11 | RED

The color red always meant danger to me.

Until her.

Now, it means surrender.
 Worship. 

Her lips, her blood, her nails—I see red, and I see her.
Not just the hue, but the emotion behind it. 

The way it ignites everything buried beneath my skin.
The way it makes me feel alive.

Before her, 

There was a time I couldn't speak.

Not literally. 

I could form words.
I could answer questions.
I could repeat expectations drilled into me like commandments. 

But I didn't know how to ask for help.
I didn't know how to need without being punished for it.

Because in my house, control wasn't luxury—it was currency.
It was safety.
It was survival.

My father was a man carved from steel.
Sharp with expectations, colder with disappointment. He ran his empire with brutality dressed in precision.
And I? I was his heir—his reflection meant to outshine him, to be better, harder, more ruthless.

I remember being ten, bleeding from the lip after an accidental fall.
I didn't cry.
I didn't dare.

Crying was weakness.
Weakness was ammunition. 

And softness? That was the first thing ripped from you when you entered manhood in the Rajwansha household.

So I built walls. 

Reinforced them with silence.
I watched.
I studied.

I learned early: the one who doesn't flinch wins.

Behind closed doors, when the shouting started, I didn't run.
I didn't scream.
I buried myself beneath the floorboards of my own mind.
I turned off my reactions like a switch.

Control became my shield.
Routine, my religion.
Emotions became weapons I kept sheathed, sharp and unused.

Every minute of my life was scheduled.
Every breath, calculated.
I controlled what I wore, how I walked, how I looked people in the eyes.
I controlled how much water I drank, how many hours I slept. 

It was the only way to feel safe.

Because when you fear chaos, you learn to build walls so thick, even love can't break them.

Then she entered. 

She entered my life like a whisper—and ruined me like a war.

Soft, stubborn, unpredictable, chaos.

Everything I'd been taught to stay away from.
Everything that shouldn't have survived the fortress I built.

But she did.

She laughed in the middle of my tension.
She didn't lean away from my silence—she leaned into it.
Reached across it.
Unafraid.

She questioned me.
She poked holes in my logic with nothing but curiosity.

And worse—she didn't fear me.

That's what undid me the most.

When I tried to control her, she didn't fight.
She stepped away.
Not with rejection.
But with intention. 

And suddenly, I was the one begging.

Not with words.

With need.

She didn't need to raise her voice to command me.
All she had to do was look away.
And the absence of her attention felt more violent than any battlefield.

So I stopped trying to control her.

And I started letting her control me.

Not as weakness.

But as devotion.

୨ৎ

It was late.

She sat cross-legged on the balcony, a silk robe barely hanging from her shoulder, her skin kissed by the moonlight.
A bottle of deep crimson polish rested beside her, the color gleaming like blood and temptation.

She was going to paint her nails.

I watched her with the reverence of a man staring at scripture.

"May I?" I asked.

She raised an eyebrow. "You want to paint them?"

"No," I murmured. "I need to."

Her eyes searched mine for the reason, the desperation in my voice. She handed me the brush without a word.

I took it with the same care I'd take handling a blade meant for a crown ceremony. Like it was sacred.

Her foot rested in my lap. I held it steady.
Her skin was soft.
Fragile. Unscarred. 

Unlike mine.

The first stroke was slow.
Careful. 

A ruby sheen staining her nail, gleaming like a wound made holy.

"This color," I said, voice thick, "used to mean blood to me. Pain. Trauma. Everything I buried."

She didn't interrupt. 

She just listened.

As always. 

"But now... it's power. Yours. And when you wear it, I remember who I belong to. I remember I don't have to keep bleeding to feel."

Her breath caught.
Just slightly. 

But enough.

I kept painting.

Her fingers. 

One by one.

"This isn't about submission," I said. "It's about meaning. You touch me and I remember what it's like to feel. You speak, and I remember I have a heart. You command me—and I finally understand freedom."

She reached out, touching my jaw. 

Just once. 

Light, but grounding.

୨ৎ

I was thirteen when I first saw red that way.

My mother's blood on white tiles.

The shatter of glass.
The sharp edge of a wine bottle.
 A scream that didn't last long enough.

