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.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEisMMEizQt
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.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡED8R5zWbzL
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 495.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡABrOEhsuRo
And sat by the window.
Cold.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZnTHGPCZIF
Yet somehow warm.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvEEvBcyyum
Bittersweet, like holding hands in a dream just before waking up.
That evening —57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRVf9rg5Bgr
she messaged me:57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSgXWkx1MV0
“It’s been a while since we talked like this…”
And my heart quietly broke.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVXkGHPbxTm
Not from pain.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkAd2jfwaDu
But from the gentle ache of knowing that this — this fleeting, shared moment —57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIuz6gMUIO4
was all I’d ever asked for.
The silences. The rain.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgobQk26t2y
The way we forgot the world together.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCut9XYP2zU
Just for a little while.
And so, once again, I gave her a name.
Forevermore.
Not some name I pulled from the air.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzreBtfKlNY
Not just for the poetry of it.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2Tid8OFBiQ
But because I’ve been naming all the versions of her I’ve seen.
Not her, exactly.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtWWOzSlENz
But the her I’ve met at different crossroads.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3Rfe0IIuqN
The her who felt like home in passing moments.
Each one of them…57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡde6wmg6BVC
so very different.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3GDzfGxfBM
And yet, so unmistakably her.
Days passed.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡA5SwwUgTCU
The storm that was my heart calmed too.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW3osLhZst3
Life didn’t stop — it never does.
Semester 2 had begun.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyh5auy5DfX
We were already halfway through our first year.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwxNRyNwKyD
Funny. Five months vanished like mist in morning sunlight.
Thub remained the constant — our place to learn and forget ourselves.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUlzNFmLz16
This time, they were teaching DSA.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYE2AP4FoJj
Classes now held at Ratan Tata Bhavan, a little more formal, a little less raw.
It felt the same as the first semester…57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTYOJHTWkdQ
Except now, Ren was often with us.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmxge4yYXAw
Or rather, with her.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlzOQgWv1df
And I?57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqDoCLItgcD
I floated somewhere in between.
Still, I shared my world with her.
I introduced her to my seniors — people who meant something to me.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡp9NFFrc7JO
And among them, she grew fond of Ariel.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6NNqw4Rbqf
A not-so-innocent senior, playful and sharp,57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCXqVjXb8Wx
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.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEhhC8H66TA
People who walked up to me not for who I was,57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTKEEubwOIf
but for what I could do.
They saw the coder.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOPjRIU6z2w
The guy who wins contests.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ36j0d6P4ZD
The guy who can explain recursion in five minutes.
But never me.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfDQV9GFBSY
Not the full picture.
I didn’t mind.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBEjlOWOmon
I had grown used to it.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡS6umLzuxTW
People don’t really care —57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf3VuNETt10
they care about what’s useful.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmRF4e4qJNi
What they can gain.
And honestly,57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZ2bQaWpeK9
I never really cared about them either.
Because I had her.57Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9gA0BlVYJ0
Forevermore.
And the name itself said everything I couldn’t.
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