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Chapter 1 - Chapter 1: The Necklace and the Stranger

🌙 Teaser:"She found a lost locket.

He found the girl who unknowingly held his past.

One glance — and a forgotten memory began to stir."

The city pulsed with neon chaos — loud, glittering, too alive for its own good.

Maholi tugged her oversized grey T-shirt lower, her fingers brushing against the frayed hem of her worn-out jeans. They hugged her long legs like they'd been stitched by memory, not money. Her canvas tote bounced against her side as she followed her best friend through the noisy maze of obsessed fans.

"I still can't believe you've never watched even one of his movies!" Ritu groaned, dramatically flipping her hair as she checked her camera angle. "Abir Roy is literal heartbreak on legs, Maholi!"

"Exactly why I don't care," Maholi deadpanned, stepping over a puddle of melting neon ice cream. "You're obsessed enough for both of us."

She wasn't being snobbish. She just didn't have space for star-studded fantasies in a life ruled by budgeting and survival. Maholi's world revolved around stacked bills, skipped meals, and protecting her twin brothers from the weight of truths they were too young to carry.

But today, she had let Ritu drag her here. Maybe because she was tired of saying no. Maybe because pretending she had time for silly things made her feel... normal.

The fan zone outside the studio was a glitter-sprayed jungle. Placards. Cutouts. Sequined madness. The crowd screamed as if their hearts were microphones.

"ABIR! ABIR!"

Maholi rolled her eyes and was about to check her phone when something caught her gaze — a glint of silver near a food cart's muddy tire.

A necklace.

She crouched.

A simple silver chain, coiled like it had been waiting. A dusty locket dangled at the end — oval, vintage, scarred by time. She clicked it open.

A photo inside.

A child. Maybe five. Smiling like joy had never been touched by fear. Hair unruly. Eyes like mirrors — large, curious, a bit broken.

Her throat tightened.

She looked around. No one seemed to be searching for it.

"I'll turn it in," she muttered, slipping it into her tote. But her hand didn't move away. It stayed. Just for a second longer than it should've.

And then the crowd lost its mind.

Screams turned feral. Electric. Almost primal.

A sleek black car rolled to a stop like the climax of a dream. The door opened.

And out stepped a man.

Tall. Black shirt half-buttoned, sleeves rolled up like rebellion. Charcoal jeans torn just right. Hair tousled as if sleep had kissed him seconds before.

Abir Roy.

The nation's obsession. The reason a thousand fan pages screamed into the night.

Maholi didn't scream.

She barely looked.

Until he did.

His eyes scanned the crowd — wild, greedy, indifferent — until they landed on hers.

And stopped.

It wasn't a glance.

It was a pull. A vacuum. A slow, magnetic grip on silence.

The chaos around them blurred.

Maholi's breath caught. Not because of his fame. But because something in her — buried, long forgotten — recognized something in him.

Familiarity wrapped in mystery. Like déjà vu with a heartbeat.

And for one fractured moment, it felt like the boy inside the locket had grown up... and was standing right in front of her.

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