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Mythili's POV -

I slowly turned around to face them and along with me, Hritik did too. Viraj and Amrita came closer to me.

" I swear I did not follow you all." I tried to make them see the truth but I also knew that they would never believe it to be a mere coincidence, which it honestly was.

" She is right. It was my idea to come here, treat the girls for all their help and efforts they put into teaching us." Viraj spoke up in my defence while Hritik nodded in agreement.

" Of course you'd all lie now. Mythili I don't think I raised you to be a liar." Mom took a few steps to where we were standing and came in front of me.

" I don't think you raised me at all mom." I had no idea how I let my thoughts slip by way of words just as soon and I could see fury in her eyes.

" You insolent little bitch. How dare you talk to your mother like this?" I saw her hand trying to reach for me and once again, I surprised myself by holding it and there was one more arm which held hers, Malini aunty's.

" How to you see it fit to raise your hand on your grown up daughter Mrs. Kapoor? You are a disgrace." Aunty came to stand in front of me as I left my mother's hand.

" Kapoor forget about your money. These papers which your daughter had signed without a second thought, after all will be of no use to you. You don't deserve her kindness or charity. You can go ahead and try to sue her but you will find my army of lawyers obstructing your every step and not to forget how your reputation will be tarnished as you drag your own daughter to court for money that she is entitled to." Shivaay spoke up as casually as if he was ordering something which surprised me. Does this man not fear anything? He is openly threatening father for god's sake!

" No Mr. Rathore. I still don't want the money. Please give those papers to them." I almost begged him. I still believe that my self-respect is higher than any amount of money.

" You can go ahead and put that money on fire for all I care Mythili but they will not get these papers. Your parents need a lesson or two and they need to be put into their place." He replied without sparing me another place as his eyes were fixated on my father who looked like he wanted to murder someone.

" But..." I tried to put my point, but to no avail.

" Enough." He said before walking out, leaving us to ourselves. My parents glared at me and walked out just after him.

" Mythili, would you like to come home with us or do you want to stay with your friends for a while?" Malini aunty asked, turning to me.

" I'd like to stay for a while aunty, if that is okay." I replied just as soon. I needed a break from everyone at this point trying to control my life and decisions, to be honest.

" Of course. I'll see you later." She gave a small sympathising smile before leaving too and I dropped myself on the chair once again, resting my head on the table.

" Why is everything so messed up in my life? Can't it be normal for like one minute?" I whined, still not looking at my friends.

" Fuck normal. Can't it be peaceful for one second?" I rephrased my question, finally looking at Amrita who looked like she wanted to strangle someone, probably my parents.

" I need pizza and I need fries and I need them from a cheap cafe. I also want like a full huge burger and yes, a coke to go with the pizza. Can we please go somewhere else? Some small cafe?" I asked them who nodded immediately as we walked out. Thankfully, we hadn't ordered anything yet.

We walked down the road to find a cafe fitting my description and seated ourselves as we ordered a lot of food ranging from Sizzlers to Chinese and I started to hog on my cravings.

" By the way Mythili, your future husband is not wrong, you know. Those people who call themselves your parents don't deserve any kindness from you. That money is yours and you should not think of returning it back to them." Viraj said and I saw Hritik nod in agreement.

" I haven't earned it. How can it be mine? It's theirs. They can do whatever with it but Mr. Rathore is going to do what he thinks fit and I don't have a fucking choice in the matter. Earlier, my parents controlled my actions and now he wishes to do the same. I am a puppet and it's high time I accept the fact." I said, shrugging my shoulders as I forced the pizza slice down my throat.

" I don't think he wants to control you. I mean he was after all making sure that those signed papers reach your parents but it was finally them who stepped out of line and in a way, all he did was defend you. Look at it that way Mythili. Any decent man would have done what he did." Amrita replied and for a split second, I agreed before forcing the thought away from my brain.

" Can we please not talk about any of this right now? I really want to forget." I pleaded them and they agreed as we shifted to discussing the latest season of Grey's Anatomy but my mind truly never got distracted, unfortunately.

After we were done, I called up Narayan kaka, the driver Malini aunty had given me. As he drove towards the Rathore Manor, my eyes started watering once again. What was going on in my life? Why was I living with them? When could I have my own place to call it home? The momentary happiness I had found with my friends was starting to fade away as reality had begun to knock.

" We are here." Kaka said and I got out of the car after thanking him and made my way inside. The huge hall was empty and neither did I find anyone up on the floor where my room was.

Sighing, I shut the door of my room behind me and dropped on the bed and closed my eyes for a while, not knowing when I let sleep overcome me.

...................................................

The next time that I woke up, it was because of a few knocks on the door. I threw myself out out the bed and steadied myself to attend the person knocking.

It was one of the house maids who was here to ask me to come for dinner. I was not hungry even a little bit but I couldn't just not go for dinner. It would be totally rude of me to do so.

I just walked out of the room and made way to the dining room where I found Malini Aunty and Shivaay in their usual seats.

I gave aunty a smile which she returned and Mr. Rathore nodded towards me, acknowledging my presence before he turned his attention back on the huge T.V screen with stock market analysis.

" Did you fall asleep Mythili?" Aunty asked as I sat next to her. I nodded sheepishly, a bit embarrassed. I slept for five damn hours!

" Good. It was needed. You hardly slept before your exams." She mothered me as she personally served food to me.

" Thank you aunty." I replied as she encouraged me to start eating, as she did.

I picked my spoon up and started to play with the rice on my plate. Somehow, I was still extremely sleepy.

" Shivaay enough. Shut that TV off now. This man has been talking gibberish for the past hour now. It makes no sense to me and I want to have dinner peacefully." She scolded her son with all her authority as I looked from her to Shivaay and back to her. The scene was comical to be honest. No one had the audacity to talk to him the way aunty did and there was nothing he could do about it. You see, you can't exactly fire your mother!

