Chapter 1
Present Day
‘Was it the same nightmare again?’ Maithili asked.
Despite the warm sunlight filtering through the half-open blinds, Kashvi felt her blood run cold.
She sat curled up in the plush armchair with her knees drawn to her chest. Kashvi kept her eyes trained on the pigeon outside the window, watching it shuffle along the narrow ledge.
The muted sounds of Mumbai traffic drifted up from far below, and she clung to that small, ordinary distraction, anything to delay turning back to the question waiting for her.
‘Kashvi, you must talk through this, so I’ll wait as long as you need,’ Maithili prompted patiently.
She let out a soft sigh and turned back to face her psychiatrist. Maithili Nanda had become her anchor over the last few years, yet Kashvi still had not grown used to her uncanny perception and patience.
‘Yeah. The same dream, as always,’ she answered, curling her fingers tightly around the mug of green tea Maithili had handed her at the start of their session, hoping the warmth would bring back some sensation in her cold fingers.
Maithili tilted her head, a curl slipping loose from her bun. ‘Did you get any sleep at all?’ she asked, studying her closely.
Kashvi looked up, startled to be asked about sleep when she had spent half the night trying to claw her way out of it. Her voice came out hoarse. ‘Not really.’
Maithili hummed faintly as she leaned back in her chair. ‘Do you remember anything from the nightmare? Was it about the accident again?’
She gave a slow, reluctant nod.
‘Do you want to talk about it? Only if you’re ready.’
‘I mean…’ Kashvi exhaled, fidgeting with the ceramic handle of her cup. ‘There’s nothing new in it. I’ve talked about the accident before.’
Maithili offered an encouraging smile. ‘I still think you should do it again. Maybe this time you’ll remember something new. It might help us understand why this nightmare keeps coming back.’
Her fingers trembled, and she bit down on the inside of her cheek, grounding herself in the sharp sting of pain. ‘It started the same way. Maa was driving the car. She kept asking me to settle down, but I kept arguing. Since I was in the back seat, she had to turn around to look at me.’
‘Go on, I’m listening.’
Cold sweat prickled at the back of her neck. Her throat felt tight, as if the scream from the dream were still lodged inside it. ‘It happened in a flash. Maa screamed, I think, or maybe it was me. She reached out for me, but there was a loud crunch of metal, and then…’
Kashvi shook her head, pressing her trembling knuckles to her mouth.
‘It’s okay. Take your time. Just take a deep breath,’ Maithili reassured her, sliding a box of tissues within her reach. But she didn’t need them. She rarely cried, not even here, where it felt safe enough to fall apart.
Kashvi swallowed hard, her voice cracking at the edges. ‘That’s when I woke up.’
‘How did you feel when you woke up?’
Kashvi gave a hollow laugh. ‘Like I was still stuck there, sitting in that car, about to die.’
‘But you didn’t.’
‘Exactly,’ she said sharply. Her eyes stung as she added, ‘I didn’t, but my Maa did.’
‘It’s been a while since you’ve had this nightmare, hasn’t it?’
Her breaths came shallow and uneven. ‘Yeah. It went away for a while.’
‘Then there must be a reason it’s come back now. Something must have stirred it up.’
Kashvi traced the seam of her jeans, unsure how to talk about it without making it worse. But keeping it buried had done nothing except bring the flashbacks back again.
Though Maithili spoke softly, the truth in her words made her flinch. Her gaze drifted back towards the window. She could lie, deflect, or change the subject entirely—she’d done all three before—but the weight of what she’d been carrying all week sat thick in her chest.
‘It had become manageable, I guess. But then I found out something about Di.’
Maithili asked, ‘Your sister? Siya, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, the only one. She’d been asleep in the front seat and suffered the direct impact of the accident, which caused internal damage. She recently found out she can’t have kids. Ever,’ Kashvi said, bitterness lacing her words as much as shame.
‘Do you still blame yourself for that accident?’
A spike of guilt pierced her chest. ‘You already know the answer to that.’
‘You are holding yourself responsible for things you could never have controlled, Kashvi. Maybe your mother had been in a rush to get somewhere, or maybe there were other factors behind that unfortunate incident.’
She snapped. ‘Di found a letter from Maa along with her will, and it said she had finally decided to leave Dad. Of course she was in a rush to get away from her imprisoned life.’
And the cruel irony was that her own daughter had robbed her of that freedom.
‘So you entirely blame yourself for what happened to your mother and sister?’
Kashvi flinched. Her chest rose and fell too fast, the tightness clamping around her breath like a fist. ‘Di lost our mother that day, and with her, the chance to have children of her own. So yes, I do.’
