"2 a.m.! Why?" She was shocked.
"Are you kidding me? Please lemme go home... my family's waiting for me." She pleaded, tears filling her eyes. He smirked sarcastically.
"Uh-oh! Sorry but I can't. You have to make a deal with me if you want to get go home. If you're agreeing than I may take you back." He proposed like a business deal.
"I don't even know you Why'd I make a deal with you." She exclaimed with anger laced in her tone.
"Oh! That bas***d family of yours! They certainly haven't told you but I'm your cousin-fiance , we're betrothed since childhood. Your mother decided it." He snorted at that and told her shrugging his shoulders.
"What a ridiculous thing! I'm already married, for your kind information. My mother won't do that ridiculous thing to her daughter when she already called off her childhood betrothal. And I don't care if it's really a thing decided by my mom, I can't break off my marriage with my husband even if I'm dying." She snapped at him. His curled lips tightly pressed into thin line as he listened to her.
"Your mother is a woman who is a dishonor to our family. It's our decency and generosity that we agreed to her. Otherwise no family accept the girl who left her house in the darkness of the night, not even if she's an honored woman." He was insulting and mocking her and her mother.
"Stop it!!!" She cried out loud with anger and hurt visible in her doe eyes. Her tears made him jam on his place. He was enchanted by her look. She was breathtakingly beautiful in her current state.
"You're gorgeous when you crying. I've never seen such a scene before." He reached her and touched her teary face in a daze as he was under a spell. He found it amusing. She snapped her head back to avoid his touch.
Was he a psychopath? Just how could someone? Finding someone crying gorgeous! It was worst she ever heard.
She thought in a fear. He was insane. Somehow she has to escape from him. Her family must be worried for her. Ignoring him she was thinking to herself.
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It was pitch dark. Almost nothing was visible. His eyes were hardly opened. He was covered with something wet, sticky. He couldn't even move his limb. It was creeping him out. Something was strange. He was listening loud sobs and cries but he couldn't interpret the situation. The loud cries turned into muffled voices. Ringing in his ears increased by the time.
"Auny!...." he mumbled incoherently, "doll." Whimpers left his mouth. It was pain, his whole body was aching badly, he was hurt, yes he was hurt.
Something bright passed by him. Then it was reversed. Yes, he was at the side of a road. A car stopped by him. In its light he came to know that he was drenched in blood. A damaged car was hit by a nearby pole, he, somehow fall out of it.
He was dumbfounded. Someone else was in the car too. His mind was slowly engulfed by complete darkness.
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"Auny mama! Auny mama!" He was calling loudly, running in his school uniform to study, then bedroom at one end. His uniform was white shirt and black pants with black school shoes. Hair settled like a school kid. He was beaming with happiness. That eight years boy was heading toward the kitchen now.
Yes she was there. His "Auny mama".
"Slow down young boy. You may fall." She was cutting some fruit for him. He just came back from school. He needed it.
"Why are you excited?" She asked with so much love.
"You know what! There's color day at my school on Monday. Guess which color it is??" He asked holding the corner of her dupatta. She smiled at his childishness.
"Ummm... lemme think!! Is it pink?" She acted like she was thinking something. He pouted at her wrong guess.
"I'm Khanu! Not doll!" He whined. She laughed and tried to make a guess again.
"Okay, once again. It's red." She said snapping her finger, blinking innocently.
"Auny mama! It's for brides. As for Shanaya api! She wore it on her wedding day. It's not for boys. You can't even guess the right color which is moreover favorite color of mine." He was being gloomy. Folding his arms on his chest he turned his back to her. She controlled her laughing at that and crouched down to hold him in a hud from back. She whispered in his ear in a low voice.
"I know it's blue. As you have your wardrobe filled with blue, your room's blue, and others too. Am I right?"
"You knew it! You're making me fool!" His eyes lit up but he was still being moody.
"How could I not? You're my kid, my heart, a part of my soul, my dear son!" She said caressing his hair.
"But aunt said I'm not your real son. My mother's dead." He told her thoughtfully. She was surprised at that. She turned him holding his arms gently, to face her. He was giving her a questioning look.
"Who said that?" She asked with a seriousness to confirm what she heard thinking she was mistaken.