People come and go, some remember you and some, not. But I remember you, Shrey. I know you enough to say that you are too strong to give up your life just like that.

The longer the bad days stay, the bigger the happiness that follows them.

You can go through this, I know. If there is nothing left to live for, live for the ones who live for you, Shrey.

Good days are coming.

Survive.

~Someone that you used to know

His heart was beating faster after a long time. The reason was simple. A person he used to know, managed to make him feel wanted than he ever felt in this phase of his life.

He breathed slowly.

He flipped the paper, looking for any sign that could reveal the exact identity. But nothing was mentioned except for that stupid hint. Maybe, clever. Someone was either to trying to taunt him or test him.

But that ninety percent of his heart was embracing this new positivity in his life. His hands loosened and eyes turned numb. He silently gave that anonymous person, the blessings.

"Who could it be?" He murmured in shock, slowly looking up at the nurse in doubt.

Aakriti couldn't decide how much information to hide. She couldn't reveal Sakshi's name so easily and now, seeing his curious and desperate eyes, it was hard for her to keep quiet.

"A girl," she began with a nervous smile, glancing back at the door if someone was coming.

Girl?

Shrey couldn't get the right idea as so many faces flashed in his mind. Maybe, some social group was trying to help him. Or what if Vikas Kaushik was again playing with his mind?

He bit his lip while leaning back on the pillows as he felt the bitter taste in his mouth because of consuming so many medicines back to back.

"What if someone's again playing with me?" He whispered to himself. "What if they are trying to taunt me?"

Aakriti was afraid to be in a suicidal person's room. The state of his mind was still unpredictable and he could do anything to himself or her at seeing this letter. But thankfully, he was calmly accepting it, except that he was misleading himself.

He couldn't trust the good things, she concluded.

She pitied him and decided to just tell him the truth. Sakshi still loved him, she had observed. If something good was coming out of this, then she didn't have to be so hideous. What if Shrey himself might get the hint and value her efforts? After all, the little letter was enough to lift his spirits and make him feel wanted.

Wanted in this world.

"Sir, she was pretty." She gulped at seeing his face turning stunned. "She said that she is your ex-girlfriend."

Shrey straightened slowly, his eyes narrowing and then, widening as again some selected faces flashed in his mind. His heart fluttered at hoping for one to be true. But he kept his guard down.

"Did someone give you money to do this to me?"

Aakriti widened her eyes. She shook her head, "Oh my God! Sir, no. You-You can check the footage. She came sobbing at this floor, hiding from media. She wanted to see you for once."

Shrey narrowed his eyes, smiled humorlessly. "My brother will not leave you for helping a stranger," he threatened through gritted teeth.

Tears filled in her eyes, her heart stopped at realising what she had done. Aakriti breathed heavily. Her ears were heating that she couldn't hear anything but her own heartbeats.

She wiped her eyes and stared at him blankly. "I can understand what you have went through. But you need to know, how hard it was for me to come into your room knowing that your mind is not right and you have been accused of a horrible crime?"

Shrey's face paled as he heard the same familiar words.

"Do you know how hard it was for me to help her see you and pass her message to you? Yet I did, because I had seen the love in her eyes. The love for you," she explained while glancing back again in fear.

He swallowed as his heart fluttered hard at imagining what she said.

"I can already lose my job because I have no duty regarding your room yet still I am here. You might have suffer many frauds. But she isn't. This letter she had wrote in front of me. Those faded marks, are her tears."

Shrey's lip trembled at realising the truth in her words. His mind was conflicted. He couldn't just believe her but he wanted to.

"No one has loved me like you are talking about," he confirmed while looking back at the letter in his lap. The handwriting was cursive, simple and so common.

He couldn't identify. He had lost his mind. This sudden anxiety was increasing.

"You should take rest, now. I am sorry that I read the letter. I had to be sure if she has written something worth reading for you. But these are more than words, Mr. Malhotra." She smiled nervously.

"When did she came?"

She bit her tongue. "Yesterday."

