QUARREL

Adheena (defensive, sharp):

"Neither have you. Still judging before you even listen."

**Alen (quiet, dangerous):** "I’ve heard enough. You always show up when you’re empty-handed, don’t you?"

His eyes narrowed. "Neena’s heart. Aleon’s trust. How many more pieces of this family do you want to collect?"

She stepped forward, eyes burning.

Adheena:

"I never asked for any of this. You think I wanted to come here tonight?"

Her voice cracked — but not weakly. With fury. "You don’t know what it cost me."

Alen pushed off the desk slowly, moving closer now.

**Alen: **"No\, Adheena. You made sure I never knew anything real about you."

He hovered just inches from her. His voice dropped.

"All I saw was the way you played the innocent girl who needed saving. And they—" he glanced toward the hall, toward the past, "fell for it."

*Adheena (low\, furious): **"And you? You were too scared to even look past your own bitterness to see the truth."*

He stared at her, breath tightening.

**Alen: **"Oh\, I looked."

The air was thick between them — not with desire, but tension. Bitter, unresolved.

**Alen (low, harsh): ***"You think I hated you, Adheena?"*

He leaned in, voice sharp as broken glass.

"I despised the way you fooled them. The way they saw something good in you when I saw right through it."

**Adheena (quiet but firm):**"No, Alen. You saw what you wanted to see."

She met his stare. "You never looked deeper. Never gave me the chance."

He scoffed, stepping even closer, jaw tight.

**Alen:**"And you never earned it."

He was right in front of her now — not out of longing, but confrontation.

"All these years, and you still walk in here acting like this family owes you something."

Adheena (voice cracking with restraint):

"I never asked to be taken in. I never asked to be your problem."

She glared at him, eyes shining. "But you made me one. From the start."

Alen’s lips parted like he might fire back — but no words came. Not yet. The silence between them pulsed like a second heartbeat.

*Alen (coldly): *“Damn right I did. Because problems don’t knock on the door and ask permission — they slip through cracks and rot everything underneath.”

He turned, pacing once, like he needed the distance to think. Or breathe.

**Alen (muted, almost to himself):**“And no one else ever saw it. Just me.”

Adheena’s voice cut through the space like a blade.

**Adheena (low, trembling with fury):** “You think that makes you stronger? Smarter? It made you cruel.”

He stopped mid-step.

Adheena:“They gave me a place when I had nothing. But you— You made sure I never forgot I didn’t belong.”

Alen turned back, eyes burning, but something else flickered now — something more than just anger.

**Alen (quiet, dangerous):**“You don’t get it, do you? I didn’t hate you because you didn’t belong. I hated that they thought you did.”

He stepped toward her again, slower this time. Controlled. But every word hit like stone.

**Alen:**“They saw you as some broken thing to fix. I saw you for what you are — a survivor who always finds a way to get what she wants.”

**Adheena (furious):**“And you saw that as a threat.”

**Alen (calm, bitter):**“No. I saw it as a lie.”

She laughed once, sharp and humorless. Then took a step of her own, closing the final inch between them.

**Adheena (soft, deadly):**“Then here’s the truth, Alen: I never needed you to believe in me. I just needed you to get out of the way.”

They stared each other down — eyes locked, not with hatred, but history. Heavy. Unforgiving.

Behind them, a door creaked somewhere in the house. Footsteps echoed faintly.

But neither of them moved.

**Alen (after a long pause):** “You think you’ve paid your dues. That this pain gives you a place here.”

Adheena (flatly): “No. Pain doesn’t earn a place. It’s just what stays when everything else is taken.”

Alen blinked. His jaw clenched once. Then:

**Alen:**“Then maybe we finally understand each other.”

They didn’t.

But for the first time in years, the silence didn’t feel like war.

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