Rags To Royals (Royal #1: Book 1) | ✔

38

Happy New Year's Eve, Everyone ✨

And we hit 9k today! Oh, what a year it has been!

-• awake and restless •-

His voice comes haunting me in my sleep. Like darkness embodied, he lives and breathes in everything that's pitch-black, concealing secrets and hiding motives. I've lived a life far lesser to call myself an experienced mortal, but I've seen enough and met enough people to judge and classify them as either good or bad. For some reason, he belongs to neither. And that's a first. Which scares me. His volatile behaviour, the inky coldness of his fleeting touch, and his voice, always whispered, never spoken, never revealing whether it's as deep as his eyes, or as shallow as his soul. He's uncertain in every moment, unexpected in every arrival, and untamed like a wind, slithering past you so effortlessly graceful, you are left with nothing but shivers in the wake.

He doesn't hide in the dark, no, he plays with it.

And darkness always plays along.

I wonder when light abandoned him, when darkness crawled so deep within that it's now him.

Will he ever come out of there? Will he ever unveil himself in front of me?

No matter how many times I say I don't want to see his face or know his name, something in the back of my mind keeps poking me with different questions.

How does he look?

I'm sure not hideous.

Those breathtaking pair of eyes are capable of bringing a destruction, they can never not become someone's ruin. I wonder if Yuvraaj gets to see him in the light, listen to his real voice, meet him in a more presentable setting, talk to him in a rather civil manner. Because with me, it's always like a secret rendezvous. One that I don't look forward to, feel breathless, hopeless and yet thrilled everytime we cross paths.

What the hell, Tara?

I shake my head, driving out the scandalous thoughts and lying back on the bed. I close my eyes in hopes to catch some sleep, not even bothering to turn off the lights.

What if he comes out when it's dark?

My breathing elevates at the thought of it. I don't know whether I'm spooked or fascinated by the probability. And that scares me.

I force myself to not think about anything, to lie blank until sleep reaches out to me.

It doesn't.

His memories do.

"For some reason, I don't like the thought of it."

"Tara, sleep," I chastise myself, and clutch the corner of the pillow in my fist before the same hand gravitates to my throat, reminded of the moment when he did the same, also squeezed it slightly.

Realisation dawns in and I throw my hand aside, lying straight as I stare at the ceiling. No matter what I do, how much I try, he just doesn't get out of my head. And it's starting to bother me. To the point I'm ready to swallow a few sleeping pills just so I can bury him somewhere inside my subconscious and never think of him again.

I sit up straight abruptly, filtering an incoming scream into a groan and slap my face in the cup of my hands before I unceremoniously get off the bed and shuffle through the drawers for my art supplies.

I need to distract myself somehow.

And what else but painting can help?

I fix the canvas closer to the bed, get some warm water from the bathroom and dip the brushes in there to soften the bristles. While I wait, my mind wanders off into the unknown options of what I want to put on the canvas. I look through the colors and choose black. It feels the right choice for something I've in my head but can't put into words right now.