The silver frame on the mahogany dresser held a lie: a portrait of Rithvik Singh and Dayana on their wedding day, faces slightly stiff but undeniably joined. They looked like a couple destined by the stars, which, according to their meticulously matched birth charts, they were.
Rithvik stood before the mirror, adjusting the cuff of his shirt for the third time. The perfection of the knot on his tie felt suffocating. Three feet behind him, Dayana was folding laundry, her movements precise, quiet, and utterly distant. The shared space of their bedroom was an ocean, and they were drifting to opposite shores.
"Are you going to the site tomorrow, or the main office?" Dayana asked, her voice flat, devoid of the soft music it used to carry.
"The site first. There's a delay with the zoning permits," Rithvik replied, not turning around. He didn't need to see her face to feel the wall she'd built between them. It was a wall constructed of misinterpretation and his own silent guilt.
He knew what she believed. She thought his quietness, his sudden habit of staring blankly at the streetlights late at night, was because of Amulya. She thought he was grieving the loss of his first love.
She was wrong. He had let Amulya go easily, three months ago, when she admitted she had feelings for Boovan. Their three-year relationship ended with a quiet, mutual acceptance. But that calm broke a week after his marriage to Dayana, when the missed calls from Amulya piled up like accusation.
Then came the news, delivered by his mother in a horrified whisper: Amulya was in the hospital, and his cousin, Ashvin, was in a coma after saving her from an attack. She blamed him. She said if he had just answered the phone, he would have warned her, he would have been there. The burden of that 'what if' had replaced every tender emotion he'd ever held for her with a crippling, stomach-deep guilt.
He finally turned. Dayana was placing his folded shirts in the closet, her back to him. The scent of her jasmine shampoo was a painful lure.
"Dayana," he started, his voice rough.
She flinched almost imperceptibly, but didn't look at him. "Yes, Rithvik?"
"We need to talk."
She closed the closet door, finally facing him. Her expression was neutral, practiced. "About what? The monthly budget? I've balanced it."
"Not about the house," he said, taking a step toward her. "About us."
She took a slow, deliberate step back, shaking her head. "There is nothing to talk about, Rithvik. We are married. The papers are signed, the families are satisfied, and the stars are aligned. What else is there?"
Her passive rejection was a physical blow. He wanted to grab her, to shake the delusion out of her, to scream that the only reason he couldn't breathe some days was because she was pulling away, not because he missed a ghost.
How could he tell her the truth?
'I'm distracted because my ex-girlfriend, who I don't love, blames me for the sexual assault she survived, which resulted in my cousin being in a coma, and I feel responsible, but I can't tell you because you'll think I still care for her, which I don't, I only care for you, but I look so guilty I can't convince you otherwise.'
The confession would sound insane. It would make his world of secrets even larger. He couldn't risk her leaving him—the thought was a sudden, chilling terror.
"There's… there's this distance," he managed, his voice dropping to a plea.
Dayana's eyes finally met his, and he saw the deep, familiar ache there, the one she fought so hard to conceal.
"That distance, Rithvik," she said, her voice dropping to a raw whisper that sliced through the quiet room, "is me protecting myself. I know you had a great love. I know I am the good fortune you had to take. I can accept that. But I won't stand here and wait for you to choose her memory over me every single day. I can't."
Tears welled in her eyes, but she blinked them back, refusing to cry in front of him. She took another step toward the door.
Rithvik felt panic rising. He had to stop her. "Dayana, please. It's not what you think. I haven't thought of Amulya that way since the wedding. My heart is here. My life is here. You are my life."
She gave a small, sad smile that contained more resignation than relief. "I wish I could believe that. I really, truly do."
Before he could bridge the final gap between them, she slipped past him and opened the door.
"Good night, Rithvik."
And just like that, the lie in the silver frame remained, while the truth of their broken hearts walked out the room.