The morning light spread softly across the penthouse, pale and gentle — a contrast to the usual tension that lingered between them.

Veeresh stirred slowly, blinking his eyes open. For a moment, he didn’t realize where he was — or who was beside him. But then his gaze fell on her.

Poornima.

She was still asleep, her face turned slightly toward him, the tear stains from the night before faintly visible on her cheeks. Her breathing was soft, steady.

He frowned slightly, sitting up halfway — his arm still resting where it had been all night, around her waist. His mind flashed back to the night before: the cigarette smoke, the hollow silence, and the quiet pull he couldn’t resist.

He remembered walking toward the guest room without thinking, driven by something he couldn’t explain — maybe exhaustion, maybe longing, maybe loneliness too deep to name. He had just lain beside her, the way a man collapses beside something familiar, and sleep had come — for the first time in years, peaceful and whole.

He looked at her again, and something inside him shifted. She hadn’t moved him away. She hadn’t taken advantage of his closeness. She had just… let him rest.

A faint, rare warmth touched his heart — quiet, hesitant, and new.

“Twenty-eight years,” he whispered to himself. “And this is the first time I actually slept without a nightmare.”

He ran a hand through his hair, his expression thoughtful. She didn’t leave. Even after all I said… she stayed.

But then his mind turned cruel again, reminding him of everything she’d done — the bullying, the humiliation, the way she’d laughed with her friends while he suffered in silence.

He shut his eyes for a moment, as if fighting with himself.

She hurt you, Veeresh. Don’t forget that.

But his heart whispered back, Yet she didn’t leave you this time.

Conflicted, he stood up, glancing at her one last time. “You make it so damn hard to hate you sometimes,” he muttered under his breath.

He walked away quietly to his room, shutting the door behind him, trying to steady the strange calm he felt.

Moments later, Poornima stirred awake. The warmth beside her was gone, but she could still feel the trace of his presence.

A small, shy smile tugged at her lips. He slept beside me, she thought softly. Maybe… maybe that’s a start.

She touched the bedsheet where he had rested his hand, a silent hope flickering in her chest. Then she stood up, wiping away any trace of her tears, and went to freshen up — ready to face a new day, and maybe, a new beginning.