The second year of medical college brought with it community medicine. Our batch was assigned to a village a few hours from Bangalore, and we'd be staying at a local Ashram for a whole month.

The batches were organized alphabetically. I had the look on her face when the lists went up. Fiza and I were in the same batch but all of her friends from the hostel were assigned elsewhere. That familiar, anxious shadow passed over her features. I knew that look. I knew how she struggled with small talk, how she could feel utterly alone in a crowd of acquaintances.

Right then I decided that my priority for this entire trip would be her. I wouldn't let her feel excluded.

Every morning, we headed out into the community, went door to door collecting data on health issues, reviewed medications with elderly patients and conducted physical exams.

When we visited the 'Anganwadi' centers, my heart would do this funny little squeeze watching her with the children. She would kneel down to their level, talking softly as she checked their growth charts, her seriousness melting away into a warm smile that could calm the most fearful toddler before a vaccination.

But the best part was the free time. The world fell away on the trails of Kailasagiri Hills. We would hike for hours, her hand in mine, not because it was romantic, but because the paths were steep and it felt natural. We would breathe in the clean, sharp mountain air and just marvel at the world sprawling out beneath us. With her, I felt completely whole.

One evening, as the sun began to dip below the horizon, painting everything in liquid gold, we were on one of those trails. The light caught her just right, and she turned to me, a thoughtful look on her face.

"We are really yellow now," she observed, completely serious.

I burst out laughing. Only Fiza would color-code the sunset, and by extension, our relationship in that moment. It was so perfectly her.

But as my laughter faded, I wondered, not for the first time, if she ever felt the same intense, aching longing for me that I felt for her whenever we were alone like this. My past—the meaningless encounters, the drugs, the casual sex—felt like it belonged to another person, a stranger from a distant, empty life. The thought of being that intimate with anyone else now felt... wrong. Impossible.

I looked at Fiza, her profile outlined in gold. Would I ever be able to love someone else the way I loved her?

Finally, the night had settled in. The village sky was a deep velvet blanket pierced by a million glittering stars. Our whole batch had gathered under the ancient, sprawling arms of a hundred-year-old banyan tree.

I had my guitar with me and I carelessly strummed a few chords on it. Fiza sat cross-legged on the ground, her face tilted up towards the stars, and in that moment, she looked utterly ethereal. The comment she'd made earlier about the "yellow" sunset played in my mind.

"Fizz," I called out strumming a soft chord, drawing her gaze. Her eyes met mine. "What you said today reminded me of this song," I said, my voice quietly.

And then I began to play.

"I swam across, I jumped across for you... Oh, what a thing to do... 'Cause you were all yellow..."

My eyes held hers and we were alone in our bubble. The lyrics felt like a confession I could never voice aloud.

"I drew a line, I drew a line for you... Oh, what a thing to do... And it was all yellow..."

I had drawn lines to keep myself from falling completely, hopelessly over an edge there was no coming back from.

"And your skin, oh yeah, your skin and bones, turn into something beautiful... And you know, for you, I'd bleed myself dry... For you, I'd bleed myself dry..."

For a second, there was perfect silence. Then, our classmates erupted. Whistles, applause, the sound of people talking, shattered the intimate bubble we had been in. But my eyes still held hers.

Amidst the noise, one playful shout stood out: "Kiss her already!"

My heart slammed against my ribs in panic. I saw Fiza's eyes shimmer in the starlight. Oh god. I've gone too far.

I risked a glance at Fiza. Did she think it was just about the color? Or did she sense everything I wanted to say to her?

I forced a laugh. "Just a song, guys, chill!" I exclaimed, as I desperately tried to shove the genie of romantic implication back into its bottle.

The walk back to the ashram was quiet. The night air was cool and thick with the scent of damp earth and night-blooming flowers.

I looked at Fiza. Tonight, I would to tell her everything. Even if it scared her away. She needed to know the truth about me.

"Fiza," I said, my voice sounding rough in the stillness. "Can we go for a walk?"

She looked at me, her brow furrowed slightly in the dim light. "In the dark?" she asked, a note of natural caution in her voice.

