Chapter 51

I open my mouth to say something. I don’t even know what—sorry, maybe, or please.

But then—

“MR. MEHRA!”

A voice. Loud. Strained. Coming from downstairs.

We both freeze.

Raj’s eyes flick up, sharp. His body goes still in a way that makes my stomach twist. Because that voice, it’s not just loud. It’s furious.

We move at the same time, rushing out into the hallway, heading toward the stairs.

And there—

Aman.

Standing at the bottom of the staircase, fists clenched at his sides, chest heaving. His eyes are glassy, red-rimmed, like he ran here on fury alone.

And it’s him. Aman, the quiet one. Aman who speaks like every word costs him something. Aman, who looks like he might actually start screaming.

“What the hell,” I breathe, more to myself.

Raj stops beside me, stunned for a second. But then—

His father steps out of his study, face pale. “Aman, I—”

“Don’t,” Aman snaps, voice breaking. “Don’t you dare pretend you get to explain anything.”

Raj blinks. “Aman?” He starts walking down the stairs. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? You can’t talk to my father like that.”

Aman’s head whips toward him, but it’s not Raj he’s looking at. Not really.

“You want to defend him?” Aman spits. “You want to protect him? Ask him what he did last night.”

Raj turns to his father, confused. “What is he talking about?”

His dad looks like he’s been struck. His mouth opens. Closes. “Raj, it’s nothing, I just—”

“You went to see my mother,” Aman says, louder now, each word like a slap. “You showed up at our house like you had any right. You think you get to check in now? After what you did?”

I feel like the air’s been vacuumed out of my chest. What the hell is going on?

Something isn’t right.

Raj’s dad takes a step forward. “Aman, please, this isn’t the time—”

“She had a panic attack!” Aman yells, voice cracking. “She’s in the hospital. Again. Because of you. Because you keep digging her up like some memory you never earned the right to grieve.”

“Aman—”

“If you cared,” he hisses, “you wouldn’t have left us.”

Silence.

That’s when the earth tilts. Just slightly. Just enough.

Raj goes still beside me. “Us?”

Aman’s face hardens. His eyes lock onto Raj like he just remembered he was standing there.

And for a moment, just a flicker, there’s guilt. Not regret. Not apology. Just rage twisted into something personal.

Raj takes a step forward. “What do you mean ‘us’?”

Mr. Mehra looks like he’s about to be sick. “Raj…”

But Aman’s already done. He shakes his head, jaw clenched. “Keep your father away from my family,” he says, quieter now. Quieter, but sharper. “Or I swear to god, next time I won’t be this polite.”

He turns to leave. And just before he reaches the door, his eyes flick to me.

For half a second.

It’s not an accident.

It lingers and I see tears shimmer in them.

Then he’s gone.

The door slams behind him.

And I turn to Raj—

His face is pale. He hasn’t moved.

There’s a kind of silence that doesn’t feel like silence. It hums. Loud. Thick.

Then—

“What did he mean?”

Raj’s voice is low, but tight. Too controlled.

His father, still near the bottom of the stairs, opens his mouth—

Closes it.

Raj turns to face him. “What the fuck did he mean, Dad?”

Mr. Mehra’s face folds in on itself. It’s not guilt. Not yet. It’s panic.

“Raj,” he says, “it’s not what you think—”

Raj steps forward. “Then what is it?”

Another step.

His voice rises. “Because it kind of sounded like Aman just told you to stay away from his mother. And you didn’t say a word.”

“I didn’t mean for this to come out like this,” his father says, hands raised. “I was going to tell you. I just—”

“Tell me what?”

Raj’s voice cracks. Just barely. But I hear it.

I see it in the way his face shifts—

The disbelief starting to crumble into something messier.

And I know I shouldn’t be here.

This isn’t mine to witness.

But I can’t look away.

His father lets out a slow breath, rubs a hand over his face like he’s trying to erase the last ten minutes.

“I knew Aman’s mother,” he says. “Back in college.”

Pause.

“We were together. For a while.”

Raj just… stares. “What do you mean together?”

“I loved her.”

A beat.

“I thought I did.”

The room tilts. Even I feel it.

“I graduated first,” Mr. Mehra says quietly. “She was still studying. I told her I’d go home, talk to my family, come back for her. Ask them for permission to marry.”

Raj is frozen.

“And?”

“My family didn’t agree.” His voice is small now. “They’d already arranged my marriage someone else. I couldn’t fight it. My dad was a heart patient and he already had one—” he couldn’t finish his sentence.

“Jesus Christ,” Raj mutters, stepping back.

“I didn’t know she was pregnant, Raj. I swear to you.”

Raj’s mouth opens. Closes. He looks down. His hands are shaking.

“When did you find out?”

His father hesitates.

“Three years ago. At the school. When Aman came for the admission with his mother. No father’s name on the form. But I… I knew her. And he—he looked like me.”

