NAVYA

I still remember the first time I saw him. It wasn't in a classroom, and it wasn't during some boring lecture where the words blurred into white noise. 

No.

my first glimpse of Yuvraj Singhania was when he stood on the dais in the grand auditorium, his voice cutting through the crowd like a blade. I hadn't even unpacked my suitcase yet. It was the start of my second year, but it felt like a first. Because this time, I wasn't just another student in a sea of faces. 

I was a girl who had clawed her way into a university owned by the Singhanias. Their family name was printed on every building, every wall, every scholarship brochure.

They didn't just run the place. They were the place. And now, Yuvraj Singhania, Director of the University, freshly returned from God-knows-where, and our new psychology professor was standing in front of us like he owned the air we breathed. Because he did.

He was six feet something, with broad shoulders, a black shirt rolled up at the sleeves like he didn't care, and a gaze so cold it froze the entire room. He didn't smile when he spoke.

He didn't soften his tone for the students who leaned forward, desperate to catch his every word. And yet, every girl in that auditorium was already in love. 

I wasn't blind. I saw the way his sharp jawline caught the light, the way his dark hair fell just carelessly enough to look deliberate. He was beautiful, yes.. beautiful in the way thunderstorms are beautiful, if you forget they can kill you.

"Discipline," he said, his voice calm but commanding, "is not about rules. It's about self-control. Remember that. Because in this university, there is no tolerance for mediocrity." Every syllable carried weight. Every pause demanded silence. I don't think a single student even blinked until he dismissed us with a flick of his hand. 

The girls around me sighed as if they'd just left a movie theatre after watching the hero save the world. I sat there, clutching my notebook, wondering what kind of man could look at a hall full of people and see... nothing. Because that's what his eyes looked like. Nothing. No kindness. No warmth. Just a hollow, polished darkness.

Later that day, I found myself in his classroom Psychology 201. The lecture hall was buzzing. Everyone had come early just to get a good seat. I slipped into the second row, too nervous to sit in front but too restless to hide in the back. 

When he entered, the room stilled. He didn't say good morning. He didn't even acknowledge the students whispering his name. He simply walked to the board, wrote Perception in neat, sharp letters, and turned to face us.

His gaze swept across the room like a spotlight. When it landed on me, my breath caught in my throat. Not because it lingered God, no it didn't. But because in that brief second, it felt like he had peeled me apart. 

Like he could see everything: the nerves under my skin, the thoughts I hadn't spoken, the secrets I kept buried even from myself. And then he moved on, as though I were no different from the girl twirling her hair in the third row or the boy yawning in the back. It should have made me invisible again. But instead, I felt exposed.

"Perception," he began, his voice smooth but detached, "is flawed. What you see is not the truth. What you believe is not always reality. Remember that, if you plan to study human behavior seriously. And if you don't, leave now." No one moved. Of course no one moved. Who would walk out on him? For the next forty minutes, he dismantled the idea of reality itself.

 His words weren't delivered like a lecture they struck like bullets, precise and unflinching. He challenged us, mocked us, pushed us to think harder, faster, sharper. And though half the class looked lost, the other half including me sat spellbound.

I shouldn't have been. I should've kept my head down, written my notes, and reminded myself that men like Yuvraj Singhania were carved from stone and shadow untouchable.

But when he paused, scanning the room for answers, and his eyes briefly rested on me again, I felt something I shouldn't. A pull. Like gravity bending. Like I'd been noticed, even if only for a second.

"Navya, are you even listening?" My roommate, Rhea, snapped her fingers in front of my face later that night. I blinked, realizing I'd been staring at my open notebook for twenty minutes without writing a single word. "Huh?" She rolled her eyes, dropping onto her bed dramatically.

 "I was saying half the girls in class are already plotting how to get his attention. Do you know Sneha? She swears she's going to 'accidentally' bump into him at the library tomorrow. Like, please. As if a man like that notices anyone."

I bit the inside of my cheek. He noticed. For a second, he noticed me. But I didn't say that. I wasn't about to sound like one of them one of the girls who sighed his name like it was a love song. Instead, I shut my notebook and forced a laugh.

 "Let her try. It's not like professors date students." Rhea smirked. "Maybe not normal professors. But Yuvraj Singhania isn't normal. He's..." She trailed off, searching for the word. "Cold," I offered. She frowned. "I was going to say hot. But fine, cold works too. Cold and hot. Like ice that burns."

I didn't reply, because the truth was sitting heavy in my chest. Yes, he was cold. Yes, he was beautiful. Yes, he was untouchable. But even as I tried to convince myself he would never notice me again, I couldn't shake the feeling of his gaze that brief second in the lecture hall when his eyes found mine.

It wasn't attraction. It wasn't curiosity. It was something else. Something dangerous.

The next morning, I woke to find an envelope slipped under my dorm door, my name written on it in neat, sharp handwriting. When I opened it, my heart stopped. Inside was a single sheet of paper. No greeting. No signature. Just one line:

"You shouldn't look at me the way you do, Navya."

I thought it was some random male classmate and I ignored it.