“She’s deep asleep. Won’t be up until the morning.” He cupped the side of her head and directed it to lean on his shoulder, unwilling to hear more excuses.
“Bugs?” he heard her mumble after a moment.
“Hmm?”
“Please don’t embarrass me in public again. Harish did that too, and I hated it. I hated it tonight even more than before.”
Nose buried in her hair, he breathed her in, the gentle request hurting him anew. “Never again,” he vowed in a whisper. “Not in public, not in private.”
Her body loosened considerably with his promise, her weight resting against him. If he thought to say anything else, it was lost to confusion when the first scenes of the movie played on screen.
“It's a Christmas movie,” Rian complained.
“So?”
“We’re in the middle of October, Doc.”
“I love Christmassy things,” she declared.
His brows rose. She came from a fairly traditional Hindu South Indian family so this new piece of information surprised him.
“You celebrate Christmas?”
“Never had the opportunity, but look how pretty!” she whined, pointing towards the TV. She sighed, a content sort of sound. “I love all festivals. It’s just another reason to be happy. When I have my own home someday, I’ll put up a tree, decorations, the works. I’ll celebrate Christmas just like Diwali or Eid or Navratri.”
Rian’s eyes swept his apartment, picturing Christmas lights everywhere, a lit up tree in the corner near the windows, and him on the couch, dressed in a silly Christmas pyjama, cuddled with a woman wearing a matching set.
He glanced down just as Aditi looked up. Warm brown eyes met steel grey ones, setting his heart galloping within his chest.
Aditi. Christmas. With him. Together.
“In the meantime,” Aditi grinned, utterly oblivious that he was close to fainting from pure shock, “I figure there is never a bad time to watch the villain learn his lesson and become a hero.”
So, somewhere between the Grinch making his plan to steal Christmas and standing atop the snowy cliff, watching the village of Whos singing, Aditi fell asleep.
As the Grinch's heart grew three sizes bigger, Rian pulled the thick blanket over the woman next to him and stroked her hair, understanding just how powerful one sweet girl could be to thaw the ice around a grumpy Grinch's heart.
21
Rian, the Wrecking Ball
Aditi
“Are you done yet?”
Aditi glanced up from her conversation, startled to find Rian standing next to her table, his lips drawn in a severe line. Granted it was his restaurant, and his presence wasn’t entirely a surprise. And shehadbeen thinking about him all evening. She simply couldn’t figure out why he looked like she’d taken his favourite toy away.
“Rian?”
“We should go home. Nanamma sounds ill.”
Her gaze swung across towards her date, her surprise turning into an awkward embarrassment when Rian continued to ignore his presence.
If someone had told Aditi that she’d be on a date with a man who had stood her up once, and would be enjoying herself, she’d have called them crazy. But when Tarun Nair had messaged her thatafternoon, apologising for having missed their matrimonial meet and asking for another chance, she had agreed.
Nina had been there with her judgy eyes, shaking her head when Aditi had stubbornly insisted upon continuing with the arranged dates. After all, one kiss with Rian and a situationship that sometimes felt real did not mean anything in the long run.
A kiss, a situationship, and a blissful night spent sleeping in his arms.