The train swayed gently through the dark countryside, the faint rhythm of wheels on tracks echoing like a drum in the quiet night. It was just past 9 p.m. Dinner had been cleared, and most passengers had retreated into silence.
Aaryaksh stood alone at the open doorway, a half-lit cigar pressed between his lips, watching the world blur into shadows. Cold wind gust his face, combed through his hair as
His thoughts drifted — not into the future, but into the depthless trenches of the past.
The events of today had stirred something unsettling. Spirits and demons... so many hidden among us. How many have he already crossed paths with without knowing?
The question was haunting. And yet, more than that, it reminded him just how far he'd come — and how much further he had to go.
Two years in stash. Two years of brutal training, cursed memories, and bitter revelations after his abilities had awakened. He had buried himself in research and training, locking his spiritual soul away, afraid that if he allowed it to feel, it would not grow or shatter.
Since due to forced and chance awakening his soul was already in weak state and at very moment even attacked by a demon. That solitude had forged him into something different... colder perhaps, harder definitely.
Lost in that thought, he suddenly sensed someone approaching from behind — too softly, too cautiously. Instinct surged through his body. Before he could fully process, his hand shot out, tightly gripping the figure's neck with trained precision. Choking person to near death.
The gasp.
The silence.
And then the realisation — Vaidehi.
She stood frozen, a paper cup of coffee trembling in her hand fall.
Her jade like face turned crimson red due to blood rushing due to choking. Forehead and eyebrows tensed.
Her lips parted, as her tongue slipped out due to excess force, thin strand of saliva falling covering her chin. Struggling to breath.
Eyes rolled inside. Tears rolled down her cheeks smudging her eyeliner.
Trying her best to remove Aaryaksh's hand from her neck.
In the instant her whole noble personality deteriorated to a damsel in distress.
"What are you doing here?" he asked in voice low with regret, releasing her quickly, as he turned his face away avoiding direct contact.
She fall to the ground with a thud and started vomiting. Eyes filled with tears. She turned and rushed into wash room.
Aaryaksh sat beside the train door in regret looking towards the wash room.
After a while after resetting her dress and makeup she exited.
She looked him with re eyes but didn't answer anything. Instead, she placed the fallen coffee cup on the ledge beside him,
Slapped him hard, and walked off without a word — her eyes still glistening with unshed tears.
"fuck!!" Aaryaksh cursed
The guilt hit him like a blade between the ribs stinging even more than the slap he received.
'How could I hurt her like that? She had only come with kindness — and I made her a fearful memory. I was still trapped in my past. Still reacting like a warrior surrounded by ghosts.'
He clenched his forehead with both of his hands.
When he returned to the coach, the light inside was warm but still. Rahul was fast asleep in the upper berth, Kiyana deep in her practice with her brows knit in focus. But Vaidehi...
She sat curled up by the window, her head pressed into a pillow, hiding her tears from the world. Yet he could still hear her sobbing and see glistening trails down her flushed cheeks. Her neck was still red, swollen slightly where his fingers had wrapped clearly visible of his finger marks.
"A bruise of my mistake." Aaryaksh murmured. And his heart ache.
He didn't say a word. he just walked over gathering enough courage slowly eased himself beside her, gently guiding her head to rest on his shoulder.
She resisted at first, she was afraid of him now, her fingers brushing away her tears as she turned to face me. Her swollen red eyes were still wet, her face flushed from silent crying.
"Why are you doing this now?" she whispered bitterly, voice trembling. "First you choke me, now you pretend to care. What are you trying to prove? That you're a hero in disguise?"
He said nothing. Because he really had nothing as excuse.
His heart melted on seeing her innocent face and for a while it was like his heart would burst and come out.
He had never thought that. He could scare such a strong girl with noble personality like this.
He felt deep remorse so ordered an ointment and a heat patch from the service attendant, and when she saw him ordering it, her expression cracked in disbelief.
"Oh, so now after all of this you care?" she said with a bitter smile. "So you are the one to hurt me and now you are also the one trying to apply the medicine too. Is this some kind of emotional whiplash you've mastered?"
She turned her face towards the window looking outside. Still sobbing slowly.
Her voice wavered between sarcasm and sorrow. He let her speak, gently patting her head, he heard all her allegations silently, while patting her head.
She kept trying to escape from his shoulder while scolding me, but he forcibly turned her and hugged her hiding her in his broad chest and continued patting her had with one hand and caressing her back with other.
