Mitali Jain

Drama, Suspense, and being psychotic wasn't something that had ever been in my life. I had always had a normal, fun going and charming routines, other than the abrupt attempts of our long lost relatives who would show some interests in our life, or my results getting announced, or with the rising prices my pocket money getting reduce a few currencies.

That was when I didn't have really a three letter word in my life, and pretty much it wasn't a Guy, rather a Job.

It was all fine, everything was good, until this fine Job of mine, which I still love to the moon and back made me stumble into Daksh's presence, than my Brothers Job that led him and me closer to Daksh, Jai and Veer.

How chaotic it was, if I were to sum up my past month since both of us siblings had began to work, I would say – I got a new friend who seemed to be so understanding and amazingly cool that we had hit it off immediately and more understandingly than I and Shakti ever did; than it was the second time in my life I met a Royal, alas this one had its protocols intact; then there was this stupid Guy who made me nervous, gave me jitters and Claimed to love me.

So much to think I might be able to enjoy my life peacefully!

My eyes wondered off to the mouthwatering food that was set in front of me, and then to the three men who seemed to be settled comfortably in their own little world.

"Bhai, what are you guys thinking?" I asked; a heavy feeling had nestled into my heart at their grim expression.

It was true that the theories and situations that we matched a few minutes ago, gave a very wrong impression of Daksh, but then there also the fact that each one of them knew him for years, I believed in him as well no matter what he did.

And if I was not wrong in understanding my brother, than I had to say, rather than accusing him, being offended with whatever Daksh had cooked up, they were worried about him.

Worried there might be something wrong with him and they couldn't even depict it. And somewhere it surprised me as I harbored the same feelings.

"Mitali did he said anything amiss this evening when the two of you met?" Naveen asked, and quickly I tried to recall all the conversation that we had.

"No, it was just like we always had, the two of us joked about you, my job, than the painting, nothing amiss... Bhai is it really worrisome, maybe he would have mixed up the situations or he would have mentioned it to me but I might have not heard properly." I tried to reason out; my eyes would linger on each of their face, measuring if any of them were even close enough to be convinced by it.

"Mitali, Arundhati Aunty and his dad are a very sensitive topic for Daksh, he won't just let it out, and you aren't that careless to ignore things like that." Jai commented.

And once again, I had to agree with them. It wasn't a small thing to mix me and his mom in a similar place, and I wasn't that careless to mix his mom with some other person. And just like that after all this conversation we were back to that one question which Veer voiced out for the first time this evening bringing it to the lime light.

"Than what could possibly be the reason... why would he give two different reasons to us?"

****

"Mitali, you need to stop thinking about it, Jai said right that he will be talking with Daksh about this than why are you so stressed out about it?" Shakti asked.

Once again I was back to this heavenly corner of the Khayali Adda, with Rey's best milk shake and Shakti's special sandwich right in front of me.

"I am worried for Daksh, I had called him in the morning but he isn't answering nor did he reply to my messages, and that's not it..." I took a deep breath and looked up at her and said, "This morning I submitted my proposal for the exhibition, I just hope this time it would be accepted."

"This soon? Usually they take about 6 months to let you guys take the lead."

"I am just taking my chance I don't know what is it that I am going to do. Ahh this is so annoying." I let my head fall on the table as I heard Shakti chuckle along with the ringing of the bell of the café.

It was almost closing time and never Rey or Shakti expected any customer at this point of time. I decided to ignore this unpredicted customer, and focused on my drink. As I took one sip and looked up at Shakti, the drink seemed to have gone into the wrong pipe as I began to cough, and point my fingers towards the person standing right behind Shakti.

"Aishh, how many times do I have to tell you to be careful while you drink... such a kid!" Shakti complained, as I tried to regain my breath.

"That she is, but how about you Rajkumari Shakti?" Veer's voice finally greeted the unexpected person. And to think he came towards us because of me.

But again, what the hell was all this?

"Rajkumar Veer, what do I owe to have your presence here?" Shakti said, as she stood up from her chair. As she did so, my eyes went at the back of the café from where Rey walked out, his expression as surprised as Shakti, yet not like mine.

"I want to talk with you." Veer said, his eyes pointed straight on Shakti, nor moving nor blinking. It scared me the way the temperature in that café had gone chill.

