• AdiYa FF ~ The Hookup •

• Chapter 5 •

With one deep breath, she finished getting ready as she constantly tried to focus her attention somewhere else.

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Zoya entered the exhibition knowing that she was late. The space was already full of people and it seemed like everyone was enjoying Pooja's work. That made her happy, at least things going well for her friend in the professional sense since Zoya herself had managed to mess things in the personal one.

"Please welcome the woman of the hour, Mrs. Poojs Hooda." A round of applause erupted in the huge hall as Pooja stepped on the slightly elevated stage.
Zoya smiled looking at the happy glow on her face and joined to clap for her accomplishments.

"Thank you all for coming here and giving me the chance to share my passion with you. Of course, none of this could have been possible without my dear husband, Adi." Another round of applause, but this time Zoya didn't join.

Her eyes followed as he stepped up on the stage, seeming a little embarrassed with all the attention and a wave of shock hit her. She had been dumb enough to not think about the possible encounter with Aditya. He was her husband, afterall. Of course he was going to be there. But she wasn't ready for a confrontation, so she looked down to avoid the direct eye-contact.

But it was too late, the damage was done for Aditya had already caught a glimpse of the face that hadn't left his mind ever since that night. Suddenly, his entire focus shifted from his wife standing beside him to Zoya, who was evidently trying to hide herself by looking down and stepping behind people.

He wanted to call her name out but obviously couldn't. He looked back at Pooja and tried to not be distracted by someone who wasn't his wife. He smiled, stopping himself from looking in the other direction. It was especially harder because Zoya was right there and the idea of meeting her again didn't seem like a possibility but there she was, in the same room as him.

Zoya didn't know what to do herself, she knew Aditya had seen her and made her feel gutted thinking that her mistake could possibly take the limelight away from Pooja's big night. Part of her thought Aditya wouldn't care enough about becaue he was up there with his wife. That's right, he was Pooja's husband, her husband. He had no relationship, no obligation to Zoya so why would he even pay attention to her at a night like this. The unrest that the thought caused was confusing because Zoya shouldn't have felt that way, just like Aditya, she too was in a committed marriage herself.

The uneasiness and the chance of an encounter with Aditya made her want to run away, and that's exactly what she did. She stooped and tried to get out of the place hiding behind people, so nobody would notice that she was leaving in the middle of the speech.

Aditya noticed her as soon as she started leaving, putting him in a dilemma. Should he leave his wife and run behind her? He had questions, he didn't exactly know what those were but he knew he had to talk to her and figure things out. There was a very high chance that they would meet again considering they run in the same circles and he did deserve one conservation to acknowledge what had happened and to put the night in the past.

He excused himself, right when Pooja's speech ended which was right after Zoya had apparently exited the hall. He told Pooja's organiser to inform her about him leaving for an emergency and ignored everyone else to head straight for the exit gate. He figured Zoya couldn't have gone too far and he was right, he spotted her from the gate as she was walking away briskly, talking on the phone. He tried to catch up with her speed, as he finally called out her name.