FF: ArHi: Perfectly Imperfect::COMPLETE - Page 29

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Authors Note: Thank you all for the wonderful comments and likes ' PM's will be sent to those who buddy me, I'm sorry but I don't know any other way, and comments are what keep this fic going so do take a minute to comment if you like it.

As you all know by now this is a song based ficlet and the song for this chapter is '

I am using the Gavin DeGraw cover though

      Enjoy!!

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Chapter - Twelve

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Six months ago

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How can I just let you walk away,
just let you leave without a trace
When I stand here taking every breath with you, ooh

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Arnav Singh Raizada was not mad.

No'mad was such a tame term.

He was bloody furious.

And that was actually a little strange considering not hours ago he'd been sleeping like a baby after having finally told the woman he loved - that he loved her.

He'd expected to wake up to butterfly kisses, and breakfast in bed, promises of how he would cut down on his overseas flights, and plans of the cricket team Khushi had once threatened they'd end up with.

Obviously, since he was standing half way around the world on his ex-fiance's doorstep the breakfast in bed hadn't happened.

No instead he'd woken up to a half-empty bed and a ridiculous letter on his study table, complete with divorce papers. Signed divorce papers none the less.

And yet still that was not what had pissed him off so royally.

The letter was obviously a pathetic attempt on her part to make him resent her, which was actually glaringly obvious, as she only used the 'ji' after his name when he wanted to piss him off or when she anticipated that something she would say or do would effectively piss him off anyway.

No, what had him racked up in such a state was the fact that she obviously expected him to fall for it.

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You're the only one who really knew me at all

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"Where the hell is she?" snapped Arnav in a low brutal voice.

Unfortunately for him this was obviously not going to be one of his better days as the recipient of his cold rage instead of meekly answering or jumping in fear, to one look at him and - squealed.

Yes squealed.

As in like Babe the pig.

"ASR?! Oh my god you should have called!" cried Lavanya, her voice tinged with surprise and the tiniest bit of awkwardness.

Well, he thought to himself, if she was idiotic enough to be hiding his wife from him, he'd make her a damn sight more than 'awkward' in just a moment.

"Where is she?" he bit out.

But, first he just needed to see Khushi.

But as if she had heard his very thoughts, Lavanya's joyful countenance soon mirrored a worried surprise that terrified him, No, she couldn't not know.

"Who?"

Andjust like that, just one tiny word finally taught Arnav Singh Raizada, the man,  what it meant to truly be afraid, as he had been taught once before, only then as a child.

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How can you just walk away from me,
when all I can do is watch you leave
Cos we've shared the laughter and the pain,
and even shared the tears

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The next six months of Arnav's life passed in a haze.

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You're the only one who really knew me at all

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In the beginning the anger had tided him over.

He'd been able to convince himself that he didn't care. That if she wanted to walk away from him he was bloody well fine with it. He wouldn't run begging after her, like a lost puppy.

Not that that kept him from putting an agency of detectives on her trail.

He simply wanted to know where she was so he could give her a piece of his mind.

A month after that he stopped pretending he was angry, and admitted, at least in the sanctuary of his own mind that he just wanted to know that she was okay.

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So take a look at me now,
'cos there's just an empty space
And there's nothing left here to remind me,
just the memory of your face

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Two weeks after that he stopped pretending even that.

Locked up for hours on end in his shrine of a room, he waited, for one of any of the number of detectives he'd hired to provide him with a more substantial lead than-  she's still in the country, sir.

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So take a look at me now,
'cos there's just an empty space
And there's nothing left here to remind me,
just the memory of your face

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One week later he was in Lucknow, having dropped by unannounced hoping to scare some information out of the community that his minions had failed to.

What then began to chill him with a deep-rooted fear ... was not that he'd failed yet again, but that if her people were to be believed, she hadn't been here.

At all.

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Take a look at me now,
'cos there's just an empty space
And you coming back to me
is against all odds and that's what I've got to face

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Three months later, there was still no trace of her.

There was no trace of him either.

ASR ' Arnav Singh Raizada, as the world had known him, had ceased to exist.

No longer did he force himself to go stare out of his office window.

No longer did he hound the detectives with question after question after question.

No longer did he send outrageous donations to all her favorite deity temples.

No longer did he secretly pray to all her gods that she come back to him.

After five months of following every lead no matter how outrageous, he finally began to come to terms with the truth the detective's incompetence provided proof of.

She didn't want to be found.

Not by him.

After all he'd failed to be there for; after all he'd failed to do, that night, that whispered confession must seem like much too little...and definitely much too late.

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I wish I could just make you turn around,
turn around and see me cry
There's so much I need to say to you,
so many reasons why

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She still cried herself to sleep.

Almost six months away from him, and she could still smell him, still hear him, still long for him.

Still wish that she could be the one to love him.

The one to give him everything in the world, everything he deserved.

But Khushi Kumari Raizada didn't get to wish on stars anymore.

No star could fix her anymore.

The truth was unalterable ... she was no longer would be able to be even just almost perfect for him.

Not anymore.

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You're the only one who really knew me at all

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Six months.

Three days.

Eighteen hours.

Apparently being blind drunk didn't affect Arnav Singh Raizada's ability to count.

It did however do wonders to his defensive walls.

Which was probably why a particular letter, with a particular detective agency's address on it, still remained unopened on the surface of his mahogany study table, which was now home to no less than five bottles of very expensive scotch.

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Take a good look at me now,
'cos I'll still be standing here
And you coming back to me is against all odds
That's the chance I've got to take, oh, oho

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A wise man once said ... courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the realization that something else is more important.

Arnav Singh Raizada had no such realization.

Then again he never really needed it.

He had knowledge.

He knew, you see, that no matter what was put on the other side of the scale, the side where even the faintest trace of Khushi hid snugly in the folds of the detective agencies ostentatious letterhead, would always be heavier.

And hence mere hours later, in the absence of his helicopter which he had recklessly crashed when he had flown it while under the influence, not two months ago he used two shots of Turkish black coffee to steady his nerves before he took one of his fastest cars.

Shimla it seemed was hiding something from him.

And he wanted it back.

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Just take a look at me now.

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