Sejal could feel the negative vibes from a very far off distance; that is from the parking lot itself. As if her every cell of the body knew something was far from distant today, like either she is going to have the worse of her cramps this week or her Dad is going to disagree regarding the property proposal. Playing with the key on her index finger she walked into the lift almost slamming into Mrs Iyer and her baby dog, sharing a little smile with each other Sejal tried maintaining as much possible distance from the brown little creature in the moving car because in her dictionary dogs are ultimo in beginning of the plot of a horror story and definitely she wasn't interested in being a lead to such a storyline.

Making a life time record sprint to the door Sejal banged her head into their flat door hoping it to open magically with only her touch, this made her think about adding a biotherm recognizing lock to the door so it could open automatically whenever she would appear on the door frame. Like the saying goes :If not magic then science could do the job.

"What has got into you also?" Katyusha shouted as soon as the door flew open, Sejal gracefully avoided her question walking to the shoe stand to place her black heels neatly on the left shelf.

"Good evening to you also, and what do you mean by you also?"

Before she could receive any answer from her best friend she saw traces of blood on the white marble, her interrogating mode switched on and she turned around to check whether the blood was of Katyusha, not finding any lead from her Sejal turned around to check for any forced entries or dead cat in the kitchen where she found Darshan washing his blood stained hands in the sink. Or was it Nic?

"Dr Vyas, what happened? Are you alright?" Sejal asked slamming her bag on the counter and rushed to inspect the blood in his hand.

"Your boyfriend happened Beautiful." Darshan replied closing the tap, while Sejal stood there confused hoping for Katyusha to give some explanation but she seemed to master her arts in disappearing from the scenes, it seems Darshan was only her feasible source of information at the moment.

"What do you mean?"

"You know, I know Shitty from med school, we studied together, had numerous lunch and study dates together, we performed our first operation together, and you know we even promised to get married together, nah- not to each other, ha-ha and we-"

Sejal took a deep breath to save her hands from strangling Darshan at the moment, here her heart is playing see-saw on the cliff; dangling from her ribcage of the worst possible cases of what might happen to her Aryan and Darshan is smiling reviving his memories with his best friend.

"Can you get to the damn point Dr Vyas?"

"Patience is the key to human survival." Sejal cracked her fingers, scoffing at the drama timing of Darshan. He should surely be nominated for being the cruelest best friend in the history of the universe!

"Okay, now that you have learnt your little lesson. Yeah so we decided to date together, I mean start at the same time obviously with different girl; it was one of my greatest ideas." Sejal added a little smile so that he could continue and reach the main topic quickly "He started dating Avantika, she was a brilliant anesthesiologist of her time."She rolled her eyes in veneration, didn't this epitome of manners know that never praise an ex in front of the present lady.

"What happened? Oh. Okay. So, yeah once Avantika came to me complaining that the whole campus is calling an emotionless fuck of Shitty, and when she told him to react back to the trolls Aryan simply said –Silence is the best reply to stupid things like this."

Sejal honestly didn't know what to gather out of this memory of theirs? Should she be happy that it didn't look like any serious relationship or should be confused over the fact that Darshan was sharing useless shit right now instead of telling her about the blood and Aryan.

"I know you are amazingly confused, I have never seen Shitty react the way he did today. He never gets violent Beautiful, not even when people called his mother a home wrecker. But today he hit-" Darshan stopped so that Sejal could grasp in the laid information.

"Is he hurt?" Darshan gave an implicit reaction of how the hell Sejal picked up the only Aryan part from his entire monologue, maybe this is love and although it was hurtful to appoint but it was amazing to watch something closely.

"He hit Nic."

"Why?"

"Because of the Race."

Sejal couldn't stop the loud inhumane groan coming out from her throat. It was a sign of avid frustration of how seriously Aryan has taken the race into, it shouldn't have been that big of a deal but at least the matter would be in control if yesterday she wouldn't be called on duty to the ER. After Aryan dismissed the angry call she was paged to come and attend an operation immediately so she couldn't go to meet him and once her duty was done in the morning, Aryan has been busy all day with meetings and appointments.

"-I don't want it Baby." Sejal turned around to the soft voice of Nikhil with Katyusha running on his heel catching the BP machine.