My father didn't flinch. 

He stepped over the mess like it was nothing. 

Like she was nothing.

I did.

I froze. 

Then I ran to her.
 But she stopped me with one blood-streaked hand and whispered, "Don't make him angry."

And then she smiled.

She smiled through it.

Like it was routine.
Like she'd done it before.

And I learned: pain, when dressed in silence, becomes invisible.
Acceptable. Routine.

So I stopped reacting.
I trained my body not to move when struck. 

I survived by never feeling.

Until Meher.

Until she looked at me after an argument and asked, "Why do you breathe like you're apologizing for it?"

That sentence cracked me open.

I wanted to scream.

Instead, I kissed her.

Because how do you explain to someone that you've been empty for so long, you're afraid of drowning in what they make you feel?

୨ৎ

After I finished painting her nails, she sat in silence.
Watching me.
Reading every tremor beneath my skin.

Then she moved.

She climbed into my lap.
Straddled me.
Her thighs bracketing mine.
Her fingers curling around my face.

"You don't have to kneel every time you love me," she whispered.

"I don't kneel out of weakness," I said.

She nodded. "I know. You kneel out of choice."

I swallowed. 

My voice cracked.

"I never had control. I just wore it like armor. I used it to survive."

She touched my chest. "And now?"

"Now, I wear you."

She kissed me then.
Soft and brutal. 

And I shattered. 

Not from the kiss, but from what it meant.

Right there. 

In her arms.
Quiet tears.
No shame.
No hiding. 

Just a man finally allowed to fall.

Her nails, still wet, curled into my shirt like she was trying to stitch me back together.

The scent of polish.
The weight of her.
The sound of my breath echoing against her heartbeat.

And in that moment, I knew something I had never believed:
I had never been powerful.

Not truly.

Not until I gave her the reins.

Because letting her lead didn't make me less.

It made me whole.

It made me free.

୨ৎ

[Past timeline] 

You don't understand what the word please means—
not for me.
Not for a man who's been obeyed his entire life.

I don't request.
I don't negotiate.
I take.

If I want something, it's mine before I finish the sentence.
It's the way my world works.
It's the way I work.

Until her.

......

The Night It Happened

It wasn't even about the fight.
I don't remember the details.
I just remember her walking away—hair swaying, spine straight, not even glancing back.
Like she knew I'd be on my knees before sunrise.

I told myself I wouldn't go to her.

The lie lasted three hours.

I drove to her condo.
Didn't knock. Didn't call.
I never call.

She was on the balcony, barefoot, a glass of wine in her hand like she had all the time in the world.

She didn't look at me.

"Leave," she said softly, eyes still on the city lights.

It shouldn't have mattered.
I could have walked away.
Hell, I should have walked away.

Instead, my chest felt like it was splintering.

I stepped closer.
She stepped back.

That's when the word came out.

Not because I thought it would work.
Not because I knew it would.

But because it was the only thing left between me and losing her forever.

"Please," I said.

One word.
Quiet.
Low.
Deadly with need.

She turned.

Her eyes—God, her eyes—were the kind of storm you don't come back from.
There was no victory in them. No pity either.

Just that knowing.
That terrifying, devastating knowing that she could break me if she wanted to.

I didn't stand tall.
Didn't square my shoulders.

I stepped forward and put my hands on her hips like I was anchoring myself to the only thing keeping me alive.

"Please... forgive me."
"Please... touch me."
"Please... don't leave again."

The words didn't sound like me.
They sounded like a man at the end of himself. 

She didn't speak.
Didn't smile.

She just took my chin in her hand—
tilted my face up to hers like she was inspecting her favorite weapon.

And then she whispered,

"Only you, Aaryan Veer Rajwansha, could make 'please' sound like a threat."

I kissed her then.
Not because she let me.
But because if I didn't, I'd bleed out right there in her arms.

୨ৎ

You think begging makes a man weak.
You're wrong.

Begging, when it's for her, is the most dangerous thing I've ever done.
Because she didn't just hear the word.

She owns it now.
Like she owns my laugh.
My anger.
My soul.

Everything.