Disclaimer: A the characters mentioned below are imaginary and a work of pure fiction.

Teja didn't know how much time had passed since she was sitting inside the washroom. She had felt Karan fall asleep and had quietly slipped out of his bed and come straight to the washroom.

The day was an overwhelming one. She had lost the task to Prateek but was she really concerned about that? Not really. All that mattered to her at that point was Karan. She was finally going back and analysing each of her's and karan's conversation. They had a few of the most meaningful conversations ever.

She felt ecstatic. She felt scared. All at the same time.

She covered her face with the palm and took a short breath.

"I don't know what to do." she whispered.

Karan shifted on his bed and frowned in his sleep not feeling her beside him. Through his half opened sleepy eyes he checked her bed quickly. Empty?

In a reflex he sat up and rubbed his eyes.

"Teja." he whispered to himself and got off the bed. He walked out of the bedroom wearing the jacket and scanned the living room to find it empty.

"Must be washroom." he muttered and made his way to the bathroom area.

"Teja?" he said loudly as soon as he reached there.

His voice jolted Teja back to reality. She quickly composed her messed up self and cleared her throat. "Yes baby?"

"What are you doing here?" came his sleepy voice.

"I think I have an upset stomach Karan." she said loudly. "You go back to sleep , I'll come in a bit"

"Do you need any medicine?" She heard him say.

"Nope. Will wait till the morning to see how this goes. You go to bed , I'm coming." she quickly answered.

"Cool." he said and sat on the couch. As if he is going to leave her alone here , he thought to himself rolling his eyes.

Teja assumed that he had left. She sighed a little and spent a few more minutes inside before coming out to see Karan sitting on the couch and playing with his finger rings.

"Karan?why are you sitting here?" she said as she walked to him.

Karan looked up at her hearing her voice. "So I was right. It is not the stomach but your mind." he said scanning her face.

"Huh?"

"Teja. What is it that's bothering you?I want to know now." he said while getting up and taking her hands in his grip tightly.

"Nothing Karan." came the feeble reply. She was tired of hiding now.

"Teja." he moved closer lowering his voice. "What is wrong?" he said while putting a strand of her hair behind her ear. She didn't react and kept staring down.

He held her hand and took her out to the outdoor garden , to the green couch , right where it had all started.

"It's too cold in the bathroom , I will freeze there." he said making her sit on the couch and settled beside her comfortably pulling her legs on his lap , like he always does , out of habit now.

He waited for her to say something but all she was doing was stare at nowhere.

"Teja." he said softly holding her hand.

"Hmm?" she finally looked at him.

"What's wrong?" he asked staring straight into her eyes , as if he was trying to read her soul.

"Karan you remember I asked you why do you feel you are the bad boy" she said quoting "bad boy" with her fingers , "and you said that everyone said that about you to the point where you also started to believe it?"

He nodded.

"It's the same for me." she chuckled sheepishly.

"That you are a bad girl?" he was amused.

"That I am a kid. That I can be funny and bubbly and chirpy but never be mature or sensitive or intense." her voice was different. Karan has never heard her with this voice. With this emotion. "Everyone said and I started to believe it." her voice trailed off to the silence of the night.

He kept looking at her. "I am all ears. I want you to speak tonight." he said sincerely. All this while she had avoided his eyes. He knew that he could read through them and she was scared.

"I started to believe that anything that I do or say without making it fun is out of character for me. It hurts sometime." she looked at him finally to find him looking at her with utmost concentration. That was the best part about him , he always had his attention on her.

"Like you say that you are not expressive with words and that you do that with gestures instead , for me that is also tough karan. It is tough to show my feelings with gestures because of the same reason you know , because apparently it is out of character for me which I had started to believe."

She wiped a tear from the corner of her eyes quickly.

Without wasting a second Karan raised his hand to caress her cheek. "What is wrong Teja?why are you feeling like this?" he asked softly.

"Because I realised that in all this mess , I have never made you realise what you mean to me. Except for that conversation in the VIP room." she said resting her face on his palm.

"But i know...."before he could complete his sentence she interrupted him "You don't."

