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Chapter 4
Someone else didn't feel it was tough luck. He genuinely felt miserable about what Ms Gupta had to face and wanted to apologize for it, although it was never his decision go ahead with the "scared confession" tactic.
With a bunch of white lilies in his hand, he got out of his white BMW and slowly made his way to the door of the Gupta household when he heard Shashi Gupta's colourful vocabulary describing the person only he could put a name to - Arnav Singh Raizada. He stopped. This was not a good time. He would come back again. Although he really wanted to say sorry, it would have to be done some other time.
*******
Khushi Kumari Gupta was gazing at the stars that hung from her ceiling. They were glow in the dark. Everytime she missed her parents, she looked at those stars. Having them in her bedroom meant she could see and talk to her parents even during the day.
She had showered and changed into a casual baby pink salwar kameez. With her damp hair dripping water, wetting the back of her kameez, she sat on her bed, absentmindedly doodling on her bedsheet with her index nail but her thoughts were running in a completely different direction.
"Amma, from up there, you know why everything happens. So tell me, why did this happen to me? What did I do? You know I feel so scared in the dark? And yet that horrible man kept me locked in a dark room for two days? Why did you let this happen Amma?"
She knew she would get no answers. She had no energy to listen. She was physically and emotionally exhausted from the events of the last 48 hours. Propped up against the headboard of her bed, Khushi fell into deep slumber.
*********
Sheesh Mahal was seeing a flurry of activities. There were lights being set up, event managers pacing up and down, shouting directions into their headphones, caterers setting up the food area, art directors doing the stage and ramp, and Lavanya Kashyap busy painting her nails for the 20th time. This time, the red apparently looked too dark.
"I don't like red anymore ASR", she chirped. "I think I am going to try teal for the party tonight. And then I might go crazy and try on a yin yang nail art with a black and white dress on the day of the show".
Arnav Singh Raizada, was busy barking instructions into his expensive Bose Bluetooth headpiece. He hardly heard what she said. Once upon a time, Lavanya Kashyap's inclusion of the words yin and yang in her sentence would have impressed Arnav. But he had gone beyond that now. He had taken all that Lavanya had to offer and now felt nothing for her anymore.
"ASR, are you listening to me", Lavanya prodded, in a gentle almost timid tone.
"No", came the clipped answer before he got on another call to bark some more at another poor unsuspecting soul on the other end of the line.
Lavanya sighed and went back to painting her nails. She was used to this by now. ASR was never interested in what she did or wanted. All he was interested in was what she could give him. In her initial days as his live-in Business Developer, Lavanya felt as if she was the center of his attention. Now he barely gave her any. The signs were clear. ASR was done with her. She could bow out on her own with her dignity intact, or ASR would end it in his own brutal way. She chose the former.
Lavanya Kashyap might have been many things, but she was no fool. She knew her time would be up one day. People like ASR never fell in love. And she preferred to still keep her self-esteem intact, whatever was left of it after being the mistress of the youngest and richest Casanova of the country for a year. She however wondered as to who would fill her shoes. A part of her almost went out to the new unknown girl, but she soon snapped out of it.
Now that ASR was done with her, she had to look for a real job. She, after all, had a mother to take care of. Better leave the country altogether, she mused, before dabbing some nail polish remover on a blob of cotton and working to remove all the colour from her freshly painted nails. Red was last season. She wondered what colour would it be this season.
Chapter 5: https://www.indiaforums.com/forum/fan-fictions/4343261/thread-1-to-love-or-not-to-love-an-arhi-ff-chp-32-pg-138-feb-14?pn=3
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