Abeer's POV

I hung up the phone, a strange, almost imperceptible feeling taking over me. Taira Kapoor. I threw the phone on the couch and ran a heavy hand through my hair. I had forgotten about the past.

I had forgotten what it was before Aashi. What I was. What I wanted with a passion. A sardonic chuckle escaped my lips as I thought about the irony of life. Life had got me exactly what I wanted, when I no longer desired it.

Aashi Singhania was a force. A force that made everything else look uninteresting and unworthy in front of her. My very first day in the office and she had shown exactly who she was. I had been hounded by all the employees working there, greeting me, positively charmed. The women had been more than eager to talk to me.

But not her. She had stood far away from the crowd, her lush lips drawn into a thin line, her face devoid of expressions.

But she wasn't successful in keeping her emotions in check. I had thought she would come to me to introduce herself, but she didn't seem interested. I walked towards her and gave her my most friendly smile, which she did not return. At least not in kind. Her tone clipped, she had answered almost all my questions in monosyllables, clearly alluding her disinterest in me. Until the smartass retort came, which threw me off guard.

"Miss Singhania is just fine," she had said to my polite inquiry about what I should call her since we were of the same age, and had walked away, chin held high.

I had been warned that Aashi Singhania would be tough to break. What I hadn't been told was that she had sparkling chocolate brown eyes, which almost always twinkled in mischief, only barring the times she was angry. That she was fierce, headstrong and in possession of a temper that border-lined towards scary. That she possessed a sharp intellect, with tendencies of landing into awkward and embarrassing situations.

And frank to a fault.

She wasn't a 'beauty to behold' or anything of that sort. And she knew that. But she had spark, which was enough to put anything on fire, if only they had the sight for it. She put me on fire. Her spark had me attracted to her like moth to light. She was attractive. And that realization drove me mad.

I had never imagined I would crave for a woman like her. I didn't want her. And I kept repeating that in my head until the day she came to my rescue. Life had got me in a similar position that had haunted me for all my childhood years. And she had been my guiding light. When I had landed in Delhi, I hadn't known Maya was working there. She had managed to make my life a living hell, until Aashi waltzed in, and forced the darkness away.

I had never wanted her. I wanted Taira.

Taira Kapoor.

I knew who Taira Kapoor was. More than that, I knew who her father was. The successful businessman who owned the company I worked in, and a lecherous bastard. The story dated back to the time when I was fourteen. My happy, middle class family had consisted of my two elder sisters, my parents and me. We weren't wealthy, but we were happy. Content. Satisfied. Until my father, the only breadwinner then, lost his job unexpectedly due to the recession and couldn't find another. My mother, who was a housewife till then, went job hunting as well and landed herself with the job as a secretary to Mr. Kapoor, Taira's father. I remember my family being shocked, when we knew that she found employment there as mother didn't have much job experience. But we had a door of income, and we were glad for it.

My mother was happy with her job. Mr. Kapoor was a gentleman, he never overworked her - my mother used to say. But then slowly everything changed, starting with a few out of line compliments, which then turned into full blown harassment. My mother could not voice out her troubles due to the fear of losing her job, especially when she was the only source of income for our family. She was the kindest person I knew. Her smile was our family's strength, a trait of hers that all of us siblings inherited.

Until the smile started slipping away, making way to endless melancholy. She didn't just make sacrifices but suffered in a way no woman should.

When we keep things bottled up inside us, it either comes to a point where we burst out, or simply let it eat us alive. My mother succumbed to the second. She slowly started slipping in depression and soon passed away due to a heart attack. I was sixteen. All of us tried to get to know why she was slipping away from us. But she didn't say anything. Two years of absolute hell.

We were traumatized, confused and perplexed as to how had things come to this. Our beautiful family, so happy with its limited resources, had suddenly fallen apart. Ma had been unhappy, but why?

This 'why' was eating us alive. We were hungry for the truth when my mother's best friend of many years revealed the truth to us a few months after she passed away. Mother had confided in her, told her of her woes, the torture she had been enduring.

I remember the day the truth had made itself known in our house. My father had fallen. He hadn't lost hope when he had lost his job. He had us to look after. He hadn't broke when mother had died. He had to raise his three children. Without another pillar to support him now.

But he had lost the day he had known of what his beloved wife had been going through. What she had done for all of us. It brought a night of deafening silence and grotesque sobs. Father had sat before Ma's portrait all night. Seeking answers to questions, knowing he wouldn't get any.

