"Ay, come here." Priti gestured to Nisha who moved her index, indicating a 'no'.
"I don't want to. I'm fed up with clicking pictures." 

She tucked a hair strand behind her ears and looked behind Priti to find Kabir standing there. He was laughing with Atif. 
"Why did they order tea here? Is tea the only thing Maa and Baba know?" Adisha asked Adil who shrugged. 

Most people were busy among themselves but the chaos her family caused gained some attention. 
"Nisha!!" She ignored Priti's constant calling and approached Kabir. 

As soon as his eyes fell on her, his grin flattened. A warm look coated his face, "Nisha." He mumbled.

"What are you doing?" She asked as his gaze travelled from head to toe, checking her out — probably in the politest way she'd ever seen — as he smiled. 
"What?" She arched a brow.

He didn't respond.

"Chatting with the idiots, that's all. You?" He asked, shifting closer to her — that did not go unnoticed by her. 
Why did he behave so intimate with her if he had someone else in mind? She wondered. 

No matter how much she mulled over it, the suspicions seemed to increase gradually.

"Nisha?" He asked, disconcerted.
"Huh? Oh.. what?" 
"You've been zoning out frequently these days. Are you sure everything's fine?" 

'Do you get to ask me that when it's you who worries me?' She thought to herself, shaking her head vigorously.
"Nope, I'm fine. Just... tired from the journey." 
"Should I walk you back to your hotel room?" 

She let out a scoff, "For my Maa to kick both of us out of the world? Sure, sir." 
Pressing his lips, he took a step closer to her. 

She swallowed the lump in her throat, feeling self-aware of his proximity. It wasn't only the fact that her parents or anybody witnessing their closure would misinterpret them but her heartbeats were on the edge as well. 

She fisted her hands, mentally praying for the tingly sensation to die down as the intensity of his scent increased around her. 
"You seem awful." He whispered, leaning closer. 
"You're too close." She looked away, blinking continuously. 
"And you're sweating too." He casually spoke, unbothered by the stares Atif was giving him. 
"I—" Her words were interrupted by Atif pushing Kabir away with him, "Come on. Are you cheating on me, Kabir?" 

She pressed her lips as Kabir scowled at Atif. 
He glanced at her, earning a small smirk. Of course, now the game was fun.

Ajay joined in with Wahi, "Ay, what are you guys doing?"
"I think Kabir's cheating on me," Atif spoke, earning loud gasps from the other two clowns. 
"Shams! Big news!" Wahi ran up to Shams who was busy taking pictures of Priti. 
"Imagine bothering the couple who barely got a honeymoon..." She sighed, shaking her head. Priti gave her a desperate look to which she could only shrug.

She only felt pity for her sister and her husband. 

"Leave my hand, you piece of—" Kabir stopped, controlling his words as Atif frowned, "What do you mean? I told your mother we're getting married." 
"That's juicy." Nisha nodded, raising her brows.
"NO." Kabir made a panicked face, trying to move Atif away. He laughed, "Just kidding, idiot. But I did tell your mother you have a thing for Shams. That's why you're single." 

"Um, I should leave now." She sensed Kabir's face turning red and walked away, not forgetting to glance at him busy smacking Atif. 
"Why are they so unhinged?" She shook her head with a sigh.

"Nisha, do you want Chai ?" Her mother asked, making her hold her nape.

Tea in this situation, seriously? 

—Time skip—

"Maa, we should give them some personal space." 
"What do you mean? They have lots of personal space. We gave them a huge room for themselves." 

Nisha let out a frustrated noise, "Maa... we're ruining their newlywed moments. Let's give them some space to spend time alone."
"What? In our generation, we didn't even have honeymoons! All we did was get married and start serving our family the next day." Hearing her mother's words, she shook her head in defeat.
"Alright. I'll just... plan it with the boys." 

"Stop mixing so much with boys. It's... not appropriate." 
"Maa, they're like my relatives." Nisha smiled. 

"I don't like Kabir." She suddenly spoke, thinking about something. Nisha's face perked up at the statement as she sat on the bed, beside her mother.
"Why?" She asked. 
"He's... a nice and lively child but, I think he has strange intentions with you. Don't get too close to him." 
"You mean...?" 
"He keeps staring at you and gets close to you a lot. I'm not saying he necessarily has bad intentions but... what if he has feelings for you? I don't think you should associate too much with him. It could cause a problem in the future." 

