“They said time changes everything. But no one warned me that love changes too—especially when silence becomes the loudest thing between us.”

                                                                                                                    - Meera

There was a time when her world was small—just the length of his shadow under a streetlamp, the width of his palm around hers, and the sound of his laughter echoing in a school corridor. And somehow, that was enough.

Before they had wealth. Before they had a name that commanded respect. Before the marble floors and diamond chandeliers—there was just Arjun and Meera.

He was the boy who walked her home, one hand holding a half-torn umbrella and the other holding her innocence. She was the girl who collected moments instead of things, the kind of girl who smiled at stray puppies and thanked bus conductors. Ordinary to the world. Everything to him.

Or so she believed.

Their love was the kind that bloomed quietly, away from the noise. It wasn’t loud or attention-seeking. It didn’t need grand gestures. A glance across a college hallway, the brush of fingers under a table, stolen laughs during family festivals—those were the foundations of their forever.

But the world outside their bubble was not so gentle.

Arjun rose fast. From the shy, observant boy in glasses to the sharp-jawed, suited CEO who could silence a boardroom with a single look. His success was the kind that didn’t ask for permission—it just arrived, and the world bowed.

And with it came shadows.

A house that looked like a palace but felt like a cage. A mother who smiled with lips that never touched her eyes. A sister who mastered cruelty with elegance. Meera walked into that world with hope in her hands. And she held on. Tighter than she should have.

She stayed silent when the walls whispered against her. When every glance from Kamini felt like a measuring scale. When every sentence from Tanya was laced with disdain. She told herself it was temporary. That love would win. That Arjun would see.

But love doesn’t win when one person fights alone.

There are things that were never spoken between them. Words that choked her in the silence. Moments when she reached for him but found only distance. And the more she gave, the more she disappeared in the spaces he didn’t notice.

Until one day, the silence wasn’t hers anymore.

It was his.

His avoidance. His suspicion. His anger—cold and quiet, like frost settling on glass. He began to look at her differently. As if she were a stranger wearing the face of the woman he once loved.

Something had changed.

Something had been said.

And Meera never got the chance to explain.

Now, there’s an ache that lingers in every untouched corner of their mansion. In the untouched mug on the left side of the table. In the way Arjun still pauses at the balcony, waiting for a presence that never arrives.

This isn’t just a love story.

It’s a story of how love dies—slowly, quietly, under the weight of everything left unsaid.

And this… this is where it all began.

"I stayed even after love left… but tonight, I'm leaving because even hope gave up on us." – Meera

12:03 a.m.

“Don’t go.”

His voice broke the silence before the suitcase wheels did.

Meera froze, just a few steps from the door, her fingers tightening around the handle like she was afraid her own bones would betray her.

She didn’t turn around. Not yet. If she did, she knew her eyes would crumble before her heart did.

“You should’ve said that when I was begging for you to look at me,” she said, barely louder than a breath.

“I’m saying it now.”

“And now,” she whispered, “is too damn late, Aryan.”

He stepped forward, barefoot on the cold marble, wearing the same white shirt he’d worn for three days. Wrinkled. Unbuttoned halfway. Just like their love—undone and messy.

“I didn’t know you were serious,” he said. “You always threaten to leave but you never—”

Meera spun around.

“Don’t you dare reduce my leaving to a threat. Every time I said I couldn’t take it anymore, I meant it. I just… didn’t have the strength back then.”

Aryan’s mouth opened, then shut. Like he had too much to say and nothing that would make her stay.

"You think this is easy for me?" he asked.

“No,” she said. “I think this is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And I still have to do it. Because you made staying harder.”

He looked at her the way a boy looks at a broken toy—regretful, confused, and just a little too late.

“Where will you go?”

She smiled—tired, cracked.

“Somewhere that doesn’t smell like your cologne. Somewhere I don’t have to pretend I’m okay.”

His voice dropped. “You’re really walking out on us?”

“‘Us’?” She laughed softly. “There hasn’t been an ‘us’ in months. There’s you—cold, unreachable. And me—begging shadows for warmth.”

Aryan ran a hand through his hair. “So that’s it? After everything? You’re walking away?”

“No,” she said, tears finally rising. “I’m choosing myself.”

Silence.

Then:

“Was it ever real for you?” he asked, quieter now.

She blinked.

“Every single moment. Every kiss. Every fight. Every damn tear was real.”

“Then why?”

His voice cracked.

