Rain.
Not the kind that makes you want to curl up in bed.
This was the kind that hammered against the windows as if it wanted in — the kind that could make you feel like the world outside had been scrubbed away, replaced with nothing but water and shadow.
Dr. Aryan Khanna sat at the metal table, his elbows resting on its cold surface, hands folded loosely. His reflection swam in the scratched metal, warped by years of use. A fluorescent tube hummed overhead, its flicker every few seconds like a silent metronome.
Across from him, Maya Verma sat with her wrists cuffed, the faint clink of the chain between them sounding far too loud in the small room.
She wasn't staring at the table. She wasn't looking at the walls.
She was looking at him.
Her gaze was steady, unblinking. Too steady.
And when she finally spoke, her voice was soft enough that he almost leaned forward to catch it.
"We've met before… you just don't remember."
Aryan didn't answer immediately. He had learned long ago that silence could be more effective than any question.
Maya tilted her head, studying him like a child observing a specimen in a jar.
Her lips curved — not into a smile, not exactly, but into something that suggested she knew more than she was letting on.
"I've been asked to assess your mental state," Aryan said at last, his tone calm and measured.
"And they've asked you because you're the best," she said quickly, like she had been rehearsing the line. "Or… because you're the only one who would understand me."
He ignored that.
"Tell me about the night of October 14th," he said, flipping open his notebook. The page was blank, but the paper felt strangely heavy under his pen.
Maya glanced down at her hands, the faint traces of blood under her fingernails catching the harsh light. She didn't seem embarrassed by it.
"It was raining," she said.
"Like tonight?"
She shook her head slowly. "No. That night, the rain was quieter."
Her voice was almost soothing — until the next words dropped like a blade.
"I woke up beside my husband. He wasn't breathing. And there was… so much blood."
She paused, as though tasting the memory.
Aryan waited for more, but she only looked back up at him with that same, unreadable calm.
"Did you kill him, Maya?" he asked.
She leaned forward just a little.
"If I did," she whispered, "you would forgive me. You've forgiven worse."
Aryan's pen froze halfway through a word.
"Why would you say that?" he asked.
Her lips parted, and her voice dropped into something almost intimate.
"Because I remember the summer of 2001."
The hum of the fluorescent light seemed louder now.
Aryan didn't remember telling her about 2001. He didn't remember telling anyone about it.
The rain outside pounded harder against the glass.
And for the first time that night, Aryan felt cold.