The One my heart chooses

It was near midnight kaaya hadn't return home. Akaay pacing home with worry. Kriya, "What happened? Why so much worry? What's bothering you?" "Kaaya has not returned. She and Nimish went somewhere after hearing, she should be back by now, what's taking her so long? I hope he doesn't hurt again." Kriya didn't respond and went straight to balcony. The night was quiet, too quiet for the storm inside Kriya’s heart. She stood at the balcony, arms folded tightly, waiting.

Akaay walked up, sensing trouble even before she spoke.

“Akaay… we need to talk,” she said, her voice trembling. He nodded, bracing himself. "Not now. We'll have a word once kaaya return." 

Kaaya returned home after meeting Nimish. When she returned she saw Akaay and Kriya having some conversation. She just spoke, "I'm home, going to sleep."

Kriya swallowed her fear. “Now can we talk?" Akaay nodded with yes. "Do you love her? Do you love Kaaya?” The question hit him like lightning. He didn’t answer and that silence was louder than any confession.

Kriya’s breath shook. “I see you… every time she’s around. The way your eyes soften… how you rush to her before anyone else. I’m not blind, Akaay.”

Akaay finally looked at her pain etched in his eyes. “Kriya… I love you. I do. But…” "But... What Akaay? His voice cracked. “Whenever I try to imagine a future… Kaaya is always there. At the end of every dream… every thought.”

A tear escaped Kriya’s eye. “So I’m what? The filler before your fate leads you to her?”

“No!” he grabbed her hands desperately.

“You are someone I chose. But Kaaya…”

He exhaled like he was confessing a sin.

“She feels like someone the universe chose for me.” Kriya’s heart shattered silently.

“So what does that make me, Akaay?”

“Someone you settle for?” He closed his eyes, fighting his own torment. 

“I wish I could change it. I wish I didn’t feel this… connection… this pull. It’s like God made sure she’d be in every chapter of my life whether I want her to be or not. Even when she wasn't with me for more than 2 years now at every hard times in my life I feel protected by unknown and I knew it was her, her prayers.”

Kriya stepped back, hurt rising like fire in her throat.

“And what about me? My love? My efforts? The way I’ve stood by you?” Akaay’s voice softened, aching. “I feel lucky because you love me… and cursed because I can’t give you all of me.”

Silence lingered heavy and cruel.

Kriya wiped her tears, but her voice steadied. “You know what hurts? Not that you love her… but that you love me too. And yet, I’m the one who will always come second to destiny.”

Akaay’s eyes burned. “No. You always come first. I don’t want to lose you.”

“You already have,” she whispered.

“Not because Kaaya is your destiny…

but because you never fought to make me yours.” Kriya froze, stunned by Akaay’s silence but he wasn’t silent anymore.

Something inside him a pain long buried finally snapped.

“You talk about how you stood by me…”

His voice was low, trembling, eyes burning with a truth he had locked away for years.

“But do you remember the day you left?”

Kriya looked away, guilt flooding her face.

“You promised me forever, Kriya,” he continued, each word sharper than the last.

“You said no matter what, we’d fight for each other. And then one morning… you were just gone.” His jaw tightened. “No explanation. No goodbye. Just silence.”

Kriya blinked back tears. “Akaay.....”

“You broke me.” His hands shook. “You shattered every belief I had in love. I tried hating you. I tried moving on. But when you came back… I couldn’t push you away.”

He laughed bitterly, wiping his eyes.

“I loved you so much, I destroyed myself just to keep you.”

Kriya stepped closer but he stepped back.

“And then…” his voice softened into something fragile, something sacred, "…Kaaya walked into my life.”

A pause.

A name that carried more weight than the world.

“She didn’t fix me. She didn’t even try.” “She just existed… and suddenly I wasn’t drowning anymore. I claimed to love her. Unknowingly I brought you up at many occasions. I talked so highly of you that she started to think I was finding you in her. And why won't she the standing resemblance you guys have. I don't know Kriya, she gave me your comfort and her protection. I was so high on us I didn't protect my connection with her, she left. I reconciled and that time I wanted to keep her in everything. But destiny had something else. She left me, unshaken, knowing I needed her the most. She broke me completely. The girl to whom I opened my worst fears, my insecurities did the same to me. She, love became my fear. Yet when you came back I believed in us... I had told Kaaya I would never see your face kriya but I love you to forget the fact you broke my heart, you just didn't cheated on me, you turned my world upside down and so did she.”

Kriya swallowed a sob.

“And at my birthday… you saw her again.”

Akaay nodded, emotion choking him. “Yes. The moment she walked with that smile, those eyes…” He placed a hand on his chest, as if steadying a wild heart. “I realized I could never hate her. Not even if I tried. She’s… something I can’t turn away from.”

