CW: Mentions of panic attack and disturbing online comments.

Laya didn't know why she'd replied to the wrong number guy.

He was a stranger whose text message was not even meant for her.

That Satyajit guy—that's what he said his name was.

Who knew if that was even his real name, because what was the guarantee?

She'd lied about her name to him—and she had a good reason why she did it, but still she'd lied. He could have lied too. He could have been in a situation too, like she was in right now. Who knew!

Anyway, replying to a stranger—a wrong number, specifically—when she already had a barrage of concerned messages waiting to be replied to on her phone was not something Laya imagined herself doing on a Thursday evening, wallowing in her bed.

She'd been in her bed—and the unfortunate and direct consequences of misogyny and sexism and extravagant double standards that people on the internet (mostly men) have been swamping the blurry, chirpy woman in a viral concert video with—for close to three days now.

The bed she had been buried into comfortably for the past two days was now starting to feel different, with her back and nape unnervingly becoming damp by the minute. She threw the blanket off of her, the swish of it echoing in the quiet space of her bedroom. The ceiling fan had stopped spinning around the time she should have ideally gotten up that day—which is to say it had been still for hours; she hadn't really noticed the exact time the fan went off.

It didn't really matter, because everything was meaningless when you were lying in your bed, wearing the same three-day-old clothes—now sticking to your clammy back, your mop of hair clinging to your damp nape, and random people on the internet were questioning your character.

She sat up with a groan—yeah, not getting up for more than fifteen hours from your bed, not even for a bathroom break, apparently did that to your body. Surprise!

Her phone was upside down on her nightstand, as if keeping it like that would contain all the monstrous comments and crude assumptions about her that were floating about on the internet wild and free.

Laya gave it a long, listless look—and, alas, it was too long a look for her brain to recover from its dratted buffering and stop her from grabbing her phone.

She knew this was not a good idea. She did not need to know any more than what she'd known already in the past three days that's been making her feel sick from the inside. This was not at all a good idea.

Against the huge 'Do not look' bouncing around inside her head, Laya's finger opened Instagram and found the video.

Of course it was still there. There were people still quoting and retweeting it with not very kind, nasty words of theirs. The blurry, shaky video shot somewhere from the middle of the dazed, adrenaline-high crowd that'd been snagging the attention of everyone on the internet who had too much time and too little kindness.

It was an unidentified video—the same singular one—going rounds on all platforms.

Her face was barely visible in it, behind those oversized sunglasses that swallowed most of it. It was a practical decision she'd taken, fearing the blazing stage lights—that now she felt grateful for, because at least her identity was hidden. Silver linings...?

But her voice. God, her voice... maybe because it was hers and she'd probably practiced the song multiple times to perfection—or so she hoped and chose to believe—she could tell it was her voice. Anyone who knew her would have heard the unclear, shaky, and unbearably distant recording of that sultry, sensual song flowing against the cheers of the crowd.

It was her first concert as the main vocalist after years of being a background singer—at least on such a humongous stage, in front of a sea of audience. She'd sung in light music groups, of course. But none as huge and compelling as this—what she'd done for Ravi Sir, her boss, one of the leading music composers in the country.

Laya muted the video right when the sensuousness of her voice, even against all the cheering and singing-along from the crowd, dipped into a husky moan. And then into several of them in succession.

It should've been special. It had been—until people on the internet started writing derogatory comments under the leaked bit of her video for doing her job.

The last time she'd checked, people were calling her all names, questioning her character, and accusing her of bringing forth irreparable damage to the society and culture—all because she was singing a beautiful, sensual composition that was all about female pleasure and owning up to one's sexuality.

Sure, it was a little too explicit.

Probably why Ravi Sir never included it in the set list all these years.

Probably why the crowd went berserk right when an inkling of a prelude wafted around from their lead violinist.

Why, of all times, had he decided to make this one scandalous composition he'd produced almost two decades ago, her debut on his stage?

The comments section was already filled with vile comments, which hadn't stopped yet. Amongst a few fire emojis (what did they even mean anymore, Laya didn't know?,) there were words and emojis that she didn't want to witness at all.

One of them read, 'Her parents must be so proud.'

Then another, 'This is the problem with modern women. No shred of decency or shame. Look at her clothes.'

The ones that followed were even worse.

'Did anyone find her name? DM me!'

Re: 'I know people who know people in that music circle.'

'Guys, can someone find her Instagram or YouTube channel?'

'I am not trying to be mean, but doesn't she have a family?'

'Other women worked so hard to be taken seriously in this industry, and she does this? I am ashamed and deeply embarrassed.'

'Imagine having to practice those moans in front of a mirror.'

'The way she moaned into that mic in public. I genuinely cannot.'

'Found her in the Reengaram cover. One of them in the chorus looks like this woman.'

'She wants attention? Okay, we'll give her attention.'

Burning hot tears gathered in her eyes as she blinked at her phone's screen—at the nasty words staring back at her with a wickedness that so exclusively the society had the ability to exhibit when it was a woman in public eyes.