Shrey pursed his lips, feeling longed to see her. "Who could it be? I had many friends-"

"Ex-girlfriend," she repeated carefully.

Shrey gulped while looking away, thinking again of every girl he could remember.

"Who? Her name?" He kept his breaths at halt.

Aakriti smiled sadly. "I asked her a lot. But guess, she just want to be your well wisher, Mr. Malhotra. I must go now."

She left the room immediately while Shrey leaned back on the pillows with the letter on his chest.

______

Aditi groaned loudly. "You are an idiot. This is not something serious. For all you can wonder is she might be going to visit her relatives again. . ."

". . . or buying lingerie?" Aarush murmured sternly.

Her eyebrows raised and she glared at him. Aarush sighed, "Alright, sorry. But she is going out so much these days. We were the ones who would beg her to come out of this room, and have fun. Now, this is happening-"

"-from this week." Aditi sat beside him on the couch. "Something is going on. When she returned for the lecture, which was unexpected, she looked better than before as if she was enjoying the lecture."

Aarush shook his head in confusion while Aditi shook his shoulders. "Aarush, that teacher's lecture."

"I am listening," he answered, "and observing too. She is keeping lots of things from us these days."

Aditi chewed on her lip while looking at him. "Aarush, you know that. From past three years, she might be my roommate. Amazing roommate, like a younger sister to me. But we are not as close as you are to her."

Aarush looked at her and observed how serious she was.

"I can call her my best friend since she knows how I cry, what I eat through break-ups, what I watch when bored, which lipstick is my favorite. But, she has this amazing, undeniable bestie-bond with you." She smiled at him.

"I can feel that something is up since she is running, missing lectures. I can even wonder if this admirer or stalker is the reason." She concluded while Aarush stared far at the wall. "But something is really bothering her."

"She was upset all these days because of Mihir's cousin and the professor. Even before than that, she looked troubled because her tai ji has been keen on getting her interested in listening to her proposals," prompted Aarush while scratching his beard. He turned fully on the couch to look at Aditi.

"Do you think that it is really Mihir's cousin and not himself?"

Aditi shook her head immediately. "No. Not at all." Aarush's eyes narrowed at her as she chuckled nervously. "I mean, he is not Sakshi's type and it is really someone else because Mihir has been serious for Mahi all along and now, getting that sick in love with an acquaintance like Sakshi is not suiting up."

Aarush pouted while thinking hard. "Right. Infact, perfect. I now really think, that some guy is really after her." He raised his eyebrows at her. "But what about Sakshi? I don't think, she would just go to meet her relatives when we have a Viva tomorrow. For all I could imagine, she would have been messed up here, preparing and reading the syllabus."

Aditi shrugged her shoulders. "I know."

"Aditi, is she fine?" He murmured while putting his head on her shoulder. "I am so worried that I want to spy on her."

Aditi breathed heavily. "She will be fine. She is our best friend. She will tell us things at the right time."

_______

The desperation to know about her identity kept increasing. On top of that, continuous visits from his parents, relatives had frustrated him. Though, the news of him being discharged tomorrow, had relaxed him.

But again that letter under his pillow was spreading the scent of that girl, he so wanted to know about. Sitting straight he counted on his finger.

"Class-IX, my first crush, Ria. But she rejected me." He bit his lip. "Then, Sonali, Sanjana, Ahana, Manisha," his lips twitched in anger.

"They were all nothing." He had to think of serious ones. But nothing was serious ever for him which he still regretted. "All through the school, then Tina, Akanksha, Mabel, Nina, Harman," he gulped.

None of those were in touch with him ever after the school. He shook his head. "College," he muttered.

It had all turned opposite since he had gain weight, he was muscular. Girls had started showing interest him and he didn't need to go after any girl since they would themselves try to approach. Which in result had made him lose interest in impressing them anymore and since then, all he had done was playing around.

"Rishabh then fell for Pihu and I was kind of linked to his friend Raamya." He bit his lip and shook his head. "But it was just mere chatting for months. Not the dates or anything. "Second year, my first with Sonia."