Raj lets out a quiet, humorless laugh.

“That’s what it took? A name on a piece of paper? That’s when you realized you had a son?”

His father looks like he’s been slapped.

“I tried,” he says. “I started visiting. Offering help. But she wouldn’t—she didn’t want anything from me. And I—”

He shakes his head. “I didn’t know how to tell you.”

Raj just stands there for a second, completely still.

Then—

He laughs.

Short. Sharp. Ugly.

“Of course you didn’t.”

His tone is nothing like before. It’s not hollow anymore. It’s cutting.

“You didn’t know how to tell me? That’s what you’re going with?”

His dad tries to speak, but Raj keeps going, voice rising.

“You kept this from me for three fucking years because what—what? You were worried I’d be upset?”

He gestures to himself, like he can’t believe the words are coming out of his own mouth.

“Do you hear yourself? I’ve been walking around your goddamn school with him in my class, and you just—what? Sat on it?”

Mr. Mehra flinches.

“Did Mom ever get to know?” Raj asks suddenly. His voice is dead serious now.

His dad’s silence is the answer. Raj’s face changes. Something shatters.

“You lied to both of us.”

“Raj—”

“No. No, don’t. Don’t call me that right now.”

He’s breathing like he’s trying not to lose it, like the walls are closing in too fast to keep up.

“You married her, had me, preached about honesty and legacy and family name my whole damn life—and you had a whole-ass kid you never claimed until it showed up in your admissions pile?”

His voice breaks on the last word.

And I feel it.

In my chest.

In my spine.

It’s the sound of someone watching their whole identity collapse.

“You let me be an asshole to him,” Raj spits, “and you never said a word. You let me walk around like I was better than him. Like I deserved this life. While he—”

He swallows. His hands are fists now.

“While he got nothing.”

“I never wanted it to be like this,” his father says quietly. “I didn’t have a choice—”

“Don’t,” Raj cuts him off. “Don’t fucking say that. You had a choice. You just didn’t pick it.”

His voice cracks again. Louder this time.

Then, without warning, he turns

Shoves past me—

Takes the stairs two at a time.

A door slams upstairs.

And I’m still rooted to the spot.

I don’t move.

I’m still standing on the stairs like some misplaced object in the middle of a wreck. The house is too quiet now, in that way it gets after someone says something that can’t be unsaid.

Mr. Mehra looks at me once. Just once. His eyes land on mine—bloodshot, hollow, stunned—and then he swallows hard, like he’s trying to get past something that won’t go down. He turns without a word and disappears into his room.

The silence that follows is worse than yelling.

I should leave. I know that. I have no business being here.

I turn to go, one step down, two—

But I stop.

Because upstairs, behind a closed door, is a boy who just had the floor pulled out from under him.

And I can’t walk away from that. Not when I know what it looks like to break and have no one left to witness it.

I don’t even remember climbing the rest of the stairs. Suddenly, I’m outside his room. The door is shut, of course. Raj never leaves things open when he’s hurting.

I stare at the handle. For a second, I think maybe I should knock and then run. Or maybe just leave. Just walk away and let him deal with this the way he probably wants—alone, controlled, without me.

But something in me won’t move.

Because I know he’s not okay.

And I can’t not know how bad it is. Not this time.

So I knock. Soft. Careful. Like I’m trying not to scare a wild animal.

No answer.

Of course not.

I lower myself to the floor, sitting against the door, knees pulled up. My back pressed to the wood like I’m trying to keep us connected through sheer proximity.

I wait a beat. And then, quietly—

“Raj.”

Nothing.

I sigh. Rest my head back. The door is cool against my neck.

“I know I shouldn’t be here,” I say, voice low, like I’m afraid to break something. “I don’t have the right.”

Still nothing.

“I should leave you alone. You probably want me gone. Maybe you should.”

I close my eyes.

“But I saw your face downstairs. And I can’t—I can’t pretend I didn’t.”

Another silence. But this one feels heavier. Like maybe he’s still on the other side of the door. Listening.

“I didn’t come up here to fix anything,” I continue. “I’m not… I’m not good at that. I just… I couldn’t leave. Not without knowing if you’re still breathing.”

The hallway is quiet, but my heartbeat feels like it’s trying to climb into my throat.

“I don’t need you to talk to me,” I say. “I don’t even need you to forgive me. I just… I’ll sit here. That’s it.”

Still no answer.

But I don’t move.

“I just want you to know I’m here.”

It slips out quieter than I mean for it to. Not some grand declaration. Just… a whisper. A truth too tired to be dressed up.

Because I meant it.

I’ll sit here.

Even if he never opens the door.

Even if all I ever get is silence.

Because this is the first time Raj has ever looked broken—

And I’m done walking away from broken people.