I didn't knew much about Shakti, all that she once belonged to a royal family as well, but how and why did they got separated was something she was never comfortable talking about and something she had said about wanting to let go off the past.

It seemed reasonable to not pester her about it. But now with this other Royal prince in picture it made me worried if Shakti and Rey were in trouble or not.

"Rajkumari Shakti-"

"Shakti... I never held that title." Shakti's voice had that cold hint in it that, if I would have been on the receiving end I would have let go off it, but Veer seemed to be in a mood to show his true royal colors as he let out a laugh and said,

"Don't you think those are quite old matters to hold on?"

"That's true, hence unless you are here for a snack I do not understand your presence here prince." Rey walked towards us and stood right beside Shakti, who seemed to be practicing certain kind of breathing exercise.

"Rajkumar Reyansh, let me first apologize for my unannounced presence, I really didn't knew I could find you here as well. Though it's good –"

"As my sister said, we no longer have any of those titles, whatever it is that you have business with isn't really with us, I am sure you will find your way to them."

"I did found my way to them, but it seems you guys had broken all ties to such an extent that you can't even hear the cries of your own people." Veer than looked at Shakti and said, "and here I thought you were different from them."

The way Rey growled at veer and took hold of his collar and snapped at him, "limits, remember Veer, you may be the prince of Rajasthan, but this lady here, is my sister and I demand respect for her from everyone... including you."

"You very well know what she is to me, and nothing can stop that." Veer snapped back.

"Veer, that topic was closed long back. And Rey let go off him." Shakti said, breaking the staring contest that was going on between the two prince, while I, I stood there stunned enough to not even know what was I supposed to do.

I watched, as veer took a step back from Rey and turned towards Shakti and looked into her eyes. For the time that I had known Veer, he had always been the fun loving chap, never this serious, mysterious and so much of a 'Royal'.

"You know very well what I am talking about." With that said, Veer walked out of the café and Shakti sat back in her seat with a thumb. It seemed she really knew what he was talking about, and was something more dangerous.

I walked closer to her and wrapped my arms around her as she let out her tears. Her words were unclear to me, yet very much understandable to Rey who raked his hands through his hair and snapped at her making us both flinch as he said,

"For god sake Shakti, you and I are no longer a part of them." He gave one long look at Shakti and walked out of the café as I took care of the messed up princess.

********

Jai Kapadia

"Veer, where are you? I have been trying to reach you from the last 3 hours, call me as soon as you get this message." I pressed the end button and looked back at the twinkling lights of the marine drive. It was a good idea truly to have the office set up in this location.

Taking a huge breath in, I walked back to my desk and pulled out the file of our next project and packed it in my bag along with my laptop and other stuffs. I was almost done with clearing the stuff on the desk when there was knock on the door.

As I looked up from my bag, my eyes met with Daksh's dark ones. His presence once again reminded me of the conversation that we had, had with Mitali, and for a moment even if I knew Daksh for almost whole of my life I couldn't help myself but worry about Mitali.

"Hey, you seem to be a bit preoccupied." Daksh said, as his eyes took in the situation in which my table was in.

"No, I was about to turn in, but that was after I had a word with Veer, he isn't answering my calls." I took hold of the next file, let my eyes wonder off to my cell phone and let out a huge sigh.

"He will be fine, if you are really turning in, mind having a drink with me?"

I stared at him and let out a chuckle and shook my head, "want me to call Naveen?"

"Nah, I asked him already he seems to be a bit busy. Don't you think it's high time he gets a girlfriend?"

"Says the guy who has never spoken a more than two words with a girl, now come let's fetch you that drink of yours." I said and walked towards him as he pulled me by my neck and almost punched me in my guts.

"Aren't you a bastard, I must warn Mitali of your inner side." I stared at him as if I was caught stealing something from my dad's room.

"What, I know you can be secretive, but your love lady is a blabber mouth. You shouldn't be surprised." And I surely had to agree on that.

******

As we walked into the bar I waved at a few of the people whom we knew there and took our seats and ordered a peg of bourbon for each of us. Once the waiter had left I turned back to Daksh and raised my eyebrows.

"What, don't look at me like that, it's you who has to do the talking today not me." He said, and sat back in his chair comfortably.

"Don't you think you are talking unusually a lot today?" I asked, as I leaned in a bit towards the table and looked at him, the dim lights of the bar didn't helped much, but I could see the small smile that was there on his face.

