Page 58 of The Divine Lies We Weave

“Help me?” she scoffed. The dream still lingered on her mind, and heartache blossomed, ripping open old wounds. She didn’t want his help when the dream was still so raw. “I don’t… I don’t need or want help. Especially from you.”

Rajesh flinched but sat back against the wall. He drew his knees high and swept a hand through his curls. “I understand.”

“Do you?” she snapped.

Rajesh’s jaw ticked, gaze steady on hers. “Despite our circumstances, Leela. I don’t hate you.”

She scoffed again. “Then get that disgusted look off your face.”

His lips twitched. “Still the same woman, huh?”

Heat ran up her spine. “What does that mean?”

“It means you haven’t changed.”

“I have. I’m… stronger. Wiser, or whatever.”

“Still having nightmares?”

“Don’t you?” she snapped. “That night was chaotic. It was chaos! I lost everyone and everything I knew and loved. Do you know what trauma does to a body?”

Rajesh held her gaze. “I am more than aware.”

“It lingers. With everything. For continuous generations, sometimes. You can’t escape it, it’s like a curse. Like it’s stuck inside my marrow and now transporting the trauma and affecting everything I do.”

Rajesh merely sat there. Like the times when it was just them, and all Leela did was talk, and he listened.

“I have changed,” she mumbled, tone softer. “Internally. Externally. Doesn’t matter. Trauma hits everyone differently.”

“I know.”

Leela racked her brain for why Rajesh was still here. Why was he sitting there, looking at her with a small curl hiding the innocent looks they used to share? Why wasn’t he leaving?

“Can you go, please? I don’t need you sitting there looking at me as if you pity me.”

He frowned. “I don’t pity you, Leela.”

She pinched the tip of her nose and huffed. “Don’t. I can’t sit here looking at you, as I relive that nightmare over and over again and have you think that I’m broken.”

“I definitely don’t think you’re broken, Leela. Of all the shitty things that have happened in our lives, I don’t think that of you.”

“Then what? Do you hate me? Because how can you hate me if you once loved me? Because I know, despite you saying what you said that night, that you did. I was there. I remember it. Don’t you?”

The question slipped from her lips before she had the chance to take it back. But it had been the question bubbling on her tongue for years, and now finally had Rajesh to answer.

Rajesh lifted his eyes to the ceiling.

“Evading me again.” Leela stood, dusting off the sand stuck to her sweaty skin. She peered down her nose at him. “You need to leave. Before I⁠—”

“I wanted to tell you,” Rajesh said, cutting her off. He met her gaze as he stood, blocking her only exit.

Leela shuffled and wished she had a weapon. Something, in case the words coming out of his mouth would make her want to strike him.

It would be my pleasure.

The thought stilled as soon as the Viperess tuned in.

“I wanted to tell you, Leela. But how could I when….” Rajesh shut his eyes, biting his lip.