My sisters, who had bickered and fought with me my entire life had grown up that day. So had I.

My father had made efforts to get Mr. Kapoor punished, but a middle class man against a big businessman stood no chance. Besides, there had been no evidence and so the case was closed.

But that didn't mean it hadn't haunted me. It had. My mother's lifeless eyes didn't leave my memory, reminding me of who had destroyed our peaceful, beautiful family. As I reached twenty-seven and became financially independent, I began giving attention to my plan. It was pretty simple - destroy Mr. Kapoor's happiness the way he had destroyed ours.

It started when I accidentally stumbled upon Karen, my childhood friend, Rohit's girlfriend, who happened to be friends with Taira. Till then, it had just been a plan, but meeting Karen had arose the possibility of fulfilling it. After my mother's death, father had soon found a job where he had been Rohit's father's senior. They hadn't been financially well off, and my father had helped him with Rohit's education's expenses even though we weren't that well off as well. He knew he owed us, and helped me.

Karen had been of much help. Taira, his daughter, was his only weakness. He loved her to a fault. She was rich, but not a spoilt brat. She was simple, gullible, innocent - she liked simple things. She didn't mingle in high society, keeping her feet firmly planted on ground. Karen had even joked that she was looking for a middle-class guy to marry, which piqued my interest.

Karen had helped a lot. Unknowingly, of course. She had me meet a score of her other friends, who also knew Taira. It was then I got to know about her 'poles apart' friendship with a headstrong girl named Aashi Singhania. Aashi, close confidante of Taira Kapoor.

Hard to please. Harder to befriend.

It was then I thought of my entire plan. Securing a position in Mr. Kapoor's office was a challenge, but Rohit secured that for me. The stage was set, and the play - get closer to Taira's closest friend, who was an employee there, and then be introduced to Taira. Make her fall in love with me, and leave her right before the night of the marriage. It would break her heart, and hurt Mr. Kapoor's image.

I would have never touched her like her father did to my mother, of course, I wasn't that cruel. But the urge to avenge my mother and my family was so strong, that I failed to see reason beyond it.

Now when I sit and think about it, it didn't make sense. Any of it. It happened in movies, an eye for an eye, which also ended with the hero living a happily ever after. But in real life? Revenge was overrated, hollow. I had been so blind that I hadn't thought of what would happen after I did what I planned to do.

I hadn't thought of my family, the people I loved terribly. I hadn't thought of Taira, a girl who didn't even know me, and most probably didn't have any clue of her father's heinous crimes.

And at the end, what would have I earned from this mess? My career ruined, my family away from me - I would have lost everything I held dear to me, because of a stupid obsession I couldn't get rid of.

It hurt, the past hurt. But I also knew that Ma wouldn't have wanted this. She would hate to see a girl ruined in the name of revenge - she would have been heartbroken. This wasn't me. I knew that.

Revenge, hate wasn't in my nature. I had taken after my mother. I had always been my mother's sweet boy. Always sweet, always polite. I didn't have a temper like my sisters. My mother would joke about how glad she was that at least one of her offsprings had taken after her.

She would hate me. She probably did hate me now.

In this sense, Aashi had saved me twice. Once from Maya, and once from myself.

After the incident with Maya I had made up my mind - revenge wasn't worth it if I had to lose Aashi for it. Revenge would not give me peace the way Aashi did. Oh, she was far from peaceful, but being with her, laughing with her brought me peace. It brought out the real me.

The Abeer my mother was so fond of.

I blinked away the unshed tears from my eyes and looked at Aashi's profile picture from Whatsapp. God, it has just been two months, but I know I love her.

Yes, I love her.

I was desperate to say this to her, and say it for the rest of my life. But I knew she was scared. It felt crazy that I would include scared and Aashi Singhania in the same sentence. But she was afraid. Her chocolate brown eyes never failed to tell what she felt.

I didn't know what her fears were, but I would love to help erase them from her life. Just like I want to erase mine. I don't want secrets between us. The thought of her getting to know about my past from someone else scared the living daylights out of me.

I would tell her. Tomorrow.

I can't wait any longer. I hope she finds it in her heart to forgive me for I can't imagine a life without her.

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Yes, we know this one is a shocker. But we hope you find it in your heart to forgive us just as we hope Aashi finds it in hers.

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