Few weeks ago, in Paris...

Mrs. Andrew could be seen haggling with the milkman about the rising milk prices. He could see Otis, her supposedly-spoilt son sneak out of Ness's window, the neighborhood's good girl and back into his own house. Mr. Andrews, who had yet again forgotten his car keys went back inside the house to get them. Mrs. Woodward looked at Mrs. Andrew and her bargaining scene with a scrunched nose and an occasional eye roll from the vegetable vendor's stall, where she was picking up fresh greens for the day. She would be gossiping with the Indian Mrs. Sharma, the one who lived across the street, about the 'miser Mrs. Andrews was', had she not been off to a vacation to her homeland.

He saw all of this. He predicted most of it. He was Marco. Forty-year-old Marco Simon. The established painter with two paintings in the National Gallery, who lived in a remote, almost country part of Paris, who kept looking at the mayhem outside his house to find a muse but failed to do so every single day.

He woke up to see the first wisps of the sunrise, hoping he could be inspired. He sat all morning until the sun was well and truly up, when he knew he wouldn't have anything else to be inspired by. His canvas sat blank before him, mocking him day and night. He felt disconnected, unattached. He ran his hand through his brown hair which now sported streaks of grey hair. He took the brush and splattered paint on the canvas. Brown. His first stroke of the day. He was hoping he would be able to go with the flow today. As he was about to continue, a decidedly youthful voice interrupted his movements.

"Father! Here, there is someone who wants to meet you," he looked up to see his eighteen-year-old son enter inside, with a grin on his boyish face, looking impeccably neat in his checked black and white shirt and jeans, as opposed to the white paint-stained shirt he was wearing.

A girl followed him in, light on her toes, her doe-like brown orbs first catching his attention, and then his breath. He straightened himself almost instantly, and he couldn't help but notice the startling similarly of the color of her eyes to that of the paint he had splattered on the canvas.

Taira felt she would drown in the moment and never be herself again as his eyes landed on hers, staring at her intently, dissecting every single color in her, as if she wasn't simply a pale human, but a cascade of his paints; a single look didn't do justice to her. She had to be looked upon longer, more diligently. Her eyes travelled to the brown on the canvas, his brown hair, and it was one of those moments where everything fell in perfect tandem, as if nothing was amiss in life. But the moment didn't last long before she noticed noticed the grey streaks within the curly mass of his brown hair, the white canvas around the singular brown stroke and straightened her posture, as if that would free her from her former thoughts.

"Dad, this is Taira. Taira, this is Marco Simon, my dad and the painter. She's a businesswoman," Taira tried to object when Adam said that, but he paid her no mind. "I got to know her last year, when her company had sponsored the exchange student program to India," he smiled at her and strode ahead to his father. "I know you don't teach but she is a special friend, please consider her. She's very eager to learn," he whispered to him, a wishful look on his face.

Marco was never the one to be impregnated in anything, not even his own rules. He always explored every muse, every attraction, everything and everyone. So it wasn't long before he accepted her and asked her to visit in the evening.

He had become a father when he was twenty-two years old, certainly young by his standards back then. He did not have a stable career then. Adam's mother wasn't a big part of his life, they both weren't a couple now, they had never truly been, per say. She was always busy with her career and her visits were occasional. But both Adam and Marco respected that.

Adam had been his lucky charm in life. His work began to be appreciated and widely known in places and art galleries. Their worth went up gradually, until he became a brand in itself. But he didn't desire the fame. Fame, he had always been of the opinion, was a very tricky thing. And he hadn't wanted his son to be at the receiving end of its repercussions. So they both led a quiet, normal life, him engrossed in his paints and canvases and art, and Adam exploring his life. More than a father and child, their relation was that of friends. They advised each-other, took care of each-other and were together in predicaments but at the same time respected the boundaries and valued their personal space.

Taira's classes commenced the very next day and with that commenced a newfangled friendship between Marco and her. And perhaps...even more. She never had an older friend but with Marco the age between then vanished in the air and gave rise to a joyous camaraderie, an uncanny intimacy.

It was one such day, in the wee hours of the morning when they both were sitting in front on their individual canvases and working in silence, coffee flowing freely between them when Marco spoke up in his deep, cultured voice, "How do you work in the corporate world?" His English was heavily accented.

"What do you mean?" Taira asked, her eyes never straying from the canvas.