I don’t know if he hears me. Maybe he does. Maybe he’s too far gone to care.

But I stay.

I stay because I know what it feels like—when your world splits down the middle and no one stays long enough to help you gather the pieces.

Amit left after the fair.

Left when my skin still ached and my throat burned and I didn’t know how to carry what had happened.

Left without looking back.

So I don’t leave now.

Because Raj—

Raj just had everything pulled out from under him.

And the part that no one talks about?

Is that the silence after the truth breaks you? It’s louder than the explosion itself.

So I sit. Back against his door. Knees drawn up.

The house gets quieter. The evening folds into night. And the night slips into the midnight.

There’s something sacred about silence after a storm. You don’t speak. You don’t move. You just exist beside the person who’s trying to remember how to breathe.

The floor is cold beneath me.

My limbs are sore.

There’s a hollow space in my chest that keeps pulsing like a wound.

My phone buzzes once. Twice. My mom. Then my dad. I don’t pick up. They’ll assume I’m with Arya doing late night rehearsal. I let them.

I don’t know how many hours pass before I hear his voice.

Faint. Croaky. Like it had to fight its way out of his throat.

“You’re still there?”

I press my palm to the floor. Anchor myself. “Yeah.”

A pause.

Then a click.

The door creaks open.

He doesn’t look like Raj Mehra—the one who smirks at teachers and owns every room he walks into.

He looks like a boy who’s just had the foundation of his world kicked out from beneath him.

His eyes are red. Shoulders tense. Jaw locked like if he loosens it, he’ll shatter.

But he opens the door.

And the second our eyes meet—

he looks at me like I’ve done something cruel.

“Why?” he asks.

Just that.

One word. Fragile. Blunt. Terrified.

Why are you still here.

Why didn’t you leave like I told you to.

Why didn’t you let me fall apart in peace.

I feel it in my chest, like something tearing open from the inside.

Because he isn’t just asking why I stayed.

He’s asking why I’d stay for him.

Because Raj Mehra thinks this is one-sided.

That he loved too loudly, too much, and I—

I never reached back.

And maybe I didn’t.

Maybe I couldn’t.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel it.

Doesn’t mean I didn’t see him, hurting, every time I pulled away.

I step forward before I can overthink it.

My arms wrap around him like instinct. Like apology. Like don’t say it. Don’t ask again. I can’t survive answering.

He tenses.

For a breath.

Maybe two.

Then he breaks.

His arms come around me fast, desperate.

Like he’s drowning. Like he’s been drowning this whole time and just now realized there’s air again.

He buries his face into my shoulder. And I feel it—

The full-body tremble.

The heartbreak leaking out of him in the quietest, sharpest gasps.

He doesn’t cry like someone who wants to be comforted.

He cries like someone who thought no one would stay long enough to see him fall apart.

And I hold him tighter.

Because what else is there to do?

He’s clinging to me like it hurts.

And I deserve that. I do.

Because I kissed him and then I ran.

Because I gave him hope and then lit it on fire.

Because I looked him in the eyes and chose my grief over his heart.

But I’m here now.

And I feel him—

his ribs shaking under my hands, his chest hitching like he’s fighting himself for making this real.

I press my face into his hair and whisper,

“I’m sorry.”

I don’t even know which part I’m apologizing for.

All of it, maybe.

Every silence. Every retreat. Every time I let him believe he was the only one who felt it.

He doesn’t say anything back.

He just holds me like if he lets go, I’ll disappear too.

And maybe I will.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll wake up and still believe I can’t love him.

That I don’t deserve to.

That I’ll destroy him like I destroyed everything else.

But tonight?

Tonight I stay.

I hold him through every broken breath.

***

I don’t know how we got here.

One second I was outside his door, cold and quiet, and the next—

We’re on his bed. Not talking. Not crying. Just—existing.

Raj’s head is on my chest, breath soft against my hoodie, one arm hooked tightly around my waist like he’s scared I’ll disappear if he loosens his grip. His legs are tangled with mine. His body pressed too close. Not in a desperate, heated way—just… like he needs to feel I’m real.

His eyes are shut, but he’s not asleep. His jaw is tense, brows furrowed like he’s still trying to wrestle sense out of something senseless.

I keep brushing my fingers through his hair, slow, rhythmic. I don’t even realize I’m doing it until his breathing hitches slightly, like it’s grounding him. Or maybe undoing him.

My heart aches with every second.

Because I’ve never seen Raj like this—

Uncomposed. Unguarded. Undone.

He shifts slightly, burrows closer, his fingers clenching a fistful of my hoodie at my hip.

Then, quietly; so quietly I almost miss it–

“I don’t even know what to think.”

My hand pauses in his hair.

He exhales shakily, voice thick and low. “I have a brother. A fucking brother.”

I stay silent. There’s nothing I could say that wouldn’t feel too small.

