** It's Not Like You **

    Relatable quote -: " You had been there  always and always, you made me something else. " 

        After reaching home , with lots and lots of emotions, and complicated series of questions running in her tiny mind, Scarlet removed her velvet red heels which were becoming a pain for her, not because they were really giving her pain but because her mind was in Chaos and heart in pain . 

     She changed to her comfy slippers and headed towards her room , and landed over her bed with a thud as if wanting to let out all the worries and feeling on the pitiful pillow under her head. 

     Her sharp gaze had long been turned smooth and she had been continuously wondering about the whole scenario that had happened back in the Gray's Corporation . She felt herself too tired and wondered if everything was just her hallucination , then why wasn't she feeling relaxed even after reaching home.   She wondered if everything was a maze in which she was getting trapped the more she thought about it and to whom does that voice belong  ? 

     She was much agitated with the thought and felt like she had heard that voice long before and felt herself somehow connected to it .  Just as she was way too muddleheaded, slowly and swiftly she drifted towards sleep .

      On the other side, the extra calm man's aura had been becoming a headache to all of his subordinates as they knew perfectly well, how dangerous he could be when he is perplexed . 

       Collecting all the courage that his Beta had, he slowly tried to enquire Emerald about his very serious emotionless face, which wasn't totally emotionless actually and whispered 

     " Lord ! what happened ? you look so serious !! Is there something wrong with the presentation ? " 

       Listening to his Beta's  whisper, Emerald came back to reality from his emotion world and looked at him while giving him a hard and frowning look and replying warningly 

     " How many times do I have to remind you Jack , not to address me as Lord publicly? ... Huhhhhhhh......... Do you want people to find out about us ?”

   With that he turned his head towards the projector screen which was showing so many designs of weapons and felt bewildered as to how can the designer be so good to provide such a variation in armouries .

      Jack who was already afraid and scared got more surprised because he didn't say something which could make Emerald howl like that over him and sighed that he got saved just now because of the meeting . 

      After certain moments , the meeting came to an end , and Emerald signed the deal of purchase of armouries and weapons with Gray's finding all the new majestic and good designed weapons which could be quite helpful for the army and their force too . 

       Just he was about to leave the meeting room, he heard Mr. Gray talking to his subordinate saying that He had just met the weapon designer today and got surprised as to how a little girl could be that much talented in such a young age to be a weapon designer .

        Emerald too became curious and made Jack to enquire about the girl while heading outside the building . 

Jack talked to Mr. Gray and collected all the information about SCARLET that he was having and headed to Emerald , who gestured him to just sit along his side.  

 Jack  told all the things that he came to know about Scarlet and cheery on the cake ......... he told her name ... 

   " Prince ! Her name is SCARLET LOZENGE , and she is merely 20-21 years old girl." 

  Just as the name left Jack's lips, the Emerald green eyes with a glaring blue color got stuck at that point and a lone tear escaped from one of the eyes...... which made Emerald feel even more pained and guilty .

 Watching his prince cry with pain and guilt and many other mixed emotions, which Jack wasn't even able to apprehend in his confused and dazzled mind thinking how could it happen and whispered merely in a vogue tone ....

 " Why are you like this Lord ? !!!!    It's so not like you, not like the real you…..

 ~ INSIDE LOZENGE HOUSE~

Scarlet was sitting inside her room and was getting lost in her weapon design booklet.  Except this passion of hers, nothing can really take her worries and emotions away from her mind and made her relaxed.   

 She was totally lost in her new design . This time she started to fight with her fear .

   Yes, she is a hidden yet so famous weapon designer , but she herself is afraid of daggers and knives. 

  But today , she unknowingly started to draw a quite sharp dagger , she wasn't even paying attention to what she was doing herself because her mind was in such a daze with whatsoever had happened In Gray's Corporation . 

    She was still hanging in those thoughts and that husky and enchanting magnetic voice . Physically she was present there , but mentally , she was struck in that vary moment . How could she be herself when such an incident happened to her, let alone focus on the design book. 

 The faint yet audible voices coming from the outside had brought her back to reality and she looked dazzled and just a mere peak at her designer book made her scared and afraid up till her core to such and extent that she let out a strong and loud cry ....

 "Aaaaaaaaaa................................."

  She was loud enough which didn't go unnoticed by the people chatting outside her room and made them head hurriedly into her room with dazzled expression that her mother came to her and held her in her arms enquiring being afraid ...

  “ What happened sweetie ?  Why did u cry !”

Also her father, her brother and some friends were there gawking at her dazzled and fabricated face mixed with variety of emotions and wanted to know as to what exactly had happened .

Scarlet got back to her room mentally too and realised that she had made them all quite worried and so she just chuckled and then replied with a surprising look 

    "Nothing happened " 

 Hearing her foolish answer, her father asked 

 " Then why did .... why did you..”

 Cutting him amidst , she asked to the other people , who were her friends who had been holding some glittering caps and some balloons in their hands....

   " What are all of you doing here at this hour guys ? And what are these things in your hands ? Why those balloons !!" 

The friends mind slapped themselves because, they were trying to hide that from her and she somehow came to know about that .

One of them was just going to reply to Scarlet and suddenly the other one grabbed her wrist stopping her to spill out the beans and showing her the room clock .

 All of them gazed towards the clock and everybody understood their expressions , but this didn't go unnoticed by the keen and sharp fish -like eyes of Scarlet and she enquired 

   " What's with those expressions now !" 

 Before she could get an answer , she herself was questioned again and this time again by her mother ..

  " Did you bother to tell us , Scarlet !!?"

Scarlet didn't want to reveal the events to her family, thus she replied faintly ...

  " I heard you guys talking outside, you didn't involve me and were enjoying alone. So I faked a cry to get myself involved in the conversation " 

Everybody got baffled and them wall clock immediately buzzed , indicating it to be a start of a new day. With that , they all merrily started to sing 

   " Happy birthday .... tooooo ... ..yooouuuuu ....

     Happppyyyy .... Birthday ... to.... yooouuuuu.....

      Happy ... birthday dear Scarlet ...... 

Happpppppyyy....... birthday to you ..... " 

Scarlet got mesmerized with all the favourite people in her life , singing in chorus and dancing merrily for her. She thought that she was way too disturbed that she herself forgot her own birthday and mind slapped herself.

Quickly coming back to the people singing and happily smiling , she got up and Thanked everybody taking  them all in a big bear hug . 

Her father came to her , patted her head, and kissed on her head, adored like a little kid blessing her ....

    "Happy birthday my child, You have turned 21 now. " 

To which , everyone said …

    " Happy 21st birthday to you , Scarlet " 

But she was deep down feeling a strange sensation of like something was going to happen and as if she was going to be trapped in it .

She was happy, but this birthday was  going to turn her life upside down and she was going to experience the most adventurous rollar coaster ride of her life.