Jasprit was pacing around the room, his phone in his hand. Behind him Shruti was sitting on the couch, nibbling at her nails. Suddenly his phone rang, which he picked up. He just hummed at the other person before he said goodbye and cut the call, sitting next to Shruti on the couch.

"Well? What did your friend say? What's happening at school?" Shruti asked, holding his arm.

"They're doing nothing." Jasprit muttered, sighing out. "I don't know."

"That's good, right! It's great if they don't do anything. That's really great news for us, too! Why are you doubting this?" She cried out, looking at him with a smile.

"Because if there's anything I know about them, they don't do this. They're preparing for something big." Jasprit wondered out loud.

"Well it doesn't matter because it's all Meera's fault so it'll fall on her. Why should we care?" She shrugged, looking at him.

"And if Meera tells that you also took part in this entire fiasco, then? Do you know what will happen to you?" Jasprit forced out, dread in his voice. He couldn't think of any other outcome than being at their mercy and he hated it, truly. He couldn't just sit around and wait for the other shoe to drop, it was giving him too much anxiety to even think about it.

"Don't say that." She gasped out. "I don't want to think about it."

"Why did you even take part in this entire thing? What compelled you to do this? I just can't understand."

"It's because of you! You were in so much pain when Simran fucked you over and you were in pain everyday. I just couldn't see you go through that. I did it for you." She sobbed out, looking at him.

"I didn't ask you to do this for me, Shruti. I wanted you to be away from all this drama. They already fucked me over, I didn't want them to fuck you over as well. I wanted you to stay far away from that group but now, it's inevitable. They will find out and they will come after you." He muttered, tired of all this. He already faced this once with Simran and now he was facing this again with Shruti.

"It'll be okay, you are with me right?"

"Till the end of time, darling." He hugged her tightly. "Till the end of time."

-

Bhuvi met Gia at the park near her house, her coming out with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders.

"When you said you had to talk to me urgently, I didn't think it would be at this very minute." Gia muttered out, looking at him. Bhuvi was sitting at the bench, his leg restlessly moving up and down. She went and sat down next to him.

"What's up? You look tensed." She said, turning towards him. She had been in the middle of dinner when he had called. She quickly just put a shawl over her pajamas and had come out, not wanting to make him wait.

"I have to tell you something." He muttered. "Though I'm scared it may ruin your relationship with Virat."

"Oh, really?" Gia wondered. "Tell me, it's okay."

"This threesome business, Nupur was the first one." Bhuvi said, looking at Gia's expressions. She leaned back and blinked at him before shaking her head.

"No, how, wait you're joking." She muttered out, looking at him and suddenly getting up. "Please tell me you're joking."

"I'm not." He shook his head and pulled Gia back to sit on the bench. "Why do you think I'll joke about my girlfriend? Gosh, I was as surprised as you and to think she didn't tell me this before."

"Huh." she muttered. "Atleast you told me, I'm afraid I would've been in the dark forever. Hell, I didn't even know about any of this until Meera told me." She shook her head, disappointment written all over her face.

"Why did you come to tell me this?" She asked after a poignant pause.

"I just thought you should know. It's only fair." He replied. "After all, everyone knew except you and me."

"So what are you going to do?" She murmured, looking forward. The garden they were in had shrubs along the periphery of the area and the flowers had just bloomed, surrounding them with the scent of jasmine.

"About what?" He shrugged.

"I'm guessing you have questions if you've come all the way to tell me something that you could've called to tell me about. I'm here, you can rant you know." She turned to look at him. "My gosh, boys are just so oblivious."

"I just, she tells me everything and she didn't tell me this, it just makes me wonder if there's anything else she had hidden from me. I trusted her with my life before this but now." He said after a moment's hesitation. He didn't know whether it was the right call telling Gia all this but he couldn't help it anymore.

"Now she broke your trust." Gia continued.

"Exactly! How am I supposed to get back to her with my sanity intact. I'll just be wondering if there's anything else she's hiding throughout the course of our relationship." He turned to her. "What would you do?"

"Do you want to break up with her?" She asked, looking at him. She could see the love he had for Nupur, even though she had hidden this. She was sure he wouldn't want to be apart from her.

"No. I cant bear to lose her." He replied, making her smile.

"Then here's what you do. Go back to her and ask her if there's anything else that she's been hiding and then give her your demands." She continued, moving her hands around while talking.

"Demands?" He questioned with a look on his face.

"Not sexual favours, please. Explain it to her what it is that you want in a relationship and ask her whether she's on the same page or not. If she is, then you should make up." She explained, easing the look of confusion on his face.