"The competition, the boredom of everyday work, how do you like that?" He scoffed, dipping his brush in the palette.

"You make it sound as if its a bad place to work," Taira moved her gaze from the multi-colored canvas to face Marco.

"There is no... eh...expression there. It is a stifling environment. Too much power struggle, don't you think?"

"I like power, and the responsibilities that come with it," Taira replied quietly and continued her work on the canvas.

"Surely not!" Marco exclaimed, his eyes wide in surprise. Taira bit her lip, and remained silent. She hadn't ever confessed it to anyone, not even Aashi, that in the remotest corner of her heart, she enjoyed being the leader. She enjoyed being in charge. Perhaps that made her a bad person, but she couldn't help it. Not that anyone seemed to believe her. Meek, soft-spoken Taira had never been considered a leader. Only her father, she recalled with pain, seemed to know her hidden depths. Her managerial strengths. She sighed and continued to work.

"Your painting has too many colors, doesn't it?" She said out of nowhere.

"Err... Oui," Marco let out, frowning.

"And hidden shades too, I believe?"

"That's the way of the an artist, yes," he nodded gravely, staring at the young woman beside him.

"So who is to say that humans don't?" Taira said slowly, and met Marco's grey eyes which were still staring at her.

"That is very true," he said quietly and nodded, a small smile playing on his rather handsome face.

Taira smiled at him earnestly and continued to paint. Once she was done, she nudged Marco to see her work.

"Ehh...passable," Marco ran a critical eye on her work and scrunched his nose. Taira let out a loud laugh at his expression, and soon they were both laughing at nothing in particular, simply enjoying the minutes of life on the backdrop of the rising run.

Meetings soon started to flow out of the studio, into the chic cafes of Paris. Evenings were spent going to exhibitions and sipping wine on the banks of the river Seine, perched on a blanket, savoring life. Their conversations ranged from day to day tidbits to the demons of their past, to their lives and how they were battling every single day. It didn't matter that they lived two very different lives in two very different worlds, they simply heard each other, steadily, quietly, fervently. It was comfortable, it was peaceful, it was beautiful.

"Hey, whose thoughts are you lost in, ma chère?" Marco teased as he placed their warm coffees and croissants on the window-side table of their regular cafe just around Marco's house.

"Us," Taira replied nonchalantly, to which Marco tilted his head questioningly. "We are just so different from each-other," Taira continued thoughtfully.

"How?" Marco questioned, sipping his expresso.

"Um...many ways... like the fact that you swear like a sailor and I never swear," she took a bite of her chocolate croissant and raised her eyebrows.

"Come on," Marco took offense, looking at her with mild disbelief.

"What? I am not complaining. It looks quite attractive when some people swear. It suits them," she shrugged and continued to hog on the croissant. Really, you cannot rival French patisserie.

"Uh-huh, Taira, are trying to say I am attractive?" Marco unshielded his disarming smirk, raising his eyebrows dangerously. It was unfair for a man his age to look this devilishly handsome, Taira thought helplessly. She made inefficacious efforts to hide the red rising up her cheeks by trying to take a sip of her coffee.

"Anyways, I swear only in front of people I am close to," he stared at her, arms crossed on the table.

Without missing a beat, Taira retorted. "Uh-huh, Marco, are you trying to say we are close?"

There was a moment of silence after which they burst out laughing. It was easy to be witty, impulsive, uncaring and unfiltered in front of some people. Marco had that effect on Taira.

Marco opened his bag and took out a small canvas and gave it to Taira.

Shocked at the gesture, Taira decided to be witty. "To what do I owe the pleasure of receiving an art work from a famous artist, for free?" When Marco didn't say anything, she finally looked at the painting, and her breath hitched. She sat for a good two minutes, staring at the colored canvas, unblinking.

There was a calm river in the picture, at the bank of which a couple sat, engrossed. The woman stared at the river but the man was looking at her, steadily.

"I... its...mesmerizing," that was all Taira could breathe out.

"Not as mesmerizing as you," Marco said looking at her with the same eyes as of the man in the painting.

Soon they found that night had enveloped the sky. After a stroll they found themselves seated on their usual spot on the banks of the Seine river.

"Taira," Marco started in a unusually low voice, making Taira halt in her actions. They were about to sip the wine, as they did almost every evening, but Marco's eyes had that look - the look she had seen in Abeer's eyes when he looked at Aashi, the look that she had never been in the receiving end of. Until now.