I bit my lip to stop the giggle that was threatening to escape me and I stuffed a spoonful of rice in my mouth as Mr. Rathore turned the television off.

" Good. Now Mythili you, why do you play with your food more than you eat it? We have been sitting here on the table for the past fifteen minutes and your plate practically looks untouched. My son, on the other hand had no idea what he is eating. He will go inside that television screen the first chance he gets. Can we please have dinner like a normal family instead of me tolerating both of your weird habits?" She asked, eyeing my plate.

" Sorry aunty." I muttered and quickly took another few bites quickly.

" Good. Now tell me, how was your exam?" She asked as I had finished eating.

" It was okay aunty. I messed up one question though." I replied, cringing at the stupid mistake I had committed.

" That is good. I am sure you've done well." She said and then she went on to look at Mr. Rathore who also had just finished eating.

" I have a kitty party with my friends tomorrow so I will be taking my dinner with them. I hope the two of you make the most of my absence and get to know each other instead of avoiding to even speak. You will be married soon enough and I haven't seen a marriage yet where the husband and wife are incapable of holding even a conversation with each other." She said before walking away and my eyes widened at her words as I felt my cheeks heat up. I absolutely avoided looking at Shivaay and followed Malini aunty out of the hall after muttering a small goodnight to him.

Thankfully, either he did not hear it or he pretended not to. Any which way was perfectly fine by me.

I climbed up the stairs once again to my room and changed out of my crumbled clothes into my Pyjamas and T-Shirt. I had no idea how I could fall asleep in the damn uncomfortable clothes I was in.

I once again laid on the bed, closing my eyes and just like that once again, I had no difficulty in falling asleep.

....................................................

This time, I woke up to nothing in particular. I just did and after tossing and turning for god knows how much time, decided to just get up instead of lying down. It was ten minutes past two and I had no idea what to do but one thing that I was sure of was that I couldn't stay in the room anymore.

I slipped my feet into the slippers and made my way outside the room to probably just go and take a walk in the lawn. As I made way to the stairs, I saw that the lights to Mr. Rathore's study were still on.

" Must be working." I muttered to myself and hopped down the stairs. I unlocked the main door and took my slippers off to walk on the lawn bare feet to let the light dew on the grass do it's soothing magic.

The lawn was very well maintained and the lighting was really peaceful. Honestly, it looked like a scene out of a Disney movie. I walked a little further to see all kinds of flowers and my favourite, lilies and even as much tempted I was to touch them, I decided against it. You should never disturb plants at night!

" Do you like lilies?" I heard a deep voice and the suddenness of it threw me off balance but his hand steadied me after which he slowly withdrew his hand away from mine. I turned a little to see him standing there with a cup pressed between his right hand and even though he wasn't looking at me, still managed to steal my breath away for some reason!

" Mr. Rathore....I am sorry I didn't see you." I apologised immediately. He did not say anything for a moment and I thought that he didn't hear me or he was just avoiding me. The second option making more sense to me, I decided to walk away.

" Do you like lilies?" I heard him ask again before I could leave him to himself.

" I do. Lilies have always been my favourite." I replied as a smile automatically made it's way to my lips.

Just like that, once again, he went silent.

" Do you like them?" I decided to break it first as we stood there, next to each other without looking at each other.

" I don't think about them enough to like them." His answer was brutally honest, just like he was but I had no idea how to respond to that response so I decided to stay quiet.

" Why are you up so late?" I finally had to say something to cut through the crazy silence and this was the first question that popped in my head but this question made his head turn towards me but I still couldn't look at him.

" Work but what keeps you up at this hour?" He threw the same question back at me.

" I slept for a very long time in the afternoon and then just immediately after dinner. I don't think I can sleep anymore tonight." I shrugged my shoulders, replying as I glanced at him in the eye briefly before looking away.

There is something about him which always keeps me at edge!

But before either he or I could say anything, surprisingly, my phone went off. It was Amrita calling. So late? For sure Hritik and her have fought.

" Umm...." I fiddled with my phone, trying to excuse myself politely.

" Go ahead." He said nonchalantly but did not walk away from me as I picked it up.

" Hello." I said.

" Hritik is a jerk." Came her response and I signed.

" What did he do?" I asked, rolling my eyes at these two.

" He called me just a while back and while we were talking, he said that Himanshi looked good the other day. He was checking her out!" She almost cried and once again, I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

" So what? She did look good that day and Amu please, it's not like that you don't check out other guys too." I announced, momentarily forgetting that Shivaay was still standing next to me.

" Honey, WE check other guys out. Don't leave yourself out of this but then again, you don't need to anymore because the literal hottest one is your almost husband." She shouted and I cringed at her words and my head turned to look at the person standing next to me, hoping that he hadn't heard anything.

Unfortunately, I was totally wrong. Of course he heard! It was pin drop silence at night and Amu was shouting like a manic over the phone.

I saw him smirk as he took another sip of whatever he was drinking and cringed even more.

" I cannot deal with you right now. We'll talk tomorrow, alright." I said and hung up before she should even go ahead and protest at my suggestion.

" I am really sleepy now Mr. Rathore. Goodnight." I murmured and tried to get away from him before he could say anything and made almost ran away from him.

Thankfully, he didn't say anything and god I was relieved for that even when that teasing smirk for me never left him lips.

Even though I was dying to talk to him about his decision regarding the money and my father, It had to wait until tomorrow because with my level of embarrassment, I wasn't fit to hold any conversation whatsoever and there was no chance I could talk to him about something so serious right after my best friend had made a mockery out of me in front of him!

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