Reading Between the Lines

Chapter 31: Regression

Seeing Vinnie be anything other than chill and sarcastic shows me that she's being fully serious. This is the first time I've seen her so giddy, and it's so nice to see her so happy. She's in love, and if it's true, I know he is too.

The moment quickly fades though as Prashanth suddenly interrupts the flow. "It's your turn now," he says directly to her, his voice sounding more inflammatory than usual.

She looks up at him in surprise, since this is the first time he's even spoken to her in a while. "Yeah. Thanks for the notice," she mutters the last part under her breath while she goes closer to the desk.

As she goes towards the desk, I look at him with a fed-up face. He raises his eyebrows for a second and does a quick up-down of his head. Is he actually confused right now?

"Yen maadthidya (what are you doing)?" I target him, making sure that no one can eavesdrop on me. Werewolves and their advanced hearing. Sometimes, I just wanna talk shit without someone busting me, you know?

Let's hope Naish and Divya are not using their hearing on me. Even if we're the only Kannada speakers, they can never know enough languages. Especially Divya. Like, her hidden ability is already omnilingualism. Why do you have to know every language when you'll automatically understand them?

"Naane thapu maadthene (what did I do wrong)?" he seethes back in Kannada, making both the twins turn back in confusion. Divya gives me an unsure nod before she turns around and laughs to herself, thinking this is just us bickering again.

Yeah, this is not gonna work. Time to bring out the headache.

Are you still mad at her about Nivedit? Dude, you're taking it too far. What did you expect her to do?

Look. I'm over the moon about Vinnie and Nivedit. They seem really cute, and Vinnie deserves a great person. And we're all happy for her. Everyone except Prashanth for some reason.

Anyway, Prashanth basically chased the poor guy around the park until he passed out from exhaustion when we saw them. And for the past 2 weeks, he's been giving both of them the silent treatment. Extreme silent treatment. Like, if he smells Vinnie's scent as she walks down the stairs, he'll leave the house.

Honestly, I understand why he's a bit upset. Two of his best friends are dating, and he didn't even know about it until now. But this is too much. He won't even look in her direction. And on Vinnie's side, she probably was just taking precautions. She's always so honest in general. Maybe she was afraid of how he'd react.

She also told me that Nivedit is an international-level swimmer. I mean, he's won Olympic-equivalent medals in this world. He's that good. And he's super popular in the sports world here too. He's like the ultimate swimmer celebrity crush. With all of that, no wonder they wanted to keep it under wraps.

I'm sure celebrity culture is way less invasive. After all, paparazzi is not a thing here. They get fined. Even tabloids are non-existent. But even with all these precautions, people can still be scary. I guess they thought it was better to be safe than sorry. Or, they wanted to just enjoy each other's company first before telling anyone.

I don't know. I just don't want to get involved. The last thing I want is to start Wolf War I all because of my big mouth.

"You just... you wouldn't understand yet. For now. It's not about the fact they didn't tell me; it's just that they were STUPID enough to do something like this."

But-

"Savi. You wouldn't understand yet. With everything Vinnie's been through..." He suddenly cuts me off and gives me an unreadable face, his eyes staring into my soul. He takes a breath, and before he leaves my side, his mouth slightly droops.