Our Hill of Stars

KATHA X VIAAN

✨ Apology Accepted ✨

Katha threw away the blue coat she had covered herself up with, for the realisation stuck her. And more than realisation, they were the haunting memories which came back. The memories of that fateful dark night which changed a lot of things in her life. Aarav is fine, he's living a normal life and she? What about her? Katha has been living under a constant insecurity, a restriction, a boundation, and she's living with hate harboured inside her heart. She flinches whenever Viaan comes near her, though that has reduced to minimal but still there's an awkwardness, a tension, a suffocation and it will always be there. Katha was never a woman who hated someone, not when she lost her parents, she never hated the cruelty of the almighty, when she lost Adi, not then, when his parents didn't accept her, when Mr Garewal thrashed her out of his house for he didn't want to pay for Aarav's treatment, she never came to loath him. But she hates Viaan. And if not hate, then she despises him, which was never in her dictionary. She never lived like that but that one man, brought her to the pinnacle, tested Katha to her boundaries and brought out the hidden emotions she used to think, never existed in her.
It's the feeling of being uncomfortable around Viaan, it's the feeling of dislike towards him. The only relief from all this is that these feelings aren't growing. Maybe they are stagnant. Because Viaan isn't that important or is it his genuine effort that she sees daily??

In the past month, Katha has seen varied shades of Viaan Ranghuvanshi. He isn't the person, he looks on the surface. He has come forward as a kind, soft, helpful, yet thorough professional and haughty boss. He seems considerate too, but Katha hasn't been able to decide if he has become careful post knowing her truth, or he always was. But how does it even matter?
The bottom line is, she can't spend this night, with Viaan, in the same room as him. She can sleep in verandah but can't breathe the same air as him in this room. Though she has become habitual of working with him, around him, in his office but spending a whole night in the same room only is causing damage to her soul.
Uncountable visions come flashing in front of her eyes, visions of her going to the hotel room one thousand one, the image of him opening the door, before she could knock, him offering her alcohol, of him holding her as she slipped, Viaan kissing her in the crook of her neck, besmirching her for rest of her life. Memories of Viaan lying beside her, doing things to her, she never imagined would happen or share with someone other than her husband, who is dead, caused goosebumps on her skin as she stares at the room, with hollow eyes. The night, she let Viaan touch her, without her subconscious affirmation, letting him f*ck her till he was satiated, came into her mind, as simply as that. Isn't it cruel?
Why can't she forget it all? Why can't she delete it away? And most importantly why she is suddenly reminded of all that now?

Maybe because she never had the time to went out her pain, her sorrow. She never had that chance to scream and cry ever so loudly in an empty room, because she was too engrossed in Aarav's treatment.
She literally traded herself for one crore. If it was a test, which it was, why didn't he stop the moment she came to the hotel?

"Aapne aisa kyun kiya?" Katha finally broke the silence which was bothering Viaan since the moment they had entered the room. He was dying to tell her that he was going to sleep in his car and she can stay here but wasn't able to frame the sentence, seeing her so lost and disheartened. He knows what she's thinking and what is bothering her. It's him, this room and the prospect of sharing it with him, but he has got the solution to it.
But the question she has asked now, has left Viaan speechless. What should he say? Why did he do that? Seems like he's standing in front of Katha's society where they had the most brutal confrontation. When he thought they had moved past it, he was finding themselves stuck there only.