Her lips parted at her mother's speech but no words escaped her mouth. She fumbled with her fingers, "You think he has feelings for me?" 
"It shows." 
"I think it's because we're more like enemies and keep pranking each other. Don't worry, Maa." She shook her head, smiling at her mother who didn't seem convinced. 
"Just saying... ever since Kabir came into our house, you both keep getting exceptionally close. Nobody sees this interaction in a good light. He's not related to you in any way." 

Right, society did have lots of problems with things that couldn't affect them any less. 

Nisha smiled, "Maa, whatever I do doesn't affect anybody around, neither the gossiping aunties nor the judgemental relatives. Just because people like to speak doesn't mean we have to hear. Our life has nothing to do with them, you know. Even when I was a child and Baba had almost nothing, people talked. Do they do that anymore? No, right? It's... life. Whatever they say won't be of any use to us. We live our lives and... bear the consequences of our actions ourselves. Nobody else does it for us." 

Her mother sighed, "You and your modern talks... I've grown up in an old-fashioned way, I'm more comfortable that way." 
"Sure, but don't force me into it too. I have my philosophy of life. And I won't disappoint you." 

"Of course, you're not meant to disappoint us." Her mother tried to smile as she got up, "Okay then, Maa. I'll go now. They're probably waiting. Rest well and tell Baba to stop talking politics with other uncles." 
"As if your baba ever listens to me." 

Chuckling, she exited the room and walked towards the elevator.

The beige walls of the hallway, coated in marble and slate interiors eased her mind. There were large windows around, giving her a whiff of the fresh air outside and lots of greenery. 
Cox's Bazar was beautiful. 

But... populated. 

She scrunched her face seeing the number of people near the elevator.

"Is there a single place in the country without people?" She walked into the elevator and pressed her lips awkwardly. 
Thankfully, there weren't too many people since one elevator already left for downstairs. She frowned when a figure rushed into the elevator, squeezing beside her and grinning.
"Kabir?" She asked.

He pulled her to a side as a few more people entered the area. 

"Click on the first floor." She whispered to him as he nodded, shifting in front of her and stretching his arms, pressing the button. 
Her back hit the handle of the wall as she looked up at him, "Move?" 
"I can't. There are a few people behind me. No space." 

She tried to peek but he obstructed her vision by leaning closer. 

Raising his brows, he asked, "Where were you?"
"In the room with Maa, why?" 
"I searched for you." 

She gave him a questioning look as he continued, "Well, I wanted to take you somewhere."
"Just me?"
"The others are too busy. You were my last option."
"Not trusting you on that." She gave him a blatant stare, earning a shaky breath from him. 
"Fine. I want to take you only. I don't like the others." 

She tried not to smile, "You should take your lover girl there. I'll reject, thanks." 
"Nice suggestion. Come with me then." He spoke, making her frown.
"What do you mean?" She tried to keep her voice as low as possible but his words were misleading. 

He looked away, whispering something to himself.

She analyzed the movements of his lips and wondered if he called her dumb.
"Did you just call me dumb?" 
He gave her a surprised look, "So we're going there. Let's go." 

The elevator door opened as he held her hands. She tried to speak but failed, carried away by him. 

"Where are the others? Weren't we all planning to go together?" 
"Oh, yeah. They're waiting at the beach for us."
"And why don't I know?" She raised a brow.
"You were included with me so I took the responsibility to take you." He seemed proud while saying that, confusing her. 
"You took my responsibility?" 
"Proudly, yes." 

She shrugged and continued, "You should try to act reserved sometimes." 
"I'm anything but reserved when it comes to you."

Wow.

Okay.

She blinked twice in an attempt to process his words. 

As they walked into the beach, the scent of the depths of the sea reached her. She smiled, shifting her eyes towards his direction. 
"We're at the Laboni beach." He smiled widely, looking around. 

"With... a huge amount of people around." She gulped, "Where are the others?" 
He shrugged, "I don't know. Let's see where they are."
"Just call them, idiots." 
He arched a brow at her, "Did you just call me an idiot?"
"Should I have called you something worse?"

He pursed his lips, "No, thank you, my lady." 

