Chapter 16: Session 13 – Restricted

POV: Aarav (Therapy Session �" Confidential)

> Transcript marked PRIVATE by Dr. Rehm. Not for clinical release.

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The recorder clicks on.
Aarav doesn’t speak. He just stares at the far wall �" not the doctor, not the window, not the clock ticking behind them.

Dr. Rehm waits. The silence grows heavy.

> “You said you wanted to go back further,” Rehm says gently.

> Aarav nods once.

> “Before Kiara. Before Meera. Even before therapy.”

A beat. Then Aarav speaks.

> “Her name was Sanya.”

---

His voice doesn’t crack. But it doesn’t hold steady either. It walks a wire.

> “She was... soft in a way that made people think she couldn’t fight. But she could. And she did �" just not loud enough for anyone to hear.”

> “Vivaan liked her. In that way where liking something meant controlling it. Owning it.”

Dr. Rehm doesn’t interrupt.

> “They were never dating. She was too smart for that. But she admired him. Everyone did. That was his weapon.”

> “He invited her to one of his private retreats �" design brainstorming, he called it. She asked me if it was safe. I told her it was just Vivaan being theatrical.”

> “She came back… different.”

---

> “I asked her what happened. She said, ‘Your brother collects women like ideas. When they stop being useful, he files them under fiction.’”

Aarav’s hands tremble now.

> “I laughed. I said she was being dramatic. That Vivaan was manipulative, yes, but not dangerous.”

> “She didn’t argue. She just left.”
> “That was the last time I saw her.”
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> “Weeks later, someone told me she’d dropped out. Another said she moved abroad. One girl whispered, ‘Sanya tried to file something against someone... but it got buried.’”

> “I never asked more.”

> “Because if I did... I’d have to believe her.”
---

The room is still. Only the faint hum of the recorder.

> “I saw the bruises. Small ones. Inner arm. Back of her neck. But she smiled like she was fine. And I needed to believe that.”

> “I needed to believe my brother wasn’t that man.”

---

Dr. Rehm leans forward, his voice quiet.

> “And now?”

Aarav looks at him �" really looks, for the first time in weeks.

> “Now I think Sanya wasn’t the first girl Vivaan silenced. Just the first one I watched disappear.”
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He exhales, a breath that sounds more like a confession than the words themselves.

> “And I told myself it was her choice.”

> “Because if I didn’t… I’d have to ask what kind of man lets someone vanish right in front of him and calls it a coincidence.”

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Session ends.