Where she was going, she didn't know.
Why she was going, she didn't care.
Everything blurred — the streetlights, the honks, the stares. It was like her body moved, but her soul had stayed back at that dining table, shattered between a spoon of pulao and a sentence she never deserved to hear.
Barefoot on the pavement, Meher walked blindly through the Bangalore streets. The once-familiar city now looked foreign, colder... crueler.
Auto-rickshaws whizzed past, men yelled on phones, someone brushed her shoulder and didn't even turn to apologize.
"Pagal hai kya?" a biker muttered when she crossed without looking.
Maybe she was.
Maybe pain made you a little mad when it had nowhere else to go.
The honking of cars was deafening. Her hair stuck to her face with sweat and tears. Still, she walked. Eyes unfocused. Heart broken. Feet aching.
She wasn't even sure what she wanted — a place to cry, someone to hug her, or just... silence.
Anything but that house.
Anything but those voices.
Anything but that reminder that she was unwanted.
"Beta?" a chaiwala asked gently, seeing her state. "Are you okay?"
She blinked at him, as if hearing a human voice for the first time in hours. But her throat couldn't form words.
She just turned away again.
Walked.
Until the noise of the world became a distant hum.
Until she felt too empty to feel anything else.
......
She didn't even realize she had stepped off the pavement.
The world was just noise.
And then — a sudden blinding light, a loud honk, a screech of tires.
THUD.
The car barely touched her, but that was enough. Her tired, starved, and shaken body gave up right there — and Meher collapsed, unconscious, in the middle of the road.
A crowd gathered instantly.
"Arre, kya ho gaya?"
"Gaadi ne maar diya kya?"
"Zinda hai kya ladki?"
The car came to a screeching halt, just inches away from hitting her fully.
From the backseat, Justice Vikram Malhotra — retired judge, dignified, calm even in chaos — opened the door and stepped out.
"What happened?" he asked sharply.
His driver, clearly panicked, pointed toward the ground.
"Sir... she... she just came out of nowhere! I swear I hit the brakes in time! She just fainted—she didn't even look around!"
Justice Malhotra walked ahead, parting through the crowd, and froze when he saw her.
A girl, not more than her early twenties.
Barefoot.
Tear-stained face.
Her hair was messy, half sticking to her cheeks, half flying with the wind.
And her hands were trembling slightly, even in unconsciousness.
For a second, he couldn't move.
She looked... broken.
Truly, achingly broken.
"Miss?" he said, kneeling beside her, shaking her gently. "Can you hear me?"
No response.
His fingers went to her wrist — a weak, irregular pulse.
"Quick, open the backseat," he ordered the driver. "We don't have time to wait for an ambulance."
"But sir, the police—"
"She's a girl in need, not a criminal. Move!"
Without another word, he lifted her carefully in his arms, holding her like one would a wounded bird, and settled her in the backseat with utmost care.
"City Hospital,"
he said urgently as he got in. "Drive fast. And carefully."
The driver nodded, and the car sped away.
Back on the road, the murmurs faded. The crowd dispersed.
But inside the car, Vikram Malhotra kept looking at the unconscious girl beside him.
Something about her tugged at him.
He didn't know her name.
He didn't know her story.
But what he did know was — fate had placed her in his path for a reason.
And maybe... just maybe... this broken girl was meant to cross paths with his family.
....
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