Whoever said, 'everything happens for a reason' needs to take one good look at me right now. And then I am sure they will never say those words in that order again.

Here I am on a working day, sitting on my couch, in my apartment, eating popcorn and watching... any guesses?

News.

I am looking at a brown-long haired girl, clad in a blue T-shirt, which reads 'I am too good to be true' (snort), and jeans giving the camera as many weird expressions as possible. She is trying to escape from the flashing white light of the cameras but she is trapped. Her face is as red as a tomato. There are people shouting something and her eyes are about the size of dinosaur's eggs. Now she is looking up at the sky and muttering something.

And that something is 'you've got to be kidding me'.

How do I know that? I am the monkey dancing before the cameras.

"Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?" I shout expecting some sort of response from the person far above, who I am sure, is looking at me right now and is being entertained.

The fake-nasal voiced-bamboo sized-perfectly dressed-gorilla aka the host is yapping about how Ryan and his lover met at their secret hide out to discuss about their future.

"Our sources tell us that the couple had known each other for a few years now and have been official ever since Riya joined VR Holdings. A very reliable source also informed us that the duo is so cute together and fight like 'old married couple'. We did a little digging have a look at what we found..."

And there were pictures of Ryan and me at the dinner party. Few pictures from months before, where the two of us were standing behind a serious looking crowd and I was laughing at Ryan's comments on the speaker.

One word that describes my life right now: MESS.

I have been ignoring all calls and messages from my parents, cousins, aunts, uncles, blood relations, friends, nosy neighbors and my watchman. Sasha was still diving around in some ocean water near a faraway island and Mini just sent me one sentenced message which read:

'Are you alright?'

The minute my brain understood the message it came up with a well-crafted snarky essay of a reply but I deleted the entire paragraph and just sent 'S'. After that she went back to being AWOL. In my head there were different possibilities for her disappearance (the last time I saw or talked to her was on the night of the dinner) but the one possibility that dominated the rest was that she has been dragged into the life in darkness by her prince of the shadows.

I switched off the TV, lifted myself from the sofa after battling with my comforter and walked to the kitchen to refill my bowl of popcorn. I placed some popcorn in the microwave and leaned on the kitchen counter and was sucked into oblivion.

My head ached and my eyes pricked, a lump formed in my throat and I was swallowing a lot. A small traitorous tear drop managed to break free from my left eye. The eye that held the tear captive for years. The saline liquid slowly crawled down my face near my lips and some more tears broke free, from the clutches of my eyelids and then they just kept coming.

I don't know how I ended up on the floor, my back pressed to the kitchen counter, my knees held close to me and my head resting on my knees. I was a sobbing mess.

Why are you crying?

I don't know.

I was sad, angry, hurt, lost and most importantly disappointed. There were many other emotions, all swirling inside me causing havoc but my vocabulary did not have words for those emotions.

Crying was horrible. After I turned sixteen the number of times I let the tears slip can be counted on my fingers. And the last time I cried was four years ago. I cried one whole day and the next day I woke up and went on with my day like nothing happened. In the days, weeks, months and years that followed there were numerous occasion when I felt sad or hurt or pained. But I never cried.

The turn of events after coming out of Ryan's house was the last straw. Someone followed me to Ryan's place and the minute I stepped out all I could see was white light and mikes shoved in my face. Ryan called security after fifteen minutes of my first ever media-appearance catastrophe and I reached home in some car Ryan arranged. He called and said that he will take care of everything and asked me not to set foot out of my apartment for anything. The apartment's guard has been calling me saying there were people here with cameras, to meet me.

I was sick and tired of being a magnet to mess. All those horrible scenarios were flashing before me. The first time I have been bullied at school, the first of many times my father missed out my birthdays, all the times I was left to myself to deal with my problems because my mom was too absorbed in her "work", the black day four years ago and all the really bad places in my life came back to visit me and drag me to the sorry state I have been in on those days.

And they have been successful. I was crying like it was the only thing I knew.

The worst past about the whole situation was I wasn't really sure why I was crying. I was sobbing, hiccupping, wiping my tears, sniffing and scolding myself for being a hysterical mess.

Mess, mess, mess

'You are a mess Lucas Scott. You are my mess.'

Seriously, brain? You thought now would be a great time to be a One Tree Hill fan girl?

But Lucas is a mess. He is messier than the word mess can get and look where he ended. You are going to be just fine.

You think so?

Ding

Brain? Why did your yup sound like ding to me?

Because that wasn't me, it is your calling bell. Some one's at the door. By the way 'yup I think so'.

I let go of my human ball position. I washed my face with some and wiped it with my hoodie's sleeves. I dragged myself like a sloth to the door and opened it without checking who it was. I opened the door to find,

"Nick?"

He observed me from head to toe, taking in my home-less look, and just said

"You look terrible."

"Yaa I was just working on my look for Halloween. It feels good to know that you like it." What was he doing here?

I turned around and walked back into my house. He walked in, right behind me.

"Did you eat anything?"

If you consider a ton of popcorn that I have consumed for breakfast and lunch. Yes, I did eat. A lot.

"Yes" It is around 5 in the evening maybe I can have popcorn for dinner too and set a record.

He let out a heavy breath, "get ready we are going out."

Oh, yaa right and I am your slave. Go to hell.

I walked stubbornly to the couch and flopped down on it, folded my legs and focused my attention back at the TV.

He can crush that thought and shove it up his a*s if he thinks he can suddenly disappear on me only to barge back here and order me around.

"Fine, be like that. I am going out now and will be back in fifteen minutes. It's your choice on how you want to look. The minute I come back I am going to drag you out whether you like it or not."

I huffed and looked back to give him a piece of my mind, but he was gone by then. I am not that docile girl that is going to give in to his threats and hurriedly get ready for his 'outing'. He can do all he wants but I am not going to set a foot outside my apartment. I will rather die in my misery than go out with him.

Why is he here anyway? Doesn't he have a fiancé waiting to be rescued or a multi-dollar company to take care of or attend phone calls and leave me suddenly?

You know brain you are taking his leaving more seriously than what is considered appropriate.

But he did leave without a word.

So, what? He just left because something important must have come up. Or maybe he just wanted to go. I don't care and neither should you. It doesn't matter; he is not answerable to me. I don't want to know his reasons and I don't even have a right to.

"So, you ready?" his voice came from behind me. "I see you want to do this the hard way. Fine by me."

He sat down beside me and pulled out his phone. I tried not to look at what he was doing but couldn't help it. I mean he was supposed to 'drag me out' right?

"No, I am not going to carry you bridal style or throw you over my shoulders to take you out. Keep dreaming Riya." he said with a chuckle still looking at his phone. "I don't get my hands dirty. I retort to less straining ways like..." he rubbed his chin and looked up at me "blackmail."

Ha. Like that is going to work on me. I smirked at him "bring it on Nickelodeon."

Frankly I am a little scared. He has this smug look plastered to his face, like he was holding my kryptonite and that thought is scary.

He searched for some contact number and waved his phone before my eyes.

"So, Riya, how would you like to have a nice little chat with your father?"

HE DID NOT. Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh

~*~*~*~*~*

I hope I am forgiven.

Until next time, stay happy.

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