"What is so great about her Akaay? Did she see your dark side and stood by your side. You were afraid to stay your true version in front of her fearing she would leave you, weren't you? And she did the exact same thing. You opened your worst fears to her and she did the same to you. She left you hanging all by yourself and still you say she's a divine protection?"

He looked at Kriya with devastating honesty. “So you ask why she’s in every dream?” “Because she’s the only one my soul, I never  learned to live without and I don't know how. Yes I was afraid to show her my dark self not because I was afraid she'll leave me or maybe I was somewhere. But the main reason to kept it hidden was I didn't want her to consume my worst, my darkness, all I want for her is my best. I was ready to become my best. I scared her. She was just little girl at heart, wasn't ready maybe. But look at her now, when Nimish broke her with words she still showed up. She saw him beyond his words, she looked into his soul which I once craved for. Even today she judges me but she understands me the most.”

Those words hung in the air like a final judgment.

Kriya wiped her tears with shaking hands. “So where does that leave me?” she whispered.

Akaay closed his eyes as though choosing an answer would tear him apart. “It leaves you as the woman I love…” He opened his eyes and the ache in them could destroy everything. “…and Kaaya as the woman I’ll always be in love with.”

There it was.

The cruelest truth of all.

Kriya walking away slowly, each step heavier than the last. Akaay stood frozen torn between the love he promised…

and the love he couldn’t escape.

In the end, he whispered into the empty night: “If loving her is fate… then breaking you is the price I never wanted to pay Kriya.”

After Kriya left the terrace, the night swallowed Akaay whole.

He stood there, gripping the railing as though it was the only thing keeping him from falling apart. The rain began, slow at first then violently, matching the chaos inside him.

He pressed both hands to his face, choking on grief.“How do I love two people…” His voice cracked into the storm, “…without breaking all three of us? What does my heart wants... the other day when we were watching Rockstar why did I imagine Kaaya and me in the hugging scene of Ranbir and Nargis... why was it her and not Kriya... ” He sank to his knees, drenched and trembling. He said in resentment remembering his conversation with Sanika, "Sanu, I tried letting kaaya live her life. But why I'm not at peace? Why do I want so badly to be in her canvas?" His heart pulled in two directions one by a love he had fought for, another by a love the universe refused to let him forget. He sobbed silently, painfully wishing love wasn’t the weapon that hurt them all.

Meanwhile, Kriya walked straight to Kaaya’s room.

Kaaya looked up, immediately sensing the storm Kriya carried inside her. “No matter what happened… I’m always here,” Kaaya said quietly gesturing her hands for a hug.

Kriya broke. She collapsed into Kaaya’s arms crying fiercely, painfully.

“I know he loves you…” Kriya whispered, voice trembling. “And I hate that it hurts but I don’t hate you. I can’t.”

Kaaya held her, stunned but soft. “I wish I could have said the same. I hated you, cursed you until I met you. After becoming your friend seeing you two together I always prayed for you guys to be together. I never wanted this,” she whispered. “I never wanted to be the reason you cried.”

Kriya wiped her tears, forcing a sad smile. “But I was the reason you cried, right? You’re the only one who understands what I’m losing…” “…because a part of you once lost him too.”

Kaaya’s eyes glistened. Neither of them chose this pain.

“He loves you,” Kaaya whispered. “And he’s trying his best to hold on. When you left him he had went into a shell. Feared of love, commitments, care everything. Every day he would walked by your house to know why you left him knowing you weren't in the city to answer him. You know once we were arguing he took your name, that was the first time in my life I had panic attack. I just knew in my gut he loves you. He said he hated you and drive over you if he sees you but I know he would never. I had called him few months after we separated and he spoke it wasn't a needed conversation and I was convinced he's long gone, he is. It's just that he wants to have what he had not when we were together. He wants to restore the perfect picture. Give him time Kriya.”

Kriya leaned her head on Kaaya’s shoulder, exhausted. “I just… don’t want to fight a battle I’ve already lost.”

Kaaya took her hand, firm and warm. “You haven’t lost anything,” she said. “Love isn’t a competition. And his heart has room for both pains and both loves.”

Kriya let out a trembling breath. And what does your heart wants? Kaaya smiled, "Someone who has fall for my soul, whose face appears when I see the moon reminding me of the calm he has brought... The radiance brings smiles on my face. The one who sees within me and whose love feels like sparkling ocean. And lastly who's love is not transient. And that someone is Nimish..."

“You’ll help me stay strong?” she asked softly. Will you protect me from myself? Will you offer me same prayer, strength and protection you have had for Akaay?"

Kaaya nodded. “I’ll help you stay… even if I’m the reason you want to run.”

They hugged tighter two women connected by loyalty, heartbreak, and the same man’s love. Slowly both girl went to sleep crying their hearts out.

Neither was the villain.

Neither was the victor.

They were simply human and hurting.

05/11/2025