CHAPTER 51
ADITI
It’s late evening when I finally shut my laptop and rub my eyes, my fingers digging into the tired muscles at my temple.
My brain’s still buzzing—one meeting had bled into another, and now the glowing number next to my inbox has hit triple digits.
I lean back in my chair and stretch my arms over my head, a soft groan escaping as my spine cracks in a few places.
God, I’ve been sitting for too long.
I glance sideways.
He’s on the couch, legs stretched out, one arm draped lazily over the backrest like he owns the damn space—which, well, he kind of does.
His phone is angled toward his chest, thumb scrolling at a slow, thoughtful pace.
There’s a small crease between his brows.
Not the sharp, irritated kind that appears when someone’s trying to get on his nerves—but the softer, focused one I’ve come to associate with him watching some new recipe or cooking video he’ll never admit he enjoys.
“You said we’re doing date night,” I say, my voice rough from hours of silence. I sound like a toad as I clear my throat dramatically.
His eyes lift slowly from the phone to me, and that stupid smile—the slow one that starts in the corner of his mouth and spreads like it’s meant to live there—takes over his face. The kind of smile he doesn’t give to the world. The kind he saves just for me.
“We are,” he says, stretching like a cat. “I’ve just been waiting for you to stop trying to save the corporate world from imploding.”
I roll my eyes, but the laugh bubbles out before I can stop it. “The corporate world is imploding. I’m just trying to soften the fall.”
He smirks and pushes his phone aside, finally standing. He’s barefoot too, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and the top two buttons of his shirt undone. He looks too good for someone who’s done nothing all day—which is both annoying and unfair.
I pad into the kitchen, my toes cold against the tiles. “Please tell me you didn’t cook already.”
“I was about to,” he says, joining me by the counter. “But I figured you’d kill me if I didn’t let you pick the playlist.”
I give him a pointed look. “Smart man.”
He shrugs, stepping closer to open the fridge, pulling out a couple of ingredients, and placing them on the counter. “I learn fast.”
There’s something strangely intimate about cooking with him. Not because we’re making some gourmet meal—he’s doing most of the work, obviously. I’m just here for moral support and unsolicited taste tests. But it’s the in-between moments that get me.
The way he brushes past me, too close on purpose. The way his hand casually finds my waist when he reaches for a spice jar behind me. The way I pretend I’m being helpful when I’m very much not.
I fiddle with the speaker on the counter, scrolling through the playlist I’ve curated over the months—a mix of old Bollywood, soft indie, and the occasional song he’s secretly Shazam’d and added behind my back. He swears he doesn’t care about music, but I know better.
“Are you going to do something this time?” he asks, raising an eyebrow as he chops a tomato with an alarming level of precision.
“I’m the emotional support,” I say, hopping up onto the counter stool. “You need me.”
He snorts. “Yeah? For what?”
“To look at while you cook.”
He turns, lips twitching. “You really think you’re doing something, huh?”
I grin. “I am something.”
He shakes his head like he’s pretending to be exasperated, but I catch the way his eyes soften when they linger on me.
He reaches for the oil bottle, heating up the pan.
The sizzle fills the silence between us, and for a while, we just fall into rhythm—music low in the background, his movements fluid, mine clumsy but trying.
I try to help with the garlic and somehow end up dropping half of it.
“Okay,” he says, deadpan. “We are banning you from knife duty permanently.”
“Excuse you,” I say, offended. “I’m learning .”
“Learning would imply progress.”
I flick a piece of onion at him.
He catches it mid-air and drops it into the pan with a flourish. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”
I lean my chin into my palm, watching him with the kind of fondness I never thought I’d feel this deeply for anyone. “You keep saying that like it’s not the entire reason you put up with me.” I smirk.
He doesn’t answer for a second. He just glances sideways at me, his expression shifting into something quieter, gentler.
“It’s not,” he says softly.
Something tightens in my chest.
God, how does he do that? Flip the mood like a switch—from teasing to heartfelt in a breath?
The rest of the dinner comes together quickly. I pour the drinks, even though he doesn’t trust me near anything remotely fragile. We set the plates down on the small table near the balcony, the city lights glowing softly in the distance.
The food is, obviously, perfect. Because he made it.
“You’re really annoying, you know,” I say, chewing thoughtfully. “Like, couldn’t you mess up just once?”
He raises an eyebrow. “You want me to intentionally ruin food?”
“No, I want to win for once. Compete with you in a kitchen and win.”
He laughs. “Aditi, you literally burnt pasta once. Water was involved. Water. ”
I sigh dramatically. “Let’s not bring up the past. I’ve grown.”
“You’re unhinged.”
“And you’re stuck with me.”
That slow smile comes back. “Yeah,” he says, almost to himself. “I am.”
And just like that, we fall into a kind of comfortable silence—the kind that feels earned. The kind that happens only when two people have seen each other’s worst and still sit across the table, still choose to stay.
Sometimes, it’s in the soft clinks of cutlery. The way he pulls my stool closer without asking. The way I steal a bite from his plate and he lets me. The way our knees bump under the table and neither of us moves away.
It’s in the way we end up on the couch later, legs tangled, my head on his chest, the sound of his heartbeat slow and steady beneath my ear.
This isn’t perfect.
It’s real.
And for someone like me—who’s spent a lifetime trying to be perfect—real feels like magic.