"Isn't it too soon? I thought we should talk like after some time." He shrugged. "Maybe like a day or two? I'll look like a simp."

"This is why men are stupid. If there's something wrong, you solve it that very moment. Don't wait, don't postpone." Gia sighed out, shaking her head.

Bhuvi got up from the bench, ready to leave. He hugged Gia, thanking her for her advice and waved her goodbye as she stood near the bench, contemplating. Bhuvi stopped after taking a few steps and shouted back at her.

"Gia, what will you do about this?"

"Hopefully take the same advice I've given you." She shouted back, smiling at him. She slowly walked back to her house, ditching the shawl as soon as she got in and closed the door. She went up to her room and sat down on the bed, wanting to call Virat and ask him about all this but hesitated. She needed to think about what to do before confronting him recklessly. She needed a game plan.

-

Nupur was alone at home, her parents having gone to a party. Usually by now, she would've called Bhuvi to come and give her company but she wasn't sure if he would come, recalling the incident which had happened in the afternoon. In fact, Bhuvi hadn't read or replied to any of the 52 messages she had sent, all varying with various apologies and gifs of crying.

No one could say, she hadn't tried.

The bell rang suddenly, causing her to shoot our of her bed and run down, hoping it would be Bhuvi at the door. As the help was about to open the door she shooed him away, causing him to back off as she opened the door, praying to god that it would be him.

Bhuvi stood there on the other side, heart pounding as he got the glimpse of his girlfriend, Nupur. She was still so pretty, even though her eyes were tinged red due to crying on and off. He had also seen all the 52 messages sitting in his chat box, fondly remembering the efforts she had put till now, even though it had been less than 24 hours. He was pulled in by her and lead upstairs to her room, all the while being silent, unsure of how to start the conversation.

"Bhuvi, are you okay?" She muttered, looking at him after he hadn't spoken a word since she'd pulled him in. He just looked at her.

"If you're going to break up with me, I have written down about 40 reason why you shouldn't. If you need more, I can compile more as well." She nervously said, moving towards her table. She picked up her notebook and flipped towards the pages, landing on her list. She turned around, facing him and started reading out.

"Number one and I'd like to say the most important one, I'm your soulmate, woah!"

She was stopped when she felt arms around her waist, pulling her to him. He quickly joined their lips together, the familiar dance making the both of them come alive and hug each other tighter, the notebook dropping from her hand. She quickly pulled him towards her, afraid that he'd leave if she didn't.

He held her waist tightly, imprinting his fingers on her body and put his tongue in her mouth, savoring her taste. If he died right now, he would honestly die a happy man.

They broke apart, a string of saliva connecting them and both of them heaving with the lack of breath. Nupur smiled.

"Number two, no one can kiss me like that, apart from you." She whispered, tears quickly pooling in her eyes, a drop falling. Bhuvi held her face in his palm and wiped the tear with his thumb, smiling.

"I thought about it, this entire thing and I realized that no matter what you do, "I still love you." Bhuvi started, dropping his palm from her face. "But my trust is broken, Nupur. I'll still love you but I can't trust you fully, like I had before." He turned away from her, looking at the door.

"Tell me then, what can I do to earn your trust again?" Nupur whispered. "I'll always be sorry for what I've done. please tell me what to do."

"I bought this." He turned around with a ring box, moving towards her. "You love diamonds and rubies. You love a shiny ring on your finger, glittering away." He spoke and opened the box.

Inside the box was a plain platinum ring, silver in color with no diamonds nor any design on it. He took it out and put it on Nupur's right hand, on her ring finger.

"You have to wear this forever, okay? I'm going to marry you and we're going to have cute babies that everyone will be jealous of. I'll give you the world but the only thing I won't give you is your dream ring. You have to wear this and promise me that you'll never break my trust, ever again.

"I promise." She said, smiling through the tears. "This is the most beautiful ring I own now."

"I'm glad." He smiled, hugging her tightly. She hugged him back, placing her head on his shoulders.

"I'm so happy now."

"I'm happier, so much happier."

-

Longest chapter of this entire book :)

I truly owe an explanation about the long absence.
I actually deleted the app due to my exam (NEET PG) approaching and I wanted to really get my last month revision done but just 12 hours before the exam was scheduled to happen, they cancelled the paper.
Amidst all the stress and drama NTA has created, I'm so lost as to what to do next. I'm still studying in hopes of the paper being conducted as soon as possible - wish me luck and pray that this nightmare is over soon :)

Again, so sorry for the delay in posting the chapters. I will be back to posting one chapter every two days :)