too calm. The kind of calm that cloaked ice beneath it—ice Priyanka didn’t recognize.

She laughed—short, forced. “Well… since you’re asking… I think her attitude is all wrong. She doesn’t say anything, but it’s the way she carries herself. It’s like she thinks she’s the most beautiful woman on the face of the earth.”

Maan raised an eyebrow. “Does she think so?”

Priyanka brightened, mistaking his interest for agreement. “Oh, absolutely. Usse lagta hai ki woh duniya ki sabse khubsurat ladki hai.”

Maan didn’t hesitate.

“Phir... usse sahi lagta hai.”

Silence.

Crushing. Final.

Priyanka’s mouth parted, but nothing came out. Her breath hitched, somewhere between disbelief and indignation.

Priyanka blinked. “Wait, are you being serious right now?”

He didn’t answer. Didn’t look at her.

Just said—quieter now, but final, “You’re not Geet.”

The words fell from his mouth like glass shattering.

Priyanka froze.

So did Maan.

The silence that followed was devastating. Not heavy. Not loud. Just final.

He didn’t look at her. Didn’t apologize.

She packed up in a quiet scramble of silk and hurt pride. And as she left—heels echoing like accusation—Maan remained where he was.

Still. Exhausted.

He looked at the glass window, at the reflection staring back.

He looked alone.

And this time, he didn’t have the strength to deny why.

+++

The elevator doors had barely closed behind Priyanka when Maan reached for the whiskey cabinet behind his desk.

He didn’t pour a glass.

He just leaned both hands against the edge and bowed his head.

There were women like Priyanka.

Polished. Sculpted. Loud enough to fill the room.

And then there was Geet.

Rough edges. Quiet presence. A voice that never asked to be heard but somehow stayed in your head long after she left.

Geet had never flirted.

Never praised him unnecessarily. Never asked him what cologne he wore or what car he drove. She challenged his thinking. She spotted flaws in logic he hadn’t seen. She once rewrote an entire slide deck because a data point “felt wrong,” and she couldn’t sleep until it made sense.

Priyanka wore effortlessness like perfume.

Geet worked.

Every compliment Geet earned was a bruise, a sleepless night, a thousand quiet humiliations swallowed and turned into resolve.

He remembered one night when he passed by the boardroom at 1 a.m. and saw her asleep with her head on the desk, red ink still staining her fingers.

He hadn’t said a word.

Just stood there, watching.

And now, she was gone.

And every conversation he had with Priyanka felt like a performance he hadn’t auditioned for.

Every suggestion was superficial. Every word choreographed.

He wasn’t mad at her.

He was just tired.

Of pretending her presence filled the space Geet left behind.

Because the truth was—Geet didn’t just fill a space.

She created one.

+++

It was just another day.

The kind that passed in spreadsheets and signatures. Another hour. Another call. Another reminder that she wasn’t here.

The office outside hummed with the usual weekday rhythm—faint clicking of keyboards, shoes scuffing across tile, phones ringing and being silenced in quick succession.

Maan sat in his cabin, a pen clutched too tightly between his fingers, the cap long since chewed through. The reports on his desk remained untouched. He had been staring at the same number for twenty-three minutes.

There was no music.

There hadn’t been since she left.

The silence had begun to rot.

He’d lost interest in calls. In meetings. In everything.

Even Priyanka—once so confident in her heels and tone—had begun keeping her distance. Her knock had grown hesitant. Her sentences shorter. His moods had taken a sharper turn, his sarcasm no longer witty, but cruel. Bitter. Vicious in bursts. Often self-directed. Often not.

He had stopped caring if he unnerved people.

Because he couldn’t seem to un-feel the absence of the one who never tried to win him in the first place.

So he sat. Alone. Drowning in a cabin that smelled faintly of old paper and everything Geet had taken with her.

Until—

Laughter.

From the hallway.

He didn’t look up at first.

Laughter was common.

The staff was young. Sometimes stupidly cheerful. He used to like that.

Now it just irritated him.

Until a word slipped through the gap in the door—

“Geet.”

He heard it like an echo inside his chest.

The pen fell from his hand.
The muscles in his neck stiffened.
His spine straightened.

He didn’t even realize he had stood.

Outside, the hallway had come alive. People were moving toward the break room. A low chorus of excited chatter filtered in, layered with the faint scent of something sweet.

And then he caught it again.

“…so sweet of Geet, even after she resigned…”

He didn’t wait to hear the rest.

He was already out of his chair.

His legs moved faster than his mind—sharp, purposeful steps that didn’t ask for permission. He barely registered the surprised glance from Sheetal as he swept past her office. A young intern stepped aside quickly, startled by his sudden appearance.

Because Maan Singh Khurana wasn’t walking.

He was almost sprinting.

And for once, he didn’t care how it looked.

+++

Inside the Break Room

Geet stood near the counter, holding a knife with slightly awkward grace as she cut through a moist, chocolate-layered cake. Her fingers were dusted with cocoa powder, her hair tied into a loose ponytail that kept slipping down her shoulder. She was laughing softly, eyes crinkling at the corners.