"Okay.." he began softly. "If you want to convey something now you can but I can assure you that even if you don't it won't matter to me." his face was serene.

"Karan I won't say it was the first day , in all honesty I don't even remember when it all started but I can tell you it was not after you confessed. " she said avoiding his gaze.

"What started?" he frowned not understanding what she meant.

"What I feel for you."

To say that he was taken aback would be understatement. He felt knocked out.

Not hearing a response from him , she decided to continue.

"I don't remember when it started , I cannot pin point a moment. May be it was when I wore your hoodie just to smell your presence when I could have borrowed clothes from anyone else , may be it was when you stood up for me in the kitchen drama, may be it was when you pulled me back from the middle of the fights so that i don't end up getting hurt , may be it was when you stood in front of me when someone else was doing my hair whereas the truth was that I wanted you to do it knowing you would make a mess out of it , when you gave me a bite of that guava, may be it was when I got to know that fixing someone's fiance's picture was your priority rather than some stupid fight , may be it was when you held me close to you , me in black and you in pink, on the rank podium so that I don't end up falling the day Farah ma'am came and ranked us. The list will not end but the night will." she said with a small smile.

Karan felt dizzy. She remembers everything. Every tiny details. Just like he did.

"It was always you Karan" his thoughts were broken with her voice.

"I was scared that I was falling. I wanted to stay away because i knew you were unattainable. I dreamt about you , about us , every single night. I tried to make a joke out of it to prove that it was funny from my end , fearing what if something was caught on camera , fearing what if a single shift of my expression was caught on camera and people knew. What if you go out and figure it out. I made jokes everyday to make everyone believe that it was all funny from my end. While it was not." she gulped her saliva. "It was just not funny. It was scary , it was intense. I was realising that I was falling for something which was in all probability love."

She felt her voice crack at the end.

"I never went to anyone else Karan, I didn't even want to." she looked into his eyes. "I wanted you. But having said that , I wouldn't have gone to you either. I didn't have the courage. I knew in my head you could never be mine. What I was dreaming was too good to be true." she said with a faint smile.

Karan knew why she was saying all this. It was because of what he had told her in the indoor garden earlier this evening as a joke. It had touched the deepest corner of her heart in a painful way. And to say that he felt terrible would be an understatement.

"Is it because of what I told you today?about me waiting for you to come to flirt with me like you probably did with others?Teja it was a joke. I know you never flirted with anyone. I swear I know."

She held his hands immediately.

"Karan I know it was a joke. It is not because I am hurt by what you said. It is because of the fact that I realised that I never made you feel what you mean to me , ever."

"I know that Teja." he said cupping her face. "I have never felt this special in my life Teja, what you are making me feel now." he said kissing her forehead.

"I never go and tell people anything about us Karan. Yes I end up trusting people but nobody comes before you. I know you look for my gestures Karan , and I know I am not good with it. I am not good with words , neither with gesture. I am such a mess." she felt her cheeks getting wet and his hand continuously wiping the tears off.

"And today I realised I will probably never reach your core. I will never be able to make you feel the intensity that I have. I will never be able to reach your nucleus that you were talking about during dinner. That you will go away because I will fail to reach there. I will lose you. Karan..." she hadn't realised when she was sobbing and was panting for breath.

Karan gulped and immediately pulled her closer to him embracing her in his arms. He held her head close to his chest and kissed her hair. He closed his eyes and felt the accumulated tears in his eyes finally drop down his cheeks.

"Karan I...." she struggled to find words.

"Shhhh...." he pulled her closer holding her tighter.

"Karan I'm scared to lose you. I cannot lose you." she clutched his hoodie tightly in her fist.

"I have never felt this Teja. I never felt that somebody can be so scared to lose me." he whispered breathing in from his mouth.

"I have been told so many times here as a joke that I am not your type , that my dressing sense is....." before she could complete her sentence she heard him whisper and felt the hug go tighter.

"You have reached my core , Teja."

Her grip on his hoodie tightened as a reflex. At at that very moment , both of them knew , there was no going back. Going back to any life where they would not be together.

"And so have you" she whispered , making him smile. They had tears , they had a smile , and the stars and the moon knew this was just a beginning of a forever.