As Vaidehi felt the warmth, safety and assurance in the grasp. She too hugged him tightly locking her hands around his back. Like if she will leave him now he will flee. And started crying heavily.
There was a strange fluttering occurred in his chest. A feeling that he hadn't felt in years. Guilt. Warmth. Something fragile, growing between the cracks.
'I don't know what it is but it is making my heart beat faster, it is making me feel high among the stars. Like with this one hug I had fully won the world.' Aaryaksh thought with sparkling eyes.
The heat patch arrived minutes later. He asked her to lie down so he could apply it, but she glared at him through those pearl like tear-streaked hazel eyes, nose flushed red in anger — adorably red.
"I'm fine," she grumbled. "Don't play doctor now."
But he could clearly see her pain. So he didn't ask again — and simply lifted her carefully in his arms and laid her down on the empty lower berth.
With the sudden gesture of Aaryaksh her face flushed even redder.
After placing her comfortably he moved close to her. His warm breath almost striking her cheeks sending shivers down her feet. Slowly her breath grow heavier and her heart thumping with the coordination of train wheel.
After reaching the required distance Aaryaksh whispered coquettishly in her ear. "Dear I'm a doctor, so well I'm not just going to play one" then he winked.
Suddenly her face turned crimson red due to raid heart beat and flushing blood through her cheeks.
"You're running a fever?" he asked, confused by her blushed cheeks.
She shook her head quickly.
"Then why are your cheeks so red?"
He instinctively placed his hand over her head and under neck
feeling her body temperature.
She quickly turned away with her rapid movements, her ears now red too.
He froze.
'What the hell am I doing?'
Then exhaled slowly, brushing those thoughts aside, and sat beside her, gently placing her head on his lap. She stiffened — then slowly, shyly relaxed.
His hand moved on its own, brushing through her long, ponytail.
"Relax," he said softly. "It'll help me apply the ointment better."
Then with great precision he applied the ointment gently against the swollen area, massaging her neck muscles in slow circles.
While still caressing her hair with other hand.
They stayed like that in silence until she suddenly asked a question out of order, voice barely above a whisper, "Aaryaksh... am I pretty?"
Aaryaksh fingers paused. He was stunned frozen.
She turned slightly, those glowing hazel eyes peeking up at him, glimmering with vulnerability.
He subconsciously gave her a small nod. "You are."
Still immersed in her ocean like hazel eyes.
Her lips trembled. "Then why do you ignore me? Why do you give all your attention to Kiyana? Am I invisible to you?"
He remained quiet.
She wasn't finished.
"Ever since we met, you've barely said a full sentence to me. You cared about what Kiyana read, what she did, what she felt. But never once... did you look at me."
There was a deeper ache in her words than he expected.
But how could he tell her that the moment he saw her. His world started to revolve around her like love at first sight. But whenever he tried to speak with her his courage gives up and his heart beat fastens.
"Since I saw you from my taxi that day," she confessed.
"I... I fell for you. That's why I had given you lift. Kiyana didn't want to, but I insisted. While you were busy chatting with Kiyana. I saw your ticket and even swapped our tickets intentionally with the other passengers of this coach only so that I could be in the same coach with you."
Now he had come to know how the two girls dropped in the same coach as his.
"I just... wanted to be close to you. But all you gave me was silence — and tonight, you also gave me pain."
Her voice cracked, the words barely hanging on. Her eyes nearly filled once again ready to begin flowing.
And then, as if all her walls had crumbled, she broke down. Slowly, silently — her tears soaking the fabric of my pants as she lay in his lap.
He didn't move.
Not even an inch.
He let her rest. Let her cry.
And after few more complaints she slept in his lap.
He don't know why but he had decided not to move and let her sleep in his lap and his hands had automatically gone towards her head caressing long ponytail,
'I don't know why but it was satisfying to hear my complaints from her. I wished that this moment would never ends.' with this thought he smiled with his warm heart.
He had not know that the moment he fell for Vaidehi she too had fall over for him and that too intense, fingers caressing her hair, he was thinking that he had barely with minor defence handled the situation with Kiyana but now Vaidehi.
But this time it was mutual because it was also love at first sight for Aaryaksh suddenly something shifted inside him. That old wall he had built around my soul — cracked, just a little. Something warm... and terrifyingly unfamiliar... bloomed in its place.
Something he hadn't felt in a long, long time.
Something beautiful.
He continued caressing her head and after a while he slept in the very position.
And the night continued.