Shades of Lies ✔ [Completed] #Book1

41. Lost Friendships, Found Roots

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Athulya's POV

Only God knows how many tests I must endure in this life. Yet, I am not one to sit down and weep over it. I've mastered the art of standing up, dusting off the pain, and moving forward. But this time it will be for the people I love.

Still somewhere in the midst of this, a silent yearning echoed within me – a longing for peace, a glimpse of happiness, and the warmth of a loving family.  Will I ever be able to get that? Another wish added to my already eiffel tower size list. I don't even know what a family means, as I've never had one. The people who were supposed to be my family now feel like strangers. If leaving your child, a mere kid, to grow up on its own, learning everything alone is considered a family, then what does living in an orphanage mean?

It was not that ,the card and all their rubbish words erase the vivid memories of the last hours, I spent with Nidhi. It is a guilt in which I am drown and I will never be able to swim out of it, because I don't know how to swim and the lack of a lifeboat made the struggle even more daunting, leaving me stranded in the deep waters of remorse.

Now, I was testing my limits, reaching the end point of my weakness. I wanted to know how weak I could be to emerge that much stronger.

Even my heart is used to switching emotions within seconds, and the mask I am wearing has been on my face for long enough to be more original than my original face. I wonder the day my facade will break down, will people even think it to be real?

If my fate can be hell-bent, then I can be a round tail. No one can mess with Athulya—no one, not even fate. What I have decided will have to happen at any cost. I will fulfill all my wishes myself.

While I was mustering up my courage, picking up my soul, his one reply made me slip again. That reply contained infinite meanings, but I want to know the real one. But maybe, maybe I am not prepared to hear that. I agree upon hating them, but still, imagine getting to know that you lived 18 years with false assurance and lies. Isn't it a tight slap on your face?

"W-What does that mean?" I stammered, my heart pounding in my chest, reluctant to face the unsettling possibilities my mind was hinting at.

"What do you think an Oberoi blood can be like you, never?" The lady whom I used to call mother smirked proudly.

"I-It means your love?" My mask was on the verge of falling now; it was a question about my whole existence.

"Fake," came a nonchalant response from the old man.

"Your promises?" Even my lips were trembling to speak these words.

Although they never gave me love, it was still a question about whatever little love they gave me. All those assurances that I gave to myself about them were going to be proven wrong.

"All lies."

"If everything is a lie, then it means I am a lie as well!" I shouted, slipping down on the ground, closing my ears.

"Yes, dear, everything was a lie—my words, my nature, me, and you. That's how it works." A cruel smile crept over his face as he replied, sending shivers down my spine and invisible tears streaming down my cheeks, even they were afraid to come out in front of fake people.

This was too much to hold; all those years I spent in their lie, started running through my mind. Unable to breathe, I sprinted upwards to the roof, desperately seeking solitude for a while.

Sweat covered my body, despite the cold night. Clutching my hand tightly, I paced around in a state of shock. It means they adopted me. M-My own parents left me. Why?