"I am not sure, its Mitali we are talking about here, I am sure you would have a lot of things out there going in your mind. I am a friend."

"That depends whose, mine or hers." I snapped. My mood turning a bit sour at the way he delivered his words and hinted to know Mitali more than I did.

"Both, I know you, so do I know her. That's why I am saying speak." Daksh's body language seemed way different from the way he always looked, but then it seemed he was my same old friend, what was it that had changed?

Do I doubt him, with all the manipulative situations that he told us? Or is it just that I was feeling jealous of the friendship that he shared with Mitali.

I didn't liked the feeling that he could have solutions to the problems that we were facing. That was ours, ours to create, ours to mend. Something special in its own way.

"Jai, don't take me wrong, you know you try your best to conceal your feelings every time, and may be those idiot business men out there and the media buys it, but I know you better, and so do you."

Before he could say anything, the waiter arrived and set our drinks and went away. Once we were left without any audience Daksh leaned in and took his drink and took a sip.

"Mitali is the first female friend that I have Jai, I won't lie to you that I am not infatuated towards her... I am, she is special and you know why." I did know why, yet I couldn't feel at ease with his confession.

I should have felt glad, but it felt weird.

"she likes you, I am sure, but Jai no matter what she is just 24 now, these things are new to her as much as to you, and being a girl, it becomes difficult to come ahead and voice out certain things, at that time I believe why don't you go and know her."

I was about to interrupt him, tell him I knew her more than anyone else but he stopped me and said, "I know you know her, you have told her that you know her, but did you made her realize it? I am no expert in relations but yes, mom used to tell one thing, where men require words for assurance, but woman, they require Actions as well as words, they are just a bit more sensitive than we are."

Unable to digest all the things that he had said, I took hold of my now long neglected drink and gulped it down in one go without ignoring his chuckles.

Once I was done, I took a deep breath and let out a laugh.

"Thank you... and,"

"You don't have to be sorry, I am fine." He interrupted me once again. I tilted my head a bit and then shook my head. Pushing my chair a bit back I stood up and said,

"I was not intending to say sorry, all I wanted to say was, I hope this confession of yours stays till you. I love Mitali, Daksh; and I hope you respect that."

For a while the two of kept on staring at each other and soon he let out a chuckle and so did I.

"You are truly a bastard." He complained and took yet another sip of his drink.

"That I am. See you tomorrow."

"Where are you going?" he asked. As turned around and yelled around my shoulder.

"I have to make my girl realize that I do love her, and my girl is stubborn and naïve as a kid." And as the two of us laughed, it made me relieved.

Yes Daksh liked Mitali, and so did I, but with that there was yet another truth, Mitali was mine. My love, my Girl, My to be wife, and Daksh respected this truth as much as he believed and respected our friendship. 

**** 

A/n 

Mtali, Jai and Daksh... and then there is Veer, Shakti and Rey whom are you most curious to know about? 

I have been working on the first chapter of the third part of the story for two weeks now, it was so difficult to write, I am not able to read, nothing seems appealing, mood swings are eating me up and then there is this continuous politics that keeps on happening in my college. well lets not really talk about it, it makes me so depressed. 

remember i had told you guys that i will be telling you all something really cool.

so since you all might be knowing I am studying Transport Management, this course is really new in the market, but thats not the cool thing, since last year we have a Insta account where in we all post all the new things that our students come up with, our upcoming events, achievements that our students have everything along with the new trends that might be coming in the market. 

so this year we are collaborating with the Mumabi railways and taking part in the beautification project wherein we all will be painting the railway stations. we are coming up with themes and portfolio right now and if we get the permission by the end of august this project will be a success. 

i would really love if you all will look at these posts and things that we will be updating on our page. 

p.s all the captions that are posted on this page are written by me. 

hence along with announcing this thing, a small request please if any of you have an insta id please go and follow our page "BTM_Hinduja" 

you all can as well follow me on Insta my insta id is Yadni_bagwe we could get even more connected, debate on things that might be going around viral and have a lot more fun. 

one more small thing, if you all are following our btm page please do let me know i would like to interact you all and say thanks to you all specifically, i wouldnt like you all getting unnoticed on that page. 

love you all

do tell me what you all think about this chapter

and dont forget to vote comment and share. 

happy reading 

Yadni Bagwe