Page 27 of A Lab Rat’s Guide to Fated Love

Fifteen

And Now That You Know

Vir

O ne moment, Nori was kissing him like she wanted to devour him whole, with her hands roaming freely under his shirt as if memorizing every crease and contour, and driving him wild in the process.

But then the moment shifted, and like a switch had flipped, her entire body locked up.

She froze in his arms, and the drastic shift in her mood made him freeze, too. Her rapidly fading desire and warmth gave way to terror. A cold, suffocating kind that made it hard for him to breathe just by picking it from her.

“Nori?” he asked, breathless under her rising panic. “What happened?”

She opened her mouth to respond, but no sound came out. She clutched her throat and started wheezing, her face pale and eyes wide in horror.

“What’s wrong?” he asked again, reaching for her.

Nori recoiled before slamming her hands into his chest to push him away .

“No,” she croaked. And as he stepped back, she slid down from the counter to collapse on the floor in a heap.

“Nori…” Vir reached for her again.

“Don’t touch me!” She shrieked, before lurching to her feet and stumbling her way to the bathroom.

He stared after her in shock. He’d triggered something. Something big.

“Nori… Please talk to me,” he spoke through the door. “Are you okay?”

“P—panic—attack,” she managed between deep gulps of air.

“I’m right here,” he said, and it took everything in him to keep himself from bursting through the door and rushing to her side. But he had a feeling his proximity would only make things worse. “I won’t come in unless you say so. Just tell me what you need. What can I do?”

“Please, just—leave me—alone.”

“Okay.”

He slid to the floor outside and sat with his arms wrapped around his knees.

For the longest time, he kept feeling her pain as wave after wave stabbed through his chest, draining him from the inside out.

After what felt like an hour, maybe more, the waves started to die down.

Once he was sure she’d been calm enough for a while, he tapped lightly on the fiber and glass panel.

“Nori?”

When she didn’t respond after a few more tries, he cracked it open to find her curled up inside the bathtub, fast asleep.

He gently scooped her in his arms and carried her to bed.

I t was still dark outside when Vir rose the next morning to find Nori’s side of the bed empty. The digital clock on the nightstand displayed five-fifteen am.

“Nori?” he called, stepping out into the living room, where the strong aroma of freshly brewed coffee permeated the air.

“I’m here,” Nori answered from the porch, sitting cross-legged on the floor with a plate of half-eaten toast beside her.

“Hey,” he said, trying to get a read on her mood as he padded towards her. He couldn’t find any trace of the feelings he’d sensed from her last evening. She seemed… calm. Almost too calm .

“I just made some toast.” She pointed towards the kitchen. “Should be warm if you have it now.”

Vir nodded before briefly stepping away to freshen up.

He joined her, moments later, with his own plate of buttered toast and coffee, and they ate in silence, watching waves rise and fall in the far distance. Little by little, the sky grew lighter.

When he glanced at her after a while, he found her eyes already fixed on him, her expression impassive, both inside and out. And for the first time in his life, he wished he could read minds.

Vir opened his mouth to ask, but as Nori continued to look at him, her emotions shifted and fresh ones began to stir.

Starting as wisps, they swelled and twisted and turned into one another.

Too many to unravel at once, they grew into a heavy, dense, dark mass that he hated and feared in equal measure.

And layered above it all, draped like a thin, viscous blanket, he sensed her resolve as it flared and wavered a few times before finally hardening into something solid.

Nori

I t was time to rip the band-aid off.

The sooner she got it over with, the less it’d hurt—at least that’s what Nori told herself as her resolve continued to rise and falter while looking at Vir’s curious gaze. He was trying to make a sense of her turmoil, no doubt.

Rip it off. She took a deep inhale and let it out in a huff.

“What are you thinking?” Vir asked quietly, before opening and closing his mouth as if he had questions, but was hesitant to ask. “I’m sorry about yesterday. I didn’t know, I—”

“Vir.”

“I triggered something, didn’t I?”

Nori swallowed, her throat suddenly too dry.

“Yes,” she replied. “But it wasn’t your fault. I usually don’t tolerate physical proximity very well, let alone intimacy…” she trailed off. “Honestly, I’ve been… anti cipating a panic attack ever since I brought you into my house. I’m only surprised it didn’t happen sooner.”

Vir opened his mouth as if to start offering more apologies.