He widened his eyes. "Fuck." She was a bold girl who liked him more than she should. In there playing together through months, she had gotten so whipped that he had broke up because of her being crazy over their future. She had started talking over their marriage plans and it had terrified him.

"She cannot be." If she was this girl, then he was better off without her. She was seriously not his type and not someone he would want at this phase of life.

He thought more of the past and stumbled on his final year. "Rishabh graduated, Pihu got married. He made me check for Sakshi."

He closed his eyes and covered his face. "That girl."

His heart thumped faster in shame as he recalled how he had apologized to her before giving up his life. "I still haven't apologized to her," he murmured.

He had flirted with so many girls, broke up with many but with Sakshi, it felt something different. She had been different. She was youngest from all of his girls.

She was cute and rich, more than him. He smiled to himself.

She wasn't really about lusting for him. She was more than that. She had brought him gifts, invited him to visit places with her, shared things about her family with him.

But she was a child. He sighed.

"Sakshi Singh Rathore," he hummed while imagining her sobbing and writing this letter for him.

"Nah!" He pursed his lips and shook his head. "Because of me, she fucked it up with her family." But he had fought for her and even then, she didn't come to look for him in the hospital. Which showed how upset she still was with him.

"No chance," he leaned back and closed his eyes. "She can't be."

Her brother won't allow her to leave Chandiga-

He came forward in a jolt as a sudden memory flashed in his mind.

Sakshi Singh Rathore in a short dress, outside the club with her eyes wide at seeing him.

Shrey inhaled a huge amount of air and breathed out. "She was in Delhi." He ran fingers through his hair and looked wide-eyed at the ceiling.

She was there outside of the club and a guy was there with her. Shrey raised his eyebrows remembering her slim and tall figure. Her hair were longer and those chubby cheeks had narrowed. He remembered all of it.

She looked hot.

He bit his lip and closed his eyes. "She can't be. She was rich and had the ego bigger than my dick. She never thanked me. She," he murmured to himself in defeat. "She can't be."

But she cared for you, just like this girl. . .

"I hurt her and she won't ever. She even had a guy with her," he whispered to himself.

You are her first love. What if she never forgot you? You were the one who had dumped her.

"She looked young," he recalled.

She must be in college while he had graduated, wasted three years of his life in a meaningless job with useless people.

He recalled the night of the club. Because of the case going on, he was troubled and had decided to meet the lawyer. He remembered getting drunk until he was unable to walk which was of course, happened long after seeing her.

"I must have looked like shit." He clenched his jaws while rubbing his eyes. "Even older." He cringed.

He hated to admit but this time, she was the one out of his league.

After all, when he had returned back to Delhi. He was engaged in company's work. Then, those monsters befriended him, used him and life became sh.t when that wicked woman accused him of such horrible crime.

"What if-" he breathed slowly. "What if Sakshi knows about my case?"

His school friend were not in touch with him. Sonia was out in Australia after her engagement which he had heard about two years ago. She couldn't just return and show her love to him just because she lost her virginity to him.

While Sakshi was in Delhi, her brother was in business world, her father was a good friend of his uncle. She could easily get to know about his case.

She must have hid herself because she didn't want to start anything with him but just help him because he was her first love.

Shrey opened his mouth in disbelief. So, now he had became a charity case.

His eyes filled with stubborn tears as his heart cried at cruel destiny. This tiny chit had brought all hope to his life.

"At least, one crazy being wanted me alive," he murmured to himself. "That even in pity."

Or maybe, simply because she was kind. He was sure of that. She was spoilt but good at heart.

"This is rubbish." He crushed the letter in his hand, and put it back under his pillow. Laying back down, he closed his eyes and thought hard. After all, he still wasn't sure of who could it be.

But no matter how much times he would deny for it, his heart told him that it was Sakshi and strangely, he had no problem with it.

Infact, it was secretly making him feel wanted and loved, after a long time.

______

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