The cruelty she was putting herself through twisted in her stomach, her heart pulsating in her chest with it, making her breathing ragged and shallow. Suddenly her lungs had no idea how to make themselves work in the arena of her chest cavity, feeling too small, too inadequate—having absorbed all the heinous thoughts people had had about her. Her head felt blurry and scratchy, like the words she read were determinedly scraping every last tinge of satisfaction and gratification she was trying hard to hold on to and preserve from her debut—not that she had a lot of it to start with, anyway.

With wobbly hands, she exited the app and threw her phone on the bed, burying her trembling face in the cup of her palms, tears rushing hot and shameful, slinking down between her cheek and palm pressed over it.

How did these people not know—or fail to remember—that the one they were talking about was not some flashy, performing object but an actual, breathing, living human being? A young woman just doing her job—singing a song, a beautiful composition with meaningful lyrics centering on female pleasure.

She wanted to scream and cry and disappear into the warmth of her bed and never come up or go out.

Worst of all were the comments about finding her Instagram account and phone number—as if she were some public property now, and all of them were entitled to dissecting her however they wished, and how so fucking casual they were about it, as if it were just another thing to do in their daily agenda—tightening and wringing around in her chest further.

The uncontrollable, muffled sniffles she was pouring into her hands were now filling the exceptionally—drearily—quiet room of hers.

From somewhere outside, an auto rickshaw meandered past with an unnecessary roar. Cracking through it, up through the floor—distant and indistinct—came Raghav's voice. Laya couldn't really tell what he was talking about—probably to Nala, his 16-month-old toddler, who was now punctuating her father's talking with her sharp, high-pitched cry.

Laya rubbed her hands down her blotchy face as Nala's cries—trebly intense—continued, with vague fragments of Raghav's voice talking through it to her, in his patient, dad voice that he often only used with Nala.

And sometimes with her.

Laya had moved to Chennai from Dubai three years ago, somehow convincing her very worried parents, and her own fears and anxieties were mixed with excitement for her new job and potential music career. One of the reasons she was able to do it was that Raghav, their family friend—and almost a big brother—and Himani, his wife, were in Chennai.

From receiving her at the airport, to feeding her a comforting, warm meal right after reaching their home, to taking her in and letting her stay on the first floor of their house, to being someone she could rely on for anything and everything.

They had a key to her home. They fed her because Laya didn't really like to cook very much. She had a kitchen in her place above theirs, but she was not actively making use of it in any way. They were her emergency contact. They were her closest friends—and family.

And they knew everything.

Even more than anyone else.

Raghav was one of the sound engineers Ravi Sir was closely associated with—he had been there in the concert too.

In the past three days, one of them had been checking on her occasionally. One evening, a couple days ago, Raghav had come with Nala perched on his folded arm—babbling something, probably with saliva dribbling from the corner of her pouty mouth. She hadn't really responded well at that time. The next morning, Himani had come up before she left for work with a tiffin box of steaming, hot idlis and her special peanut chutney. She had let her in briefly and was bestowed with a hug—she needed that so, so much.

And Laya never really left her place—the husband and wife duo had been a little too understanding of it, of her needing her space, and didn't really coerce her. They just made sure she was fed with their tiffin delivery system.

But when Raghav came back last night to talk to her, she snapped at him. She'd asked him to 'just leave her alone.' Her voice had come out way too much sharper than she'd intended to. And without another word, he'd quietly gone down—leaving no way, or any hurt for her to prick upon further.

She sniffled more, tears springing down her tired eyes, fresh and searing, a twisting ache hollowing down her throat. She sat there for a moment letting herself stew over the guilt, having decided she deserved it for being an asshole to Raghav.

Roughly brushing off the tears from her face, she scrambled for her phone. There were messages from her parents. She'd last responded a day ago, not wanting them to worry too much about what she was going through.

Then appeared the messages that Raghav had sent last night—staring right back at her, among a sea of them from her friends. She'd turned off the notifications on all apps and hadn't checked them ever since she'd responded to that wrong number guy.

Raghav's message read: hey, how are you doing? come down for dinner whenever you feel like it. no pressure, though, okay?

also, nala misses you.

Followed by: actually, no. nala doesn't care. but himani and i miss you a lot. come down whenever.

And that'd brought a tiny chuckle out of her.

She put her phone aside—no throwing this time; she couldn't afford to buy a new one in case it bounced off of her bed. Lively traces of existence drifting above had ceased.

Laya sat there for a moment, pulling in a deep breath, her palms clutching her bed on either side of her body. Her rigid shoulder loosening with each breath, the straining knots in her body decidedly letting go. For the first time in three days, breathing felt doable. Unlike the times her chest felt too constricted and heavy, and she had to chase down breath after breath, her chest heaving and some thorny dryness wrapping around her throat.

Just as she was reveling in taking her leisurely breaths, still lightly sniffling, brushing her nose with the back of her hand, Laya realized something. She smelled a little too much.

She bent down to take another confirmatory sniff poking her nose into the neck of her sticky T-shirt.

Yep. She definitely needed a shower.

She'd never gone so long without showering.

But, guess what, she'd also not gone viral before or had her heart thumping like it was about to jump out of her ribs.

So many firsts of her life had presented themselves to her—her debut on stage, people on the internet decidedly hating her, responding to a stranger's message, and not showering for three days straight, and the week had not even ended, yet.

What a stupidly silly realization to have!

Thank you for reading the chapter. Do tell me in the comments what you think of it.