"Yeah," I said, my heart beginning to hammer. "I just want to talk to you about something. It's important."

I saw the hesitation. She didn't have a curfew here, not like at the hostel, but we were strangers in this village. Outsiders. I knew she was worried about our safety. But then, she nodded. "Okay." She was never any good at saying no to me.

I led her away from the main path, onto a smaller trail that wound up one of the lesser hills. She was quiet the whole way. I reached for her hand, lacing my fingers through hers like I always did when we hiked up the hills.

About half way up the hill, I started to speak.

"Aarthy was my guidance counselor."

I felt her sharp intake of breath, but she didn't say a word.

"I was a bit of a prankster in PUC," I continued, forcing a lightness into my tone that I didn't feel. "So she would call me to her office all the time." I took a shaky breath. "She was hot, and I was a hormonal teenager, so I didn't really mind."

I could feel Fiza's eyes on me in the darkness, but I kept mine fixed on the path ahead, the words starting to tumble out now that the dam had broken.

"She would have me sit on the couch in her office and ask me about my day, my family, my dreams and aspirations. She was easy to talk to, easy to open up to. Slowly, I started thinking of her as a peer rather than faculty." The confession felt like pulling out a splinter that had been festering for years. "And I had a bit of a crush on her. She was young, just graduated from college, she was hot, and you know how teenagers are..." I swallowed hard, trying to control my wayward emotions. "I was a horny bastard."

I felt Fiza try to slow down. She opened her mouth to interrupt but I squeezed her hand. I needed to get it all out before I lost my nerve.

"But I never intended to act on my indecent thoughts," I pushed on, my voice dropping to a near whisper. "I never even imagined I would."

We kept climbing, the only sounds our breathing and the crunch of our footsteps on the path. The hardest part was still to come. But I had started, and I had to see it through.

"One day I was in her office," I continued, my words seemed to stick to my throat as I the memories came to the surface. "I remember lying on her couch as usual, but then I blanked out. The next thing I knew, my pants were unzipped, my shirt was open. And I was... exhausted. Completely drained."

"Oh, Alan!" Fiza's exclamation was a soft, pained cry in the dark. Before I could even process it, she had stopped walking and turned, wrapping her arms around me in a fierce, tight hug. I held onto her just as tightly, burying my face in her hair, drawing strength from her presence. I needed this. I needed her to hold me together while I fell apart.

"I didn't know if I had passed out or if I had been drugged. I was so confused," I whispered into her shoulder. "And Aarthy was looking at me all weird. I didn't say anything. I was too scared, too disoriented. I just... walked out of the office." I took a ragged breath. "But it happened again. Twice."

Fiza's arms squeezed me tighter.

"The third time around," I said, my voice was so soft, so hoarse, I wasn't sure she could hear me. "I asked her what had happened. And she said that I... that I raped her."

I felt Fiza's arms go slack. She let go of me. My heart plummeted. What else did I expect? Of course she was pulling away. I had just told her I was a monster. I had brought her, a woman, out into the middle of nowhere in the dark, and now she knew. She must be terrified of me now.

But when I finally dared to look at her, her face wasn't filled with fear or disgust. Her eyes were wide, but they were full of understanding.

"I didn't believe her at first," I rushed on, unable to stop now that the truth was out, my gaze dropping to the ground. "But she showed me the nail marks on my body, the bruises on hers. She said she had been trying to escape my hold." The shame was a hot, suffocating wave. "I refused to go back to her office when she called for me again. But then she threaten to tell the principal. When I finally went there again, her entire demeanor had changed. And I thought... if I had really done... done what she said I had, then I deserved to be treated like that. Like I was the worst kind of person."

There was silence but Fiza was still here. She hadn't run. And in her eyes, I saw not horror, but a dawning, furious compassion.

"You would never have done that," she said, her voice quiet but absolute, her eyes holding mine with a conviction that I had never felt.

I cupped her face in my hands, my thumbs stroking her cheeks. She was so trusting, so certain. She had no idea what she was defending. She had walked straight into the den of a predator, and instead of running, she stood her ground.