Maithili furrowed her brows, just enough to show her concern. ‘How did you feel when you found out about her condition?’
She scoffed bitterly. ‘I found new ways to hate myself when I already had plenty. The night Di told me, that’s when the nightmares got worse.’
Maithili spoke softly, ‘Listen to me. Grief twists the story in our minds until we can no longer tell the difference between what we fear happened and what actually happened.’
‘The difference doesn’t matter, because it won’t bring back Maa!’ Kashvi snapped, anger surging through her veins.
Neither will screaming at the therapist who is only trying to help, the shameful thought slithered through her mind, and Kashvi clamped down on her tongue.
She took a moment to compose herself, dragging a hand down her face and curling her toes into the plush velvet carpet. ‘I’m sorry, Maithili. It was wrong of me to snap at you.’
‘You’re allowed to be angry here.’ Maithili met her gaze calmly. ‘Besides, I remember how you refused to talk about the accident when we first started our sessions. It’s taken me years to get you to yell at me, and honestly, I’d take that over your silence any day.’
That pulled a small, reluctant chuckle out of Kashvi. ‘You really do know how to distract me with your dry sarcasm.’
Maithili smiled. ‘It hasn’t been easy, but I think I’ve found a balance with you, and I’ll take that as a win.’
Kashvi wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she let her gaze drop to the floor.
‘How’s Siya?’ Maithili asked, hoping to keep her from retreating into herself.
A soft smile tugged at her lips when she thought of her elder sister. ‘She’s good. Actually, really good. Abhay Jiju proposed to her at Versova Beach, where they first met. He’d been planning it for weeks.’
Maithili blinked in surprise. ‘Wait, I thought they were already married.’
‘They were, but it wasn’t exactly by choice. It was more like emotional blackmail from my father. So Jiju said it didn’t count. He wanted to make a memory that was only theirs, one that didn’t have my father’s dark shadow all over it.’
Maithili’s eyes softened with understanding. ‘That’s incredibly thoughtful.’
Kashvi nodded. ‘I haven’t seen her cry out of joy in years. He’s good to her. Di deserves that, and a whole lot more. There are moments when I watch them together and feel peaceful, knowing that some parts of our family didn’t completely fall apart under our father’s wrath.’
‘Speaking of whom, have you heard from your father lately?’ Maithili asked.
She tucked back a loose curl. ‘No. Di ousted him from the family business after she found out how he’d hidden our mother’s will.
She still allowed him to stay at the Kashyap townhouse and he’s been there since.
Licking his wounds, I guess. Honestly, I’d be perfectly fine if we never hear from him again. ’
‘How is Siya holding up through all of this?’
‘Di is a creative beast, completely fixated on expanding the business overseas now that she finally has control. She’s been working closely with Dhruv a lot lately.’
‘Dhruv? Your brother?’
‘Stepbrother,’ Kashvi corrected with a hint of impatience.
Maithili sighed. ‘Right. So they are getting along well?’
Kashvi nodded reluctantly. ‘He helped her expose our father’s fraud, and then he backed her new company as an investor too.’
‘And how do you feel about that?’
Kashvi answered as casually as she could, ‘It doesn’t matter to me. If they want to be siblings now, that’s their choice.’
Maithili hummed thoughtfully. ‘When was the last time you saw Dhruv?’
‘At the beach, when Jiju proposed.’
Surprise flickered across Maithili’s face. ‘Oh? He was there? I don’t remember the last time you mentioned him being present for a family event.’
Her remark nudged open a memory Kashvi had kept carefully shut. Dhruv had stood apart from them at the beach, his eyes puffy and red-rimmed. Siya had told her he had taken their father’s betrayal to heart. In an impulsive moment, she had wanted to comfort him, to ease the hollowed look in his eyes.
She had turned away instead.
‘It’s because I hated having him around, so Di never invited him to anything,’ Kashvi said, looking away as a wave of guilt rose within her.
Maithili raised an eyebrow as she noted, ‘You know, in the last eight years, this is the first time you’ve used that word in the past tense. Does that mean you don’t hate him anymore?’
‘No, I…’ Kashvi began, instinctively reaching for denial, but then admitted, ‘I don’t know.’
Maithili leaned back, tapping her pen against the writing pad in her lap. ‘What’s changed?’
She swallowed, fiddling with the tassel on the couch cushion. ‘Di and I always thought that Dhruv had it easier, that Dad actually cared about him. We assumed Dhruv hated us because he saw us as competition.’
‘But?’ Maithili prompted gently.