"Hi banana. Tell your bullshit of a friend that I am fine."

Sejal could see the small bruise near the division of the eyebrows of Nikhil and a small round black outer line of the right eye as he tried resisting Katyusha from taking a BP check.

"Katu, why are you hell bent on checking his BP now?" Sejal asked really confused about the matter of how a BP check and his bruises are related?

"Come on Sejal that's what a doctor would do, out of all the people you should know it." Katyusha spoke as if it is the most obvious thing in the world.

"But why check his BP when his wound needs dressing, Usha."

Sejal chuckled as Katyusha rolled her eyes on being called Usha, and lord forbid she didn't want another argument about the same nickname bragging thing because once their bickering turned out so serious that Darshan didn't allow anybody to call Katyusha as Katu; strange but sweet, maybe that's how they bond.

"You guys being doctors are being so ridiculous right now!" Katyusha shouted in complete exhaustion because nobody was letting her do something feasible and Nikhil wouldn't agree letting his arm to be strangled.

"Katu it's a relief to the universe that you aren't a doctor or else the world would have turned into a massive BP checking loop." To this everybody gave in and laughed, Nikhil finally extended his arm for the bare sake of love.

Maybe sometimes a bragging bunch of friends is the only cure to the negative aura clouding your soul.

~

The concept of love and hate is quite simple with a very complicated exterior. It's just the mere difference of how the brain puts it through, both love and hate are just the flicker of emotions which is categorized the human brain and the heart; although the heart doesn't have the power to think.
Just like a coin love and hate are the two different sides of the same metal, if you try understanding one side you miss the other side.

Aryan stared at the old picture of Mahima hanged on the wall, not understanding which side of the coin his emotions were on. He never understood that it was his mother who stopped loving him or it was Dr Suhana who made his mother to stop loving her son? A few things still didn't make sense and he wished his head has never thought about them in the first place.

He never understood his Shreya pali was dead due to drug overdose or depression. He always wondered, was it true of what his sister would say about jet black eyes – 'Her black eyes makes her more desirable because there is always a life in them, a lively one, she finds love in everything she does. I can never stop loving her'

Something never fitted in his head that his father divorced Mahima because she was cheating on him or because he was done taking responsibilities of his children. Aryan watched the scar in his hand confused that it was the love for Sejal he fought Nikhil or just the payback he feels for Shravan Bhattacharya.

"Hey Dr Shetty, how is your hand?"

Aryan watched the door not sure when Sejal came in and how he didn't pay attention to the movements around him, was his mind playing games again?

"How are you feeling?"

Aryan displayed his little bandaged hand still not sure what possessed him to turn violence and this definitely led to no surgery for three days in the already hectic schedule, as they say hands are the precious for a surgeon. Sejal gave a small chuckle and stood beside him with a cup of warm water as her mother always said: few milliliters of hot water into the system and you can slowly see your tension dissolving in it, stupid one but it worked in some of the times.

Aryan held the cup in one hand and motioned her to sit beside him, instead Sejal settled smoothly on his laps snaking her right hand around his skin covering the medulla region, resting her head on the nape of his neck trying to check whether the theories of synchronized heartbeats of soul mates does have any truth or is just a bluff. Her body tingled as Aryan took his sip of water and watching him curved up a smile on her face because being in love changes the smallest bits of thing also like; even the simplest action of drinking water looks sexy or is it the lust?

"Do you want a chocolate?"

Aryan didn't reply instead entwined their free hands and planted a small kiss on her palm staring into her hazel eyes trying to check was his Shreya Pali right about seeing some lively life in the eyes, but again they were black in colour.

Sejal knew something was troubling her love's functioning brain but she didn't wanted to act persistent so instead of asking she simply applied the distraction trick, the emotional turmoil will bail out if a physical terrain is activated.

Giving a half sided loop smile Aryan kissed her forehead as she gripped his ribcage tightly.

"Let's play a game."

"Yeah." Aryan whispered hoarsely into her ear which made Sejal to lick her lower lip in an instinct reaction.

"Okay. So whatever I as-k you ha-ve.."