Raj’s fingers tighten. “And my mom… she died without knowing. Without ever finding out that the man she loved had another son. That he lied. That—”

His voice breaks, just for a second. Just long enough to shatter something in my chest.

“I don’t even know who to blame.”

He pulls back just enough to look at me, eyes red, wide, but burning. “Him? Her? Myself?”

“You—?” I start, confused.

“I don’t know,” he cuts in, frustrated. “Maybe if I hadn’t been so busy being me, acting like I knew everything, like I was above everything—maybe I would’ve seen it. I would’ve known something was wrong. Why would Aman hate me unreasonably? That things didn’t add up. But I didn’t. I didn’t see any of it.”

He swallows hard and leans in again, pressing his forehead to my collarbone. His voice is smaller this time.

“I feel like I don’t know who I am anymore.”

I want to say something. Anything. But all I do is hold him tighter. Because that’s all I have.

He exhales again, slower this time. “I keep thinking she died not knowing who she was married to. Not knowing what he did. What he hid.”

His voice trembles. “She would’ve wanted to know.”

And I know he’s not asking for comfort. He’s not even asking for answers.

He’s just trying to put the pieces somewhere. Anywhere.

So I press my lips to the top of his head, let my fingers run through his hair again.

“You don’t have to figure it out tonight,” I whisper. “You’re allowed to not know.”

Raj doesn’t answer.

He just curls tighter against me, breath catching like he’s holding back everything that hasn’t spilled out yet.

And I let him.

Because right now, he’s not Raj Mehra—loud, charismatic, untouchable.

He’s just a boy who doesn’t know how to grieve the version of his life that doesn’t exist anymore.

And I’m the one he’s holding on to in the wreckage.

At some point—

Raj falls asleep.

His breathing evens out, slow and deep against my chest. His grip around my waist doesn’t loosen, not even a little. One of his legs is still tangled with mine, and his fingers are still curled in the fabric of my hoodie like he’s holding onto something more than just cotton.

It’s been a long time since someone held me like this.

Since someone got this close.

Since—

And it hits me; so suddenly, so violently; I can’t breathe for a second.

Amit.

This isn’t what I’m supposed to feel. This isn’t what I’m allowed to have.

I’m not supposed to be in someone’s bed. Not supposed to be this warm. Not supposed to be wanted like this.

My chest tightens. My hands tremble.

I try to move—just a little. Just enough to create some space between us, enough to breathe without guilt crawling down my throat like it wants to choke me.

But the second I shift, Raj’s grip tightens.

Not violently.

Just instinctively.

And then—

He nuzzles closer in his sleep, His nose brushes the base of my throat. His breath, warm and steady, ghosts across my skin. And then—

He says it.

Half-asleep, barely audible. A whisper swallowed by the dark.

“Don’t go.”

And I—

I break.

Not in the way that hurts. Not in the way I’m used to.

I break like something finally giving way. Like a door unlocking.

Because God—how long has it been since someone wanted me to stay?

How long since it wasn’t about fixing, or apologizing, or bleeding just to be allowed in the room?

I stare up at the ceiling like it’s going to give me permission to breathe.

It doesn’t.

But Raj does.

He’s still asleep. Still curled around me like it’s instinct. Like I’m something worth holding onto even when he’s unconscious.

“Raj,” I whisper. Just to test it. Just to feel the name in my mouth.

He doesn’t answer.

I don’t expect him to.

But something about the way he exhales—like his body hears me even if his brain doesn’t—makes my chest go tight.

So I move.

Not away. Not anymore.

I shift toward him.

I wrap my arms around him—slowly, then all at once. I bury my face in his shoulder, close enough to feel the steady rise and fall of his breath.

And I whisper, “Okay.”

Just that.

“Okay.”

Because maybe I don’t know what this is.

Maybe I’m still scared.

Maybe the past still lives under my skin like glass splinters.

But right now?

Right here?

I’m not running.

I’m not apologizing.

I’m not afraid of being seen.

I’m just a boy, holding another boy, in a bed that feels too safe to be real.

And maybe it’s wrong.

Maybe I’m betraying a ghost.

Maybe this is me failing to carry the weight of what I lost.

But—

Raj is holding me like I’m the only thing anchoring him to the world.

Like if he lets go, everything will slip through his fingers.

And I know that feeling.

God, I know it.

So I let myself stay.

I stay because something in him is cracked wide open and aching, and maybe I can’t fix it—

But I can hold it.

I stay because if Raj shatters, I will too.

Because he’s the only one who’s seen every broken, jagged part of me and still reached out without asking what they’ are.

Still stayed. Still held on.

And right now, with his head on my chest and his breath steady and his hand still clinging to me like I’m worth holding—

I don’t feel like a mistake.

I don’t feel like a ghost.

I feel human.

I feel me.

And it’s been ages since I’ve felt myself.