...but Mr. Malhotra could only recall the time when he met Nandani for the first time.
The first time he saw her smile and kept looking at her.
Their first kiss.
And then the moment he was informed of her betrothal.
He crashed the glass across the floor which shattered into a hundred pieces. And he found his heart in the same state.
Only it bled too.
"I prayed like a fool. I prayed for you each night, every hour of my day. I kept you alive in me, in my memory and you think you are a fool? So guess what Manik Malhotra? You are a fool to not love me enough to return to me. To tell me that you are still alive." With each sentence she said, she found the resolve in her breaking down and with that her physical strength as well. She cried remembering the days and nights when she had ached for him.
For the first time since he had seen her, he found himself weak because her tears could still bring him down on his knees. He felt his hold on her wrists slacked and his hands found their way to her back and before he knew it, he had stroked her twice. When she did not resist his touch, he made her sit on his lap. In that moment all the norms seemed unreal. In that moment she was not someone else's fianc.
In that moment, she belonged to him. Like she always did.
...
Her breath was caught in her throat for a few seconds, then he felt the coldness around his neck and found his embrace void of her presence.
She walked to the window behind his chair, looking at the dark clouds marking the sky. The bleakness of her life seemed eternal now.
...
Tonight he needed to drink to forget her tears.
