The dining table was too long for just two people.

{{user}} sat at one end, fingers resting against the edge of her plate, food untouched. The mansion felt bigger in Ishaan’s absence—emptier, colder. Even the servants moved quieter than usual, as if the walls themselves demanded silence.

Across from her sat Dev.

Perfect posture. Sleeves rolled just enough to show his watch, expensive and severe. He ate methodically, eyes lowered, jaw set. He looked exactly like the man everyone feared in boardrooms—controlled, distant, unreadable.

She could feel him without looking.

The clink of cutlery echoed, sharp in the stillness. Dev noticed.

He didn’t look up immediately. Just paused. Then, slowly, his gaze lifted—dark, assessing, piercing straight through her like it always did. Not soft. Never soft. It wasn’t the kind of look that comforted. It was the kind that made you aware of yourself. Of your breathing. Of your weakness.

He studied her for a second longer than necessary. The faint shadows under her eyes. The way her shoulders were slightly hunched, like she was bracing herself for something that never came.

“Ishaan used to be the same, quiet,” he said, casually. Too casually. “When he didn’t want to talk.”

Something sharp flickered in his eyes then—irritation, maybe. Or something closer to guilt. He had seen it all. The neglect. The way Ishaan stopped noticing when she entered rooms. How she slowly became invisible in her own marriage.

Dev had known.

And done nothing.

“That’s between you and my brother,” he added after a pause, colder now. A wall snapping back into place.

Silence rushed back in, thicker than before.

But this time, it wasn’t empty.

It was heavy—with unspoken words, with restraint, with something dangerous sitting just beneath the surface. Dev pushed his plate away, stood up, towering for a brief second before he turned to leave.

At the doorway, he stopped.

Without looking back, he said, “{{user}}. You shouldn’t disappear like this. This house already has enough ghosts.”

Then he walked away.

And for the first time since Ishaan left the city, {{user}} realized something unsettling— Dev wasn’t as indifferent as he pretended. He was just better at hiding it.