And then, quietly, I turned around.
Returned the umbrella to Krish with a soft thank-you, still half-soaked and half-lost in the moment.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm6MDs6353z
After that, I didn’t rush. I didn’t need to.
I just wandered around the campus as the rain calmed, the sky grey but not cruel anymore.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ49aJD4PeNi
The kind of grey that feels… numb.
Eventually, the buses roared back to life — ready to take us back to our homes and our silences.
I climbed onto mine. Bus 495.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSy7KMRNSpk
And sat by the window.
Cold.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoJPwW1KxcZ
Yet somehow warm.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡR06UzFwAJi
Bittersweet, like holding hands in a dream just before waking up.
That evening —56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3nN9CfNcTB
she messaged me:56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRxP2i1IC33
“It’s been a while since we talked like this…”
And my heart quietly broke.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡI6MlR1KgOQ
Not from pain.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVmfZVX5cXg
But from the gentle ache of knowing that this — this fleeting, shared moment —56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡywHMXExBek
was all I’d ever asked for.
The silences. The rain.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrwOuCZ8eng
The way we forgot the world together.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW9gsF10BH0
Just for a little while.
And so, once again, I gave her a name.
Forevermore.
Not some name I pulled from the air.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVEGxchXWZN
Not just for the poetry of it.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHvXlyROjvT
But because I’ve been naming all the versions of her I’ve seen.
Not her, exactly.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡde7nMw8vxG
But the her I’ve met at different crossroads.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8YlBWkDYOt
The her who felt like home in passing moments.
Each one of them…56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGxAKNosPlh
so very different.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpduH3vLCyr
And yet, so unmistakably her.
Days passed.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhElWNdvULW
The storm that was my heart calmed too.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBUhyV7L8fs
Life didn’t stop — it never does.
Semester 2 had begun.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ48cEwm6pWe
We were already halfway through our first year.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡs6W0JEC3VF
Funny. Five months vanished like mist in morning sunlight.
Thub remained the constant — our place to learn and forget ourselves.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8go7YnEzAm
This time, they were teaching DSA.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ0uCEDJEbE
Classes now held at Ratan Tata Bhavan, a little more formal, a little less raw.
It felt the same as the first semester…56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOWzv9R9AJn
Except now, Ren was often with us.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbtYrVrnffz
Or rather, with her.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtKr9PyGM0d
And I?56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBdcUu33v8R
I floated somewhere in between.
Still, I shared my world with her.
I introduced her to my seniors — people who meant something to me.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxn0PtF5uCQ
And among them, she grew fond of Ariel.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJkSK3qz6ZP
A not-so-innocent senior, playful and sharp,56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeByAIkpA9e
but with a charm that made her laugh in ways I hadn’t seen in a while.
And maybe that was okay.
As the semester unfolded, I met others too.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqdGgGGiw5J
People who walked up to me not for who I was,56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2F1EEmhhVu
but for what I could do.
They saw the coder.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXJcelf5PCY
The guy who wins contests.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡA22KR7vgb5
The guy who can explain recursion in five minutes.
But never me.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnLWj1WPOh3
Not the full picture.
I didn’t mind.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDBPqE0j1MZ
I had grown used to it.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ50BJQTlQlS
People don’t really care —56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ37aqNMQ4El
they care about what’s useful.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMhId3GniUH
What they can gain.
And honestly,56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQJMul6mXua
I never really cared about them either.
Because I had her.56Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡw8rBrRykcg
Forevermore.
And the name itself said everything I couldn’t.
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