I pressed my thumb gently against her lower lip. Her eyes fluttered closed, her lips parting slightly. Her breathing was shallow, shaky. She was so responsive, so beautifully open. It would be so easy to lose myself in her, to seek comfort in the one thing I had always been "good" at.

But I wouldn't. I could never risk hurting her. Not like that. Not ever.

"How would you know that I didn't, Fiza?" I asked softly, her face still in my hands.

She opened her eyes. "I know you, Alan," she said simply.

I shook my head. "You don't know what I've done." The memory surfaced, ugly and sharp. Aarthy telling me that if I wanted to make things right, I needed to do things her way. That it couldn't happen at campus. She suggested meet-up points. And I? I did ever humiliating thing she asked me to.

"I've hit her, Fiza," I confessed, the shame burning like acid. I remembered one of Fiza's friendship rules from so long ago: no physical violence. She needed to know this about me. That I've hit a woman. "I've slapped her. Pushed her."

Her eyes widened, but she didn't pull away from my touch. "Why?" she whispered.

Then she looked away for a second, frowned, before locking her gaze with mine again. "Like... Fifty Shades of Grey?" she asked, her voice tentative.

I had to laugh. In the midst of this nightmare, her question was so innocently off-base it was almost sweet. "No, princess," I said, my voice heavy with affection and pain. "I have gotten so angry at her that I have hit her, pushed her off the bed, slapped her..." My voice trailed off, the last of my confidence draining away. What if this was it? What if this was the truth that made her finally see the monster and run?

But she didn't run. Her next question surprised me, its softness disarming my defensiveness.

"Did she hit you too?" Fiza asked.

I nodded, the memories flashing—the sharp sting of her palm against my cheek, my surprise the first time it happened, the shove that sent me stumbling into a wall, how she pulled me across the room, her hands in my hair.

"Why did she do that?" Fiza pressed, her voice still a gentle whisper, guiding me instead of accusing me.

I had no answer that made sense in the narrative Aarthy had built. "Maybe 'cause I raped her?" I said, the words tasting like poison. She had always been angry, triggered by the smallest of things, hitting me if I didn't do things exactly the way she wanted it.

Fiza shook her head slowly, her eyes not leaving mine.

"She kept calling you back to the office after the first time," Fiza said, her voice gaining strength. "She never told on you... You think she would have stayed quiet if it were true?"

The truth, which Fiza saw with such stunning clarity, began to finally, finally break through the prison of lies I'd been trapped in.

"And you said you had an arrangement with her for a year and a half?"

I was stunned she'd remembered that offhand comment from over a year ago. I just nodded.

"Why would she want that with you if you had assaulted her? Why would she trust you?" Fiza pressed, her voice sharpening. She was silent for a few beats. "Did you ask for the arrangement, or did she?"

"She asked for it," I admitted. How could I have been so blind? I'd been too traumatized and guilt-ridden to see the glaring inconsistency. "I felt like I needed to... like I owed it to her. Like she deserved to be treated with respect after what I'd... done. And I deserved whatever she did to me..."

"That manipulative witch!" Fiza spat.

I let out a choked laugh, but her anger was real and it burned bright for me.

"She assaulted you and then gaslit you! Don't tell me she is still a guidance counselor!"

"No," I said softly. "She actually quit. She said she quit because of me. That the place gave her PTSD."

"She was afraid of getting caught!" Fiza said through gritted teeth. "That sick woman! If I ever see her, I will punch her face!"

This time, my laugh was genuine and it loosened something tight in my chest.

We held hands and walked to the top of the hill. I found a flat rock and lay down. She looked skeptical for a moment before lying next to me, her head finding its familiar spot on my arm.

And there, under the starry sky, I told her everything. Every humiliating, degrading detail I had locked away. She listened, never flinching, just present.

"She assaulted you, Alan, not the other way around," she said quietly when I finished. "She used the gaps in your memory to convince you it was the other way around."

"How can I ever be sure, Fiz?" I asked, my voice small. I needed her to convince me.

"Because she hurt you..."