The peon—Mr. Narayan—was standing beside her with tears in his eyes.

“You really remembered,” he whispered, voice thick with disbelief. “Even after you left.”

Geet smiled. “A promise is a promise. I said I’d bake you a cake for your fiftieth birthday, and I meant it.”

Nisha and Meera were already around her, hugging her, teasing her, fussing over how “office didn’t feel right without her.” Kavya added dryly, “Who bakes cakes for peons after resigning? This woman’s either an angel or insane.”

Raj snorted, taking a photo. “Or both.”

Geet laughed, brushing flour off her cheek. “Just don’t post that online. I look like I fought the cake and lost.”

There was warmth in the room. Familiarity.

She wasn’t an employee anymore.

But she belonged.

And she hadn’t realized how much she missed it—until she saw everyone again and felt, if only for a moment, like she wasn’t invisible.

+++

The Door Flies Open

The room quieted almost instantly.

Not abruptly.

But like someone had pulled the breath out of it.

Geet turned, mid-laugh.

And there he was.

Maan stood in the doorway, chest rising ever so slightly from exertion, his black shirt half unbuttoned beneath his blazer, his hair a little disheveled like he hadn’t looked in the mirror before walking out.

His eyes—those eyes—landed on her and didn’t move.

She hadn’t come here to see him.

She told herself that three times as she arranged the cake knife, slicing into the soft, spongy layers as the room buzzed around her with cheer and praise.

She hadn’t worn anything different—just a pale blue kurta with faint threadwork at the sleeves, soft white juttis she wore when walking a lot, her hair in a practical low braid. There was nothing in her that said I want to be seen.

And yet—

She felt it.

Before it happened.

That inexplicable stillness in the air. That drop in temperature. That invisible pull on her skin, like the atoms around her had stopped spinning.

The laughter dimmed behind her ears.

Her breath caught—not completely. Just enough.

She didn’t turn right away.

Because she knew.

She knew.

Her fingers clenched the serving knife a little tighter. Her smile froze—not visibly, not enough for others to notice. But inside, a tremor broke through her chest like glass cracking in silence.

She turned.

And there he was.

Maan.

Standing at the entrance of the break room, one hand still loosely gripping the doorframe as if he wasn’t sure whether to step inside or not.

He looked—

Wrecked.

Not in the physical sense. His shirt was tucked in, blazer sharp, shoes clean. But the edges of him were frayed. His eyes were darker. Tired. Not tired from work—but from the kind of thinking that doesn’t let you sleep.

And those eyes?

Locked on her like she was something he had hallucinated.

Like he was scared if he blinked, she’d vanish again.

She couldn’t look away.

Wouldn’t.

Because something in her—something raw and still healing—ached at the sight of him.

He hadn’t changed.

But he had.

She hadn’t expected this.

She hadn’t prepared for this.

She had only brought cake.

The cake knife slipped from her hand onto the counter.

He didn’t speak.

Neither did she.

The others sensed it instantly—the shift in the air, the unspoken charge crackling between two people who had clearly left things far from finished.

Meera cleared her throat. “I’ll, uh… go get more plates.”

“I’ll help,” Nisha added too quickly, already tugging Raj with her.

One by one, they peeled away, filing out silently, pretending not to notice the way Maan was still staring at Geet like he had forgotten what to do with his hands.

In seconds, the room was empty again.

Except for the two of them.

The door shut softly behind the last colleague.

Maan’s voice came quiet, but rough.

“…You came back.”

Geet swallowed, her fingers still resting on the edge of the table. “Only for the cake. I promised Narayan ji.”

A beat of silence.

“You remembered,” Maan said. And he hated how raw it sounded.

Geet nodded, her tone neutral. “I don’t forget promises.”

He exhaled.

But didn’t move.

Didn’t come closer.

Because something about her posture—calm, composed, untouched by him—told him she was not the same girl who’d walked out of his cabin days ago.

She was steadier now.

Not colder.

Just... further away.

Wonderful update simply amazing brilliantly written fab

Part 26

Intriguing and very Curious Update

Priyanka's fake charm is no longer working

and Maan can clearly see that she wastes more time in flirting

instead of working on deadlines

Geet coming to office was actually a surprise but sweet one too

hope now both Maan and Geet can truly speak

Why does she think that she is used or maan got over of her its because of non communication and lack of trust and not expressing the feelings

Why? Is this the fault of maan to clear his feelings about her or geet that she didn't understood maan or they are not very clear about the feelings and they didn't expressed to each other

26

every second maan missing geet

it is taking him too much time in finishing his single report in geet's absence

priyanka is just show off her every suggestion is coated with glory of fake

she actually taunt geet n answer she get from maan make her hesitant n confidanceless

Part 25

sad that Geet left

but cannot blame her

dismayed that Maan did not stop her

Maan's thoughts were reasonable

at least he knows why she left

the office is surely empty without Geet

well Geet is continuing her modelling

for Maan she belongs her

of cos Maan misses Geet

he does feel hollow without her

glad Maan put Priyanka in her place

as expected Maan cannot concentrate

great that Maan was angry seeing Priyanka's behavior

Geet clearly made a place