Aarvi Andrews - the girl of great values

After reading all the notifications Ali smiled happily and looked at the workaholic gothic girl fiddling with the pen and papers around the desk.

'She's a villainess too huh. Well, she sure looks the part.' Ali said and coughed and looked away, as she suddenly looked up to meet his gaze again.

"She's scary." Ali said slowly as he saw her leaving.

"I'll go back too." He said and stood up to leave, hoping to have a little conversation with the villainess.

"Wait.." Aarvi ended up shouting as she saw him leave.

"Yes," Ali said as he turned around and frowned when he saw Aarvi walking towards him.

"You're bleeding." Aarvi said pointing at his chest.

Ali looked down and noticed a red stain over his white shirt. The cut he got from Kevin's knife a few days back, had opened again and was leaking blood.

'That bastard… .." Ali cursed as he remembered that this was probably due to Kevin, who caused it when he pushed him away earlier.

Kevin probably wanted to check if Ali was really injured, or this guy was someone else and not the one he stabbed. But when he pushed Ali, he probably felt the cut and bandages so he didn't create a bigger drama and just left.

"Sit, I have a med kit." Aarvi said and walked towards the wooden drawers.

"Naah, I'm fine. I'll just ask Emily to change the bandages at home. Don't worry about it." Ali raised his hand and stopped her.

The system had healed the main injury of his, and it was only a shallow cut that the doctors operated and sutured, so this little bleeding didn't really hurt him.

"Ali, sit." Aarvi said sternly, pulling a box of first aid kit.

"I told you I'm fine. I have something back at home, so I gotta leave."

Hearing the words and seeing him, hoping to leave in a hurry, Aarvi sighed and stood in front of him. "Are you ignoring me?"

"I'm literally standing in front of you." Ali said with a smile, but Aarvi's face just turned even more serious, as her small eyes behind the big round glasses glared at him. "You know what I mean."

"Are you angry at me, for that night? For stopping you from killing him?" Aarvi said seriously, but Ali just shook his head.

"You're overthinking it,..."

"Am I? We haven't had a single normal conversation that didn't end in one or two lines, in the past three days. When was the last time this happened?" Aarvi said as her voice turned a little softer at the end.

"I was hurt, and resting in the hospital for two days. They don't count." Ali joked with a smile, but Aarvi just gave him a silent look, and he gave up. "Look, just forget it, ok. You just signed the deal you were waiting for. Go and celebrate with your friends, or work even harder for the next project. I'm _…"

"Don't change the topic, Ali." Aarvi interrupted and spoke again. "Just tell me the truth."

Seeing her being persistent, Ali gave up and massaged his head.

"What do you want to know, Aarvi? Huh, that if I'm angry that you sided with the killer of my best friend? That I was stabbed, and nearly died because of you? Cause I am." Ali said honestly, his voice getting colder as he remembered the previous events. "I can't just forget it."

Hearing him Aarvi stepped forward and placed her hands over his shoulder, "I didn't side with him, I just_ just didn't want you to turn into a killer. To do something you'd regret for the rest of your life. I didn't want that."

"And what makes you think __ that I'm not a killer already." Ali said and took her hands away.

"Ali…"

"The families we're born into, the money we use, the markets that are waiting for us to inherit, those things aren't clean, Aarvi. They weren't formed over smiles, sweets and flower petals. They were built over the crying, cursing sounds of someone spitting blood." Ali said talking about the businesses their parents raised over the years.

"That's different. That's business. Someone's loss is someone else's gain. But taking a life, it's not right." Aarvi replied.

"Right, what a joke." Ali said and snorted coldly. "Justice, police - they're right, right? Then tell me, what did they do? It's been three days and he's roaming out here freely, just cause there's no proof. Well guess what, I don't need proof. I'll bring him my own justice."

"Killing him is not the answer, Ali. It won't bring him back. Shiva, he wouldn't want you to ruin your life like this." Aarvi said, trying to convince him to give up on this murderous revenge.

But Ali just felt her words and views were too naive. Too different. So he just scoffed at her high sounding words.

"You weren't there Aarvi, I was. I can still see Shiva's face when I close my eyes. That image, when that bastard pushed him, that scene_ that had played in my mind for hundreds of times, and every time it just ends with the self loathing about why I didn't do anything to stop it. Or what I could've done differently to change it. B_But…" Ali spoke, his voice getting heavier as his eyes turned a little misty when he mentioned everything.

Aarvi came forward and hugged him. But Ali just took a deep breath and added on.

"I am going to kill him, Aarvi. Maybe not today. Not tomorrow. May even take a while. But I will kill him, and no one's gonna stop it. Not even you."

Ali finished his words and left the room. While Aarvi just stood there staring at his back.

She took a deep breath to calm her worried heart and walked back to her seat. Staring at her childhood photo at the table where Ali stood behind her and had his fingers over her head, like little horns. There was a smile on his face, a gentle, kind and happy smile.

'Why _why did you change so much, Ali?'

They had known each other since they were eight. And now it's been well over a decade, but everything's changed.

The boy she considered as her friend ended up falling in love with her. And when she finally got over this weird game of ignoring his expectations and hopes, this happens.

The guy who wouldn't eat meat as a kid, cause he was too afraid to hurt a chicken, turns around and says he wants to kill someone now.

Morales, such a weird thing to have. If you don't have them, you're just a beast. But if you do, then one day you're gonna come across this situation where you gotta lose something or everything, just to keep those morals alive.

For Aarvi the value of friendship today was just opposite her value of life and the morals she grew up with, and she had to make a choice, or lose both.

'Why can't everything be as simple as it was in our childhood, Ali. Why can't things go back to the way they were.' Aarvi said and glanced at the picture book where she noticed a photo of three simple kids just playing around happily - Ali, Aarvi and Liv.

[Ding Ting]

[Liv - Stay away from him, you lying bitch.]

Aarvi read the message and frowned feeling confused, but then her eyes moved to the second notification which was a message from her brother and she understood everything.

Giving a helpless laugh to herself, she just sighed and closed her eyes. 'Guess I'll just lose everything at the end, won't I?'