🖤 The Monster Inside Me 🖤 - Chapter 2 [“He thought he was a monster—until she looked into his darkness and chose to stay.”]
Chapter 2: The Pact
Rain still tapped against the window like a ticking clock counting down to something inevitable.
Aditi sat cross-legged on the floor, holding a cup of chai. Aditya sat opposite her, wrapped in the oversized T-shirt she’d given him. His eyes wandered, restless, as if they were searching for exits even where none existed.
He hadn’t said a word in ten minutes.
Neither had she.
It wasn’t awkward. It was loud — loud with unsaid thoughts, loud with the tension of two strangers who already knew too much about each other’s darkness.
“So,” she finally spoke, “you believe there’s a monster under your bed.”
Aditya didn’t look up. “I don’t believe. I know.”
She leaned forward. “Then let’s deal with it. Together.”
His eyes snapped to hers, suspicious. “Why?”
“Because” she said with brutal honesty, “I don’t think you’re trying to write a book. I think you’re trying to survive one.”
He blinked. Once. Twice. Then, a whisper — “You’re not wrong.”
Aditi stood up and grabbed a notebook.
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” she said, as if drawing battle plans. “No fake characters. No twisted metaphors. I want truth. Brutal, raw, ugly truth. And in return, I’ll help you shape it — not into a bestseller, but into something that makes sense to you.”
He frowned. “And what do you get out of this?”
She shrugged. “Maybe I’m tired of editing lies.”
✍️ The Pact:
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Rule One: No lies. Even the unspeakable ones must be said.
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Rule Two: If either of them wants to walk away, they can.
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Rule Three: No romantic distractions. This is not a love story.
(They didn’t realize how badly they’d break Rule Three.)
The days that followed were strange.
Aditya would show up at odd hours — sometimes 7 a.m., sometimes past midnight. He never knocked twice. He’d walk in, sit down, and start talking.
He didn’t tell stories.
He bled them.
“I was twelve when I first heard the voice.”
“My mother never forgave me for being born.”
“I watched someone die once… and I did nothing.”
Aditi recorded everything.
She never gasped. Never pitied. Never interrupted.
She just listened — the way a drowning man needs someone to breathe with him, not for him.
And slowly, he began to change.
He started bringing her coffee. He started noticing the tiny things — the cracked frame near her desk, the chipped blue nail paint she never bothered removing, the way she always checked the locks three times before sleeping.
One evening, she asked, “What do you see when you look in the mirror?”
He didn’t hesitate.
“The monster.”
Then, softer — “But these days… I think he’s getting tired.”
⚡ One Night:
She was scribbling edits; glasses perched on her nose.
Aditya was lying on the floor, eyes closed.
“You’re going to fall asleep there,” she warned.
“I don’t sleep,” he replied. “Not really. I close my eyes and wait for the screaming to stop.”
She turned to him. “What if I told you... it stops faster when someone stays?”
He didn’t open his eyes. But his breathing changed.
He heard her.
By the end of the week, the manuscript had taken shape. It wasn’t a thriller. It was a memoir disguised as fiction. A confession disguised as a story. It was him on every page.
But something was changing. Not just in the manuscript. In them.
A warmth. A gravity.
The monster, it seemed, wasn’t just hiding under the bed anymore.
It was inching closer.
And so were they.
Chapter 6 - https://kvs302.blogspot.com/2025/07/monster-inside-me-chapter-6-last.html
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