Arshi SS: The Tinder Affair | (Part 31 up) | (Blog Link Up!) - Page 33

The bed was littered with crushed, dirty tissues. A half-empty tub of chocolate ice-cream lay abandoned amongst the blankets.

And Khushi was torturing herself by watching the most dreadfully boring soap opera on television. It was the ideal punishment for her scandalous behaviour.

Sniffing through her read nose with self loathing, Khushi stared at the blinking notification light yet again.

She couldn't.

She WOULDN'T.

This wasn't Salman Khan.

And she couldn't do this to Arnav.

A loud wail escaped her throat.

Why was this so HARD?!

She'd been crying since yesterday. Had lied to Arnav - yet again - when he'd enquired about the red Rudolph nose and litter of tissues with concern. She'd pleaded a headache and a cold and he'd innocently believed her, reminding her to take care of herself as he'd left for work. Although he had offered to stay home with her, she couldn't allow that horror. She needed to sulk in private.

And she'd been wailing wildly since he'd stepped out the door. The neighbours were probably convinced by now that she was a banshee...

But that didn't matter.

What mattered was that she couldn't have Salman Khan.

And that she was a cheating, lying chudail (witch).

Minefields or no minefields, there was no justification for her actions.

Khushi blew her nose.

The snarky aunty on TV was bullying her daughter-in-law again.

What a shitty soap opera.

The wailing grew louder.

Anjali had been up thinking all night. And she had decided.

Just as Arnav would have told her if Shyam-ji was cheating on her - oh! What a horrible thought - so would she tell her brother the truth about his wife. He needed to know from her. Before he found out in some other, more terrible way.

Anjali had her whole speech prepared, complete with the perfect sentimental quotes and reassurances of 'everything is gonna be okay'. But she stopped just outside his office door. Because she couldn't BELIEVE what she was hearing.

"Told you Tinder was a good idea, man! You HAVE to give me credit!" NK's voice, somewhat muffled floated out of the slightly open door. Was he perhaps eating something?

"Shut up, NK! And get out of my office! Don't you have work to do?"

"Okay! Okay! But you should be grateful to me, seriously..."

Anjali was too frozen to react as NK opened the door. He did a double-take as he saw her standing outside. Shooting a terrified look back at Arnav - who looked just as alarmed - NK stepped around Anjali and quickly disappeared downstairs.

For five minutes, the brother and sister simply stared at each other in shock. Then she walked in and closed the door behind her.

An hour later, when Anjali walked out of the office, the guard watched her closely. She seemed extremely dazed and was muttering to herself most unusually. He wondered what was wrong.

"HE is Ashish Ranjan... But then that means.. Khushi-ji? And HIM?" She stopped outside the entrance to the building and shook her head incredulously. She'd heard of many married couples cheating on each other. But she'd never heard of one cheating on each other WITH each other.

She didn't know whether she was supposed to laugh to cry.

Reviews are like feather-soft tissues to a sulky Khushi! Drop me a comment! 😃