Meera stepped closer, close enough for him to see the veins in her tired eyes. “Because love should never feel like a punishment.”

He swallowed hard. “Tell me you don’t love me anymore.”

She hesitated. Her lips trembled.

“I still love you,” she admitted.

Aryan’s eyes lit up.

“But I can’t live in this love anymore.”

And just like that, the light vanished.

She turned back toward the door.

“Meera…”

“Don’t,” she said, voice a whisper now. “Don’t make it harder.”

The door opened.

Rain kissed her cheeks like the sky was mourning too.

"Meera!" His voice chased her like a ghost.

She didn’t turn back. Not this time.

Her final words floated behind her, barely louder than the wind:

“I stayed until I disappeared in your world, Aryan. Tonight, I just want to exist… even if it’s alone.”

The door closed.

And for the first time in years, Aryan realized—

She didn’t leave because she stopped loving him.

She left because she finally started loving herself.

"Some people don’t crash into your life like storms. They seep in—slow, quiet, and before you know it, they become the air you breathe." – Meera

He wasn’t the kind of boy they warned us about.

He didn’t have a bike, or that devilish grin.

He wasn’t the charming flirt.

He wasn’t rich.

He wasn’t loud.

He was just… there. Always there. And somehow, that was enough.

The first time I saw Aryan Kapoor, I didn’t even know I’d seen my forever.

It was my first week in college. I was new in Kolkata, nervous, constantly calling home to ask my mother how long to soak rice or how to keep my laundry from smelling like mildew.

I had come from Siliguri—small house, strict parents, one younger sister, and a dream that barely fit in my chest.

I worked hard for that scholarship. I wasn’t the prettiest girl in class, but I was the one who always had a pen and always knew the answers. I didn’t expect attention from anyone. I just wanted to survive and maybe breathe a little.

Then he sat beside me in Sociology class.

Not by choice, I think. All the back benches were full.

I remember glancing at him—dark hair, eyes too serious for someone our age, a bag that looked older than he was. His shoes were torn on the side, barely holding together. He didn’t try to hide it.

When the professor asked a question, everyone stayed quiet. But he raised his hand.

And when he spoke—

God, he didn’t speak like the others.

He didn’t stutter. He didn’t bluff.

He answered like someone who had lived the lesson.

That was the first time I noticed him.

A few weeks later, I found out he came from a basti in North Kolkata. That he traveled 2 hours every day just to reach college. That he worked part-time at a garage to afford Tanya’s school fees. That he skipped meals so his mother, Kamini ji, could buy her medicines.

He never said any of this himself. I heard it from others.

He never looked for sympathy.

He never asked for help.

But every time someone mocked him, called him “garage boy” or “charity case,” he didn’t flinch.

He just kept going.

I think that’s when I started falling.

Not in one big moment.

But slowly. Silently. Like water rising after rain.

We became friends before we became anything else.

I’d wait for him outside class, pretending I needed help with notes. He’d pretend not to notice my silly excuses. One day, I asked him to have tea with me, and he said,

“Are you sure you want to be seen with me?”

That broke my heart.

I nodded. “Maybe I’m the one who should be lucky to be seen with you.”

He laughed. Just a little. But it was the first time.

Then came the real him.

The Aryan who skipped sleep to stay by Tanya’s side when she had a fever.

The Aryan who touched his mother’s feet before leaving for class every day.

The Aryan who gave me his umbrella in a thunderstorm, then walked home in the rain with cracked sandals.

He never had much. But with him, I felt like I had everything.

One evening, we sat on the hostel rooftop.

I asked, “What do you want from life?”

He looked at the sky and said, “Peace. For Ma. And a future for Tanya. That’s it. Meera, I’m not made for big dreams.”

“You are,” I whispered. “You just don’t know it yet.”

He turned to me. “And what about you?”

I smiled. “I think I just want to love someone who makes me feel seen.”

He didn’t say anything. But his hand found mine. Calloused. Warm. Steady.

That was the night I knew.

I loved Aryan Kapoor.

Not for what he had.

Not for what he could give.

But for who he was when the world wasn’t watching.

And maybe that’s why the pain is unbearable now.

Because the boy I loved would’ve never let me walk away.

The boy I met on that rooftop… wouldn’t have become this stranger.

But before everything shattered—before silence and distance swallowed us whole—there was this boy.

This boy with cracked shoes, fire in his eyes, and a world on his shoulders.

And I… I fell in love with the way he carried it all.