Two years passed.

Two long, relentless, unforgiving years.

Years that reshaped Poornima Azeez into someone unrecognizable.

Not the girl who stood trembling in a rain-soaked corridor.

Not the one whose heart cracked under cruel words.

Not the one who cried on flights or stared at London rain with broken hope.

No.

She became something new.

Something fierce.

A woman who rebuilt herself from ashes she didn’t ask for.

---

London: Her Battlefield

University life was nothing like home.

Here, no one knew she was the daughter of Rehan Azeez.

No one treated her gently.

No one shielded her from consequences.

For the first time, she wasn’t a protected princess.

She was just… Poornima.

A student.

A fighter.

A girl far from the boy who hurt her.

And she loved it.

She drowned herself in her books.

Not to prove something to her father.

Not to make her family proud.

To erase him.

Every time she solved a difficult equation—she erased his voice.

Every time she topped an exam—she erased his face.

Every time she earned praise—she erased the image of him walking away from her in the rain.

And with every success, the hatred in her heart didn’t fade.

It sharpened.

“I will never be weak again,” she promised herself.

Not for him.

Not for anyone.

---

Her Reputation Grows

By her third semester, professors began remembering her name before attendance.

By her fourth, she was tutoring international students.

By the end of the first year, she was already offered a research internship.

Everyone admired her.

Her confidence.

Her independence.

Her discipline.

What no one knew was that these weren’t gifts.

They were scars turned into armor.

---

The Night That Defined Her

One cold December evening, she received a call from India.

From home.

Agasthya.

Her childhood friend.

Her brother’s figure.

One of the few people she still trusted.

“Poo?” he said softly.

He hadn’t called her that nickname in years.

Her heart tightened.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing serious,” he said quickly. “I just… I wanted to check on you.”

She knew that tone.

Someone must have told him.

Someone must’ve hinted she wasn’t doing well.

“I’m fine,” she said firmly.

Agasthya exhaled.

“Doesn’t feel like it.”

She clenched her teeth.

“Don’t, Agasthya. I left India for a reason.”

A pause.

“Because of him?” he asked quietly.

Her grip tightened around her phone.

“Don’t say his name,” she whispered, the words dripping with a coldness that even surprised her.

Agasthya was silent.

And then—

“Poornima… he isn’t the same.”

She laughed.

A sharp, humorless sound.

“I don’t care what he is. I don’t care how he is. And I don’t care if he thinks about me or not.”

Her voice lowered, steady and fierce.

“He is nothing in my life now.”

Agasthya swallowed. “He regrets—”

She cut him off.

“I don’t want his regret.”

Her voice cracked, not with weakness, but with rage and pain she had never allowed herself to release.

“I don’t want his apologies. I don’t want explanations. I don’t want memories. I don’t want anything from him.”

And then she said the words she had never dared to before.

“I hate him, Agasthya.”

Silence.

As if the world itself paused.

And then—

“Okay,” Agasthya whispered gently. “If that’s what you need to move on… I won’t bring him up again.”

The call ended.

The tears didn’t fall.

Not anymore.

She simply closed her eyes and let her chest burn with the truth.

She hated him.

Or at least, she believed she did.

Hatred was warm.

Hatred was fuel.

Hatred kept her moving when heartbreak couldn’t.

And she chose to keep moving.

---

Her New Life

She made new friends.

Joined a small cultural group.

Started part-time work at the university library.

Took weekend photography classes.

Decorated her small apartment with fairy lights and books and plants.

She built a life.

A future.

A life where nothing—absolutely nothing—reminded her of Veeresh Rathore.

She didn’t know that back in India—

he was still standing on that same balcony at times, staring at the same skyline, wondering why forgetting her was impossible when he never allowed himself to love in the first place.