“Please, just—listen. It wasn’t your fault.”

“Nori.”

“No, listen. You have to listen to me, because I’m going to tell you exactly why you’re wasting your time having feelings for me… why you’d be better off without me.”

Vir pursed his lips, but didn’t interrupt her again.

And a few heartbeats later, she began.

Roughly four years ago: Vancouver, Canada

S unny worked at a restaurant Nori frequented during the last few months of her PhD program in Vancouver. He asked her out the night she was there celebrating with her friends after having successfully defended her thesis.

Nori declined at first, knowing she was going to move back to Calgary soon.

She wouldn’t have time for dating once she started work, anyway.

But Sunny’s sweet persistence wore her down.

She hadn’t met a man more charming, attentive, and progressive thinking than him.

He always knew the right things to say, remembered the smallest details about her, and showered her with affection all the time.

And in a few short weeks, with an overabundance of butterflies calling her gut home and her heart drumming at cardio speeds every time Sunny held her hand, Nori knew she’d met the man of her dreams. A man who worshipped the ground she walked on. A man to whom she was perfect.

Till she wasn’t.

Over dinner one evening, the discussion shifted towards work, and Nori excitedly started talking about her upcoming plans again.

She was going to develop programmable mites to help human bodies heal faster than with regular surgical interventions—something she’d been working on for years.

It was now time to develop a targeted model to actually prove her theory.

And that meant moving to Calgary, where Nori’s mom had offered to help her with the lab. In addition to assisting her with the phage-based drugs that played a significant role in her work.

Sunny didn’t think it was a good idea.

“You know that’s not what I want to hear,” he said, popping a stuffed olive into his mouth.

“What do you mean?”

“Who’ll stay with the kids if you’re in a lab all day?”

“Kids? What are you talking about?”

“Well, now you’ve ruined the proposal, haven’t you?”

“Proposal?”

“I want us to get married by this fall.” He gave her one of his brightest charming smiles. “Don’t act like this is news to you, Nori. You’ve known my intentions since the day we met. Of course, I’ll take care of all the expenses. You just have to pick a dress.”

She didn’t know how to respond. “We’ve only been together for two months, Sunny,” she said. “And you know all about my research and what this project means to me. Besides, I’ve been clear from the start; I’m going to move to Calgary soon.”

“Does my love mean nothing to you, then?” he growled, a tick working in his jaw. “Plans change. You don’t need to work once we’re married, anyway. What makes you think I’ll allow it?”

“What makes you think I’ll marry you?”

“You’re being disrespectful.”

“So are you.”

No sooner had the words left her mouth, the back of Sunny’s palm met her face with a loud smack. And as if a switch had flipped, he sat across from her, flinging dishes off the table and spitting curses at her, while Nori clutched her ringing ear, too stunned to react.

A while later, he dropped her below her apartment building .

“I’ll pick you at seven tomorrow,” he said, circling around to her side as she stepped out of the car. “I have something special planned for my jaan .” Just like that, he was back to his usual charming self.

As if nothing had happened at all. As if Nori had imagined the slap, the past half hour of yelling, and her still ringing ear.

Once she broke out of the shock, alone at her apartment, she texted him to cancel the plan. Yet, sharp at seven the next evening, he was at her door with a large bouquet of bright pink lilies. She told him she had to finish packing.

“Packing? I thought we were over this already. Why are you being so cruel, Nori?” he asked, his eyes brimming with tears.

“ I’m being cruel?” She tilted her bruised jaw towards him. “Look at what you did.”

“What I did?” He sniffled loudly. “How convenient of you to gloss over the fact that you broke my heart. How could you decide to go live six-hundred miles away without asking me what I thought of it first? What did you expect me to do?”

“I don’t know, not hit me maybe?”

“HIT YOU? Oh my god! I’ve never met anyone as overdramatic as you.” His eyes widened. “I just nudged you a little. Have you forgotten that YOU insulted ME? Do my feelings not matter at all? Does shifting the blame on me make you feel less guilty about what you did?”

Nori stared at him for a moment. It hadn’t been just a nudge.

Did he not remember hitting her? Or was her version of the events messed up?

The slap, the cursing and yelling and all the broken plates everywhere…

It was his restaurant, and it’d been after closing hours so it’d been just them, but…

she wasn’t overreacting. She didn’t think so.

She bit her lip. Either way, she had to go.