She scoffed, turning around as he dialled Shams's number. After a few seconds, he hung up and turned towards her, "They're at the Burmese Market." 
"What? When did they—" She stopped, heaving out a deep sigh. 
"No worries, let's go there." 

He casually strode forward, glancing behind at her, "Come on, Nisha." 

While they were walking in the direction of the market, she noticed how he admired the view around. 
"Oy, do you want crab fry?"
"Right now?" He gave her a surprised look as she grinned, "Look. That looks so interesting." 

He opened his mouth to say something but paused, taking a look over there. 
"Are you sure you want that right now? We had lunch not too long ago." 
She gave him a bored look, "Whatever." 

"He's so useless." She shook her head, gaining another reason why men were up to no good for her. 
"Right... the man who's for me will agree to go." She whispered to herself, preparing to walk away but her steps halted when he spoke, "Wait. I didn't disagree." 

Turning around, she let out a confused, "Huh?" 
He smiled, "Let's go. It does seem interesting. I was just ensuring you're actually up for it." 

Her lips parted as she felt her words backfiring at her. 

She should've thought before speaking. He turned towards the stall where a man was selling crab fry and rushed there, gesturing for her to follow. 
Pursing her lips, she got down from the pavement. 

For some reason, the thought of him being the one for her didn't bother her. It felt nice, instead. And she might have been a huge bum for it but she kept wanting to believe that his so-called 'crush' was her. 

She wished it was. 

"Woah, this tastes so good!" Kabir beamed, earning a fit of chuckles from Nisha.
"It tastes even better every time I remember how we're temporarily ditching them." She gave him an evil grin as he laughed silently.
"You're so..." 
"You're nothing better." She eyed him as he smiled, "Good I'm not." 

"Have you visited this place before?" She asked, earning a nod from him.
"When I was eighteen, twenty and now." 
"For real?" She gasped, clasping her palm to her mouth. He shrugged, "Why? How many times have you been here?" 
"Like... four times." 
"You're worse!" He shook his head with an 'o' face.

She grinned, "Well, that's not my fault, come on. My family visits this place on every occasion. It's the default tour plan." 
"Bengalis need to know there's more to touring the country than Cox's Bazar." 
"Oh, you know, if we can travel by sea from here, we'll reach my hometown. It's an island, right? It's very near." His eyes lit up in curiosity at her words.

"Really? I'd like to visit your hometown once." 
"Same. It's finally advancing there too. It was probably a few years ago when they first started usage of electricity there whereas the cities have been advanced for decades." 
"Narshingdi is near Dhaka so it's quite different there. A literal island sounds extravagant to me." 

She chuckled, shaking her head briefly at his statement. 

An ecstatic feeling took over her as they joked around for a while, enjoying the food.

She finished eating and sucked in a breath, "It's so spicy though. How are you handling it?" 
"What do you mean?" He frowned.
"You're disgusting at handling spice."
"I can handle spice, you're wrong." He frowned. 

She shrugged, "Sure, my guy." 
"How much is it?" He asked as the man replied, "One spicy crab and one... non-spicy crab, it's 500 taka." 
"Non-spicy crab..." She mumbled, giving him a side-eye as he gulped, "Um... I wasn't in the mood for spicy." 
"Sure." She nodded, trying to hold in her laughter as he frowned, "Stop." 

Not being able to hold it in further, she let out a cackle, "You're hilarious." 
He hissed at her, taking the change as she faced him. 

"You can't hide it anymore. I've seen it countless times." 
His gaze went from her eyes to her lips, a soft furrow forming between his brows. 

He took a tissue from the stall and leaned in closer, confusing her.
"What?" She asked, her eyes falling to his lips. 

Her mind clouded with strange thoughts as she stared at him. 

How would it feel to kiss hi—

She felt something against her lips and realized that he was wiping the corner of her lips with a tissue. 
"You're quite messy yet laugh at me all the time." 

Her heart skipped a beat as his eyes came to a level with hers. He tilted his head, "What's wrong? You're staring at me like I'm a zombie." 
He tapped her nose and backed away with a smile, unknown to the reactions he had caused in her brain and heart.

She pressed her lips together tightly, looking down. 

She'd never know if he had his eyes for her but for all that she knew, her heart was already on its way to him.

She failed to control it.

He had half of it already.

No wonder she felt so salty when he was professing his love for someone to her. Shit, Nisha.

Holy. Fucking. Shit.