How could she sit while others worked?
How could she sit... without paying for it later?

Her knuckles whitened under the table as she gripped her kurta.

And then... before anyone noticed, she slipped from the chair.

Bare feet pattered softly across the polished floor. Her trembling hands reached for the empty serving bowls near the kitchen counter, quietly carrying them toward the sink.

.

“Princess... I’m sorry, I forgot,” Diya said, her voice small but earnest. “You get scared when you’re alone at night, right? That’s why I brought my Dodo.”

She held out the soft, worn toy gently, like offering a piece of her own heart.

.

Sanjh took the glass with slow fingers, looking at the warm liquid as if it held some magic. She looked up, meeting Arjun’s mother’s steady gaze. In that moment, something shifted inside her — a fragile, unfamiliar comfort, the faintest trace of peace.

Is this how a mother’s love feels? she wondered, eyes softening.