"Before anything, I want to say something to you. Something that has to be said now," Marco shifted closer to her, never once breaking eye contact with her. Taira's heart beat wildly, unable to look away from his grey orbs. "When I said I'm close to you, I meant it. I mean to be close to you, perhaps even closer."

"Marco," Taira sighed in a effort to stop him from saying the things that would change everything, forever, but Marco wasn't the one to differ when he had his mind set on doing something.

"No, listen to me. I know that I have dated many women. Some intelligent, some distinguished, some uncommonly beautiful. But this is different. I have realized after 40 years that love doesn't make you sophisticated, refined - it brings out the raw, simple version of you," his eyes, which had taken a faraway look focused back on Taira, the grey orbs smoldering with passion, with promise. "I am the simplest I have ever been when I am with you. And it's the most beautiful version of me, the most beautiful version of us," he whispered.

Taira, who had been engrossed in his words hadn't realized that Marco had come dangerously close to her. When she turned to the side their lips collided, but only momentarily. The mere touching of their lips had been so electric, it had left both of them breathless. But the cold evening breeze, the water's tranquil cascade and Marco's soul-stirring words tore her fortification and she was left vulnerable. She moved her head ahead and that was the only affirmation Marco needed to capture her lips in a soul-wrenching kiss.

It was enchanting, beautiful, and otherworldly.

As their lips started slowing down, the gears of her mind started functioning again. Heavily breathing, she suddenly let go of Marco, got up and sputtered, "I remembered...I had an important call... I need to go... I... I..." Taira internally cringed at her words, but her mind couldn't come up with anything better. She picked up her bag and practically ran from there, her heart beating wildly against her chest. Marco called after her but knew that she needed her space, that it was all too much for her considering the things that have happened in the past with her father. So he continued sitting there, staring after her running form which turned smaller and smaller until she blended in the dark of the night.

When she came back to her hotel room, she knew she was doomed. Her mind was a muddled mess; she wasn't able to make head and tail of anything. The only thing that churned in her head was the kiss - the fated kiss. And Marco. Her heart fluttered despite everything. She sat on the settee, trying to process the happenings of the evening, when the shrill ring of her phone fetched her out of her thoughts and the news that it brought threw her out of the paradise with Marco which she had been using as a tape to her broken heart.

The news came to her in broken pieces. Her father... ill... left out on a bail... in a hospital... major hue and cry in the media. The only thing that registered fully and completely was that - she was needed in India.

After an hour of thinking and fretting, she decided to book a flight. On the way she would return the books she had borrowed from Marco and tell him that she was leaving. She had no idea what else to say.

But as fate had been cruel to her in the past, it decided it had not hurt Taira enough. She was going back on a morning flight, so she decided to go to meet Marco early. As she stepped out of her car and arrived on his doorstep early morning, she saw him hugging a woman. She didn't know who she was. Probably Adam's mother, probably someone else, and reality came crushing down on her second time in a matter of mere hours. How could life be so unfair? She deserved a respite, didn't she?

She left the books in the front yard on a bench and got back in her taxi on her way to the airport. They could have been hugging casually but insecurity ridden brains often forget to consider that. She couldn't stop the tears now. What had she been thinking?

She knew Marco and his reputation as a woman's man. She knew he was known to date women. She wanted stability, peace and quiet in her life, above everything else, and she also knew that Marco wasn't capable of rendering any of those things.

He was the wind, she was earth. He could flow over her but never unite. She wished she had realised this before. The last few weeks had been a fairytale for her, where she had glowed, frolicked, and been happy. She hadn't given a moment's thought that perhaps the fairytale wouldn't last forever.

She had faced a ton of humiliation due to her father, it hadn't even been an year since that. She thought that if above all that, the world came to know she was dallying with a divorced father much older than her; she shivered at the thought. Hell would break lose in the media back home. She hated appearing on the news; she would have to go through all of it again. The mere thought made her squirm. She took out her phone and drafted a very formal email to Marco informing him about the books she had left on his front yard and that she had to urgently leave for India and wouldn't be able to contact anyone for a few days. And that was the end.

She ignored Marco's every effort to reach out to her.

Stability. Stability.

That's all she convinced herself to find and she felt that she had found it when Abhimanyu placed forth his proposal.

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