"She was punishing me for what I did to her," I repeated Aarthy's twisted mantra. "She said that I was lucky I wasn't locked up, that she took pity on me because I was a kid. That she wouldn't tell anyone as long as I helped her heal."

"And you believed her? That you can heal a woman you sexually assaulted by having consensual sex with her? Or by letting her abuse you?" Her voice shook with anger. "It's the biggest bullshit I've ever heard."

"It's not like I haven't questioned it..." I remembered bringing it up, the immediate, stinging slap, the fury in her eyes.

"I bet she lashed out the moment you questioned her? Got violent?" Fiza asked, her voice fierce.

I smiled despite myself. "Yeah..."

"She was clearly gaslighting you. Why didn't you tell anyone, da? It was clearly affecting you so much." She turned, her eyes searching mine. "Anyone would have told you the same thing. She was sick. Abusive. Not you."

"I told a Brother at church," I confessed. "Not in detail. Just about the incident in her office, the blackouts and what Aarthy had accused me of."

"And?" she asked, her eyes flashing, already guessing.

"He said it wasn't possible for a woman to sexually assault a man without him being a willing participant. He said if I was willing, I wouldn't have blocked it out. So I must have done what she accused me of."

"The stupid, illiterate frog!" she swore.

I laughed. "That's the most creative swearing I've heard."

But she wasn't laughing. She lay back, staring at the sky. "I hate Aarthy. She should be in jail. Aargh! Men can get... umm..." She struggled for a moment, then pushed through. "Men can get erections and even ejaculate during an assault. Just like women can orgasm during a rape. Arousal is not consent. Arousal and violation are not mutually exclusive."

"You sure?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper. If this was true... it changed everything.

"A thousand percent, Alan. I don't know why you wouldn't even Google it! She may have even drugged you! God knows who else she's done this to."

I stayed quiet, feeling foolish for my own ignorance.

"Have you been tested for STDs?" she asked.

I laughed. "Yeah, Mownika made me test periodically..."

She was quiet for a beat.

"I don't have any STDs," I said, wondering if that's what she needed to hear.

"You may still want to test from time to time with your... habits..." she said dryly.

"My habits?" I teased, wanting to see her squirm.

"I don't know if you use..." she caught herself.

"I do, Fiz," I said amused at the direction our conversation had taken.

"If I kill Aarthy, will you help me bury her body?" she asked, utterly casual.

I laughed. "I don't know if I'd want to kill her... she did teach me some things..."

"Like what?" she asked, instantly irritated.

"Like how to make a girl cum over and over..." I liked teasing Fiza to just get a reaction out of her. It was a hobby. Sue me.

But instead of getting flustered or shutting me down, she looked straight at me. "Like with your mouth?"

Now it was my turn to be shocked. And intensely, undeniably turned on.

"Yeah... amongst other ways."

Her eyes dropped to my lips, and she did that thing she always did when she was aroused and fighting it. She licked her lips, her breaths coming a little quicker.

I remembered what she'd said about arousal and consent. It didn't matter how my body reacted, or how hers did. I didn't have her consent, and I would respect that. I looked back at the sky, giving her an out, giving us both space.

"The stars are so clear from up here..." I said, my voice rough.

"I can see the constellations... Ursa Major," she said, pointing vaguely.

"Look at the stars," I whisper-sang, the lyrics now ours, "look how they shine for you..."

This time, there was no audience. Just me and her. And I knew. I would draw every line. I would swim every river. I would do anything for her.

In a way we did belong to each other. And maybe that was enough.

Authors Note

I know this was an intense chapter. I tried to stick to the wattpad guidelines but if there is any concerns, please comment or DM me on Zk_author on insta. Please don't report it without warning me first.

I did have a close friend who went through something similar. For the longest time, I debated about including this in the book. If you've read the previous version of the book, this whole chapter was just a couple of paragraphs.

But I wanted to bring to light that men too can be raped. That men too can be vulnerable. I also wanted to outline clearly that arousal is not consent. Especially with all you young people reading dark romance. 😅

Stay safe and don't forget to vote! ⭐️
❤️Naina