Sejal slapped his hand with which he was trying to tickle her stomach, knowing very well of how immune she was to it.

"What?" Aryan asked innocently as if he had done no deed of fault, trying to stop smiling with his perfect lips which were now having a little scar from a straight punch of Nikhil. As if on cue Sejal has also seen the little cut now only she traced her thumb finger getting a small whimper of pain from him.

"Your touch has a strong healing power Muneca."

Whispering a small is it Sejal kissed his lower lip softly which was having the cut, at first Aryan didn't respond maybe still in shock then after a moment he gripped her soft hair and kissed her back with a feverous aggression, pinning her to the sofa which made their bodies settle in a position where he was on top of her and with the passion he was moving his lips in sync with her made Sejal dig her nails into the sensitive skin of his neck leaving pretty claw marks. Definitely that made him let out a little groan adding an extra pressure to the lips, this was something Sejal would call a toe curling kiss.

Panting heavily he inclined their foreheads with their nose touching each other affectionately giving a breathtaking smile as Sejal stared into his eyes thinking about how their kiss had turned from a soft one to an animalistic action filled with some unnamed emotion. At this point she knew something has definitely changed. But what?

"Did the pain go?"

Aryan looked confused stabilizing their position into a sitting one.

"Why did you fight Nikhil?"

Aryan stared into the hazel pool of innocence for a moment and then eyed her pink lips which automatically made him lean forward to give a small peck.

"I don't know."

"You should start trusting me with my decisions Dr Shetty. I say something when I am confident about it or else I don't."

Giving one of his unaffecting sad smiles he pecked her lips again, simply watching dreamily into her eyes.

"I am talking to you Dr Shetty."

This time he kissed the corner of her lips which made Sejal close her eyes in a wreck of emotions.

"Aryan, I know you are trying to avoid my question distracting me."

A bright smile curved up on his face and this time he gave a brief kiss on her nose receiving a loud slap on his right arm which merely effected him, instead he watched Sejal hiss in pain very cutely.

"Aryan sounds so good coming from your lips."

"Don't change the subject Dr Shetty!" Sejal edged her voice louder in order to stop Aryan in observing the little blush creeping on her traitor cheeks.

He chuckled.

"You need to understand people and things in a better way Dr Shetty."

"Can you be precise of what you are talking about?" Aryan asked spreading both his arms onto the sofa making his body now lie in a T shape.

"I know you didn't feel good about my racing thing with Nic but that completely doesn't give you any freaking rights to hit him."

"Come on Muneca, you know me I am a doctor first but still a business man so I do everything in accounting. Even if that includes pain."

Sejal couldn't understand of what connection pain had to do with him being a business man but she knew one thing that he needs to understand pain in a better way or deal with it very carefully. Or she has to understand Aryan's way of experiencing pain.

"How does it feel now? The pain?"

"Neutrally charged, that's how I feel. My theory of pain is simple. The person who is the source of my pain should go through the same pain and I must witness it. That seals the deal. An eye for an eye. I don't see any problem in that."

Psychic. That's how his concept of pain sounded but maybe Sejal was sounding too cryptic turning into a judge landed from nowhere land.

"Even if you love that person a lot?"

"Yeah. You are asking this because I know you haven't done anything like this so you don't get the relief behind the action.

"Even if it's me?"

Aryan was taken back for a moment but was soon enough to mask it with a breathtaking smile.

"I trust you. But will you promise me something?"

"Depends on what you ask."

"Will you go through such a pain which will give me peace?"

Sejal bit her lip in torturous anticipation, because the request sounded like too much of an outrageous demand. Was it worth the risk?

"Okay promise, if you tell me something."

Thinking about the dreadful way of Aryan's concept of pain, Sejal sighed. How can a pain ever give peace to somebody, is this where people start misunderstanding hate for love and obsession for possession? Now that she had said wanting to know about something but Sejal had no idea of what she should ask so she let her brain ask the first thing she was thinking about.

"How was Avantika?"

.      .      .      .      .

Hello,

I hope all of you are doing well. I know it's a tough time but stay strong and together we all will fight COVID-19.

Make the best of your quarantine time. I will try updating more chapters, but no promises. :)

Love,

Sana Afreen. ❤