Healing isn't peaceful. It's violent.It rips through you like a storm, tearing up the old lies you buried under smiles.
That's what I learned in those months after Reya's call.
I didn't tell anyone about her, not even the guys at work who joked about my sudden mood swings. They thought I was seeing someone new. I laughed along, but deep inside, I was just learning how to breathe again.
Every night, I'd sit in front of my laptop, open a blank page, and just type.No plan. No structure. Just words spilling like open wounds.
At first, it was rage — the kind that tasted metallic, hot, and unrelenting. Then came sorrow, guilt, and eventually, something else: awareness.
The words became a mirror, showing me how far I'd fallen.I wasn't Dhruve the husband, or the man who once believed in second chances.I was Dhruve the manipulator.Dhruve the controller.Dhruve the man who found pleasure in pain — both giving and receiving it.
And yet… I wasn't ready to let that version of me die.
Because for all the damage it caused, control was the only thing that ever made me feel alive.
One evening, I went to the same café by the river — my self-made confession booth. The waitress recognized me now. She'd smile politely and ask, "The usual?"
Black coffee. Bitter as memory.
That day, though, a stranger sat across from me — uninvited, but bold enough to stay. She was in her late twenties, sharp eyes, neat hair, that city charm wrapped in perfume and pretense.
"You always drink alone," she said. "Mind if I join?"
I shrugged. "Suit yourself."
She smiled — that confident kind of smile that hides curiosity and danger."Name's Nisha."
"Dhruve."
"I know," she said. "You work at Nexus Corp, right? We've seen each other at the lobby a few times."
That's how it started — casual, almost harmless. But nothing that starts with loneliness stays harmless for long.
Nisha was witty, grounded, real in ways that reminded me of what I used to crave before my world turned toxic.She didn't ask too many questions. She didn't pretend to understand me.And that's exactly what made me want her more.
Days turned into nights, messages into calls, and before I knew it, I was falling again — or maybe just pretending to.
The strange part? I knew what I was doing.I could see the pattern forming — charm, pull, disappear.The same cruel rhythm that once broke me.
And yet, I didn't stop.Maybe it wasn't about love anymore.Maybe it was about control — the art of undoing others before they could undo me.
One night, she asked me, "Why do you always look like you're fighting something invisible?"
I laughed, half drunk. "Maybe because I am."
"Does it have a name?"
I hesitated. Then said, "Reya."
Her smile faded. "Is she…?"
"She was," I interrupted. "Now she's just a ghost that keeps calling."
Nisha didn't ask more. She just leaned closer and said softly, "Then maybe you need someone to silence the ghost."
That night, I let her try.
But when she slept, I stared at the ceiling again — same as before, same silence, same emptiness.Because the ghost didn't leave.It just smiled in the dark and whispered, You're learning.
I started to see it clearly now — Reya wasn't haunting me for revenge anymore.She had become part of me. Her methods, her calm cruelty, her psychological chess — I was carrying all of it forward.
And I didn't hate it.That was the scariest part.
Every time I smiled at someone, I wondered if it was real. Every time I touched Nisha, I wondered if I was really feeling her — or just trying to feel anything.
A month later, Nisha told me she was falling for me.
And I said the only honest thing left inside me —"Don't."
"Why not?" she asked, voice trembling.
"Because I destroy things I love. And I love watching the destruction more than I should."
She stared at me, silent, confused, maybe even afraid.
And I smiled — not cruelly, but honestly.
Because for the first time, I wasn't lying.
That night, I deleted Reya's number again. Deleted the emails. Deleted everything.But when I opened my drafts folder, all those unsent letters to her were still there — untouched.
The last one ended with a line I didn't remember typing:
"Sometimes healing is just another form of self-destruction — but slower."
I closed the laptop and whispered to the empty room,"Maybe I deserve that."