her.

how it began

somewhere in 2024 · Free Fire · a friend group lobby

we met in a game.
we were never supposed to.

Free Fire — Dynamic Duo

It wasn't some grand, cinematic meeting. No slow motion. No dramatic lighting. Just a friend group lobby in Free Fire, a bunch of strangers, and her — somewhere in the middle of all that noise, quietly existing. I didn't use a mic back then. Too awkward. Too afraid. So we never actually spoke. We just played. Side by side. Two people who didn't know yet that they were already becoming something.

After the game, we exchanged Instagrams. Some messages. The kind that feel casual until you read them again at 2am and realize — nothing about this was casual. And then, without warning, she was gone. Blocked. Unfriended from the game. No explanation. No goodbye. Just — absence, where she used to be.

I told myself it didn't matter. That it was just a game. That I barely knew her. And then the universe, with its terrible sense of humor, put her in another friend group I was in. There she was again. And I think she remembered me — because something in her eyes shifted the moment we were in the same space. Like a song you forgot you knew, starting to play.

This time, we actually talked. Really talked. She told me things. I told her things. The kind of things you don't say unless someone makes you feel safe enough to. We'd stay up way too late — not because either of us planned to, but because neither of us wanted to be the first to say goodnight. She'd send voice notes at odd hours. I'd reply with paragraphs. She'd respond with one line that somehow said more than everything I'd written. That was her. That was always her.

I named her Proo — her first alias, the name only I had for her — and it felt like I was claiming a small piece of her that the world didn't get to touch.

0 mini-breakups
in a few months.
5 to 10 days each.
and every time,
we came back.

We became a Dynamic Duo. That's what the game calls it when two people keep choosing each other, keep surviving together, keep showing up. And we did. Over and over. Even through the little breakups — those ridiculous, heartbreaking, five-to-ten-day silences that came out of nowhere and ended just as suddenly. The Dynamic Duo badge would reset. And we'd rebuild it. Every single time.

I used to think we were just bad at this. Now I think we were just too real for anything simple.

She was childish in the best way — the way that makes ordinary Tuesday evenings feel like the kind of memory you'll want back someday. She didn't know how to be anything other than completely, dangerously herself. And I — I didn't know how to be anywhere other than right next to her.

before it got complicated

She was childish in the best possible way. Not immature — just untouched by the part of growing up that makes people stop playing. She could turn a regular game night into the funniest two hours of your week without even trying. She had this way of reacting to things — dramatic, genuine, completely unfiltered — that made you want to keep talking just to see what she'd say next.

There was this thing she did when something was genuinely funny — she'd go quiet first. Like she was trying to hold it in. And then it would just break out of her and she'd laugh too hard and too long and sometimes get embarrassed about how much she laughed. I loved that. I loved that the most.

I called her Proo. Her first alias. The name I gave her before I even understood why I was the one naming her things. Before I knew that naming something is just another way of saying — you're mine to keep.

And for a little while, the world was just the two of us, playing a game, sharing a screen, choosing each other over and over — the way people do before they realize what they're doing, before it becomes something too heavy to hold casually.

who she actually is

She is the kind of person who makes you feel like the conversation just started, even when it's been hours. She doesn't perform. She doesn't try to be interesting. She just — is. Completely, uncomplicatedly herself, in a way that most people spend their whole lives trying to unlearn.

She gets dramatic about small things. Not in an exhausting way — in the way that makes small things feel like events worth caring about. A bad game round. A stupid argument. Something funny that happened that she can't stop bringing up. She commits to the moment entirely. No half-presence. No phone-checking-while-you-talk. When she's in, she's in.

She's funny without trying. The kind of funny that comes from being honest instead of performative — she'll say the exact true thing at the exact wrong moment and you'll laugh before you've even processed it. And then she'll look at you like she didn't even mean to be funny, which makes it worse.

She's also stubborn. She'll dig into a position she knows is wrong just because she doesn't want to be the one to back down first. We'd break up over the most ridiculous things — five days here, ten days there — and it was always somehow both our faults and neither of our faults. She's infuriating. She's perfect. She is somehow both at the same time, always.

everything I keep

I can't explain the whole of you.
So I learned to love you in pieces —
and somehow that made you feel even more infinite.

her without makeup
her laugh that fills the whole room
her communicating — even when the words were hard
her playful attitude that made ordinary things feel like events
her adorable smile — the small one, not the posed one
her delicate hands and how they moved when she talked
her beautiful eyes that said things before she did
her with makeup — like art deciding to walk
her perfect face at 3am in bad lighting
her mannerisms — the ones she probably didn't notice
her personality — complicated, warm, real
her eyelashes casting small shadows on her cheeks
her structure — like someone drew her very carefully
her long hair and what she did with it when nervous
her glances — the ones that were only ever for me
her humor that caught me completely off guard
her height — the way she fit into spaces
her voice — a sound I still hear in quiet rooms
her teeth when she laughed too hard to care
her style — effortless and entirely her
her lips mid-sentence saying something I always forgot to reply to
her silences — which were never empty
her presence — how a room changed when she entered it
her.

fragments

I still wake up thinking I need to tell you things.

And every time I remember I can't,

something inside me folds in on itself a little tighter.

I may look like I have it all together,

but one hug from you

and I'll completely break down.

III

maybe I'm delusional,

but I like to believe

good things

are choosing me too.

we knew

too early

and still

too late

what we were —

something

that could feel like home

but never

be lived in.

I still look for the place

where 'you' stopped being part of 'we'.

I've been looking for a long time.

I'm not sure I want to find it.

The first time she heard my voice,

she laughed — not at me,

just at the fact that I'd been there this whole time,

silent, hiding behind a mic I never turned on.

"You never talk," she said.

"I talk to you," I said.

She didn't reply for a moment.

That moment was everything.

VII

A quiet meridian passes through me.

One side still orbiting your gravity.

The other,

learning the slow art

of returning to itself.

I suppose in the end,

every map eventually chooses a center.

in the mother tongue

Prem patjhad hai
Prem hi basant

उसके साथ मंदिर जाने से
उसके लिए मंदिर जाने तक का सफर।

Chamakte chand ko mai
Haantho mein yun bhar loon
Ae... raat andhi tu ho jaye.

Jab tak jahaan mein mera naam hai
Tab tak mere naam tu

क्या तुम्हें पता है मेरी हत्या के बाद
तुम्हारी बची उम्र का क्या होगा

tujh ko dariya-dili ki qasam, saqiya!

for the sake of generosity, swear upon it, o bartender!

mustaqil daur par daur chaltaa rahe!

keep the round of drinks flowing one after another!

raunaq-e-meyqada yuñ hi badhti rahe —

the flock and jolly of the winehouse shall only get better —

ek girtaa rahe, ek sambhaltaa rahe!

one shall stumble, another shall get steady!

VIII

every day, i choose you again.

not in some soft, fairytale kind of way.

in the ugly way.

in the bloodshot eyes, shaking hands,

screaming-into-the-pillow kind of way.

i choose you when i hate you.

i choose you when you ruin me.

I CHOOSE YOU WHEN I'M LYING TO MYSELF,
SAYING I DESERVE PEACE.
I DON'T WANT PEACE. I WANT YOU.

I think I loved you in a way that only works in movies.

The kind where timing is cruel

and the music swells at the wrong moment,

and two people almost choose each other forever.

You said we'd find each other again someday.

I think that's what people say

when they already know they won't.

I memorized it anyway.

I say it sometimes —

when I need to believe in something.

"I loved only you,

and I chose you every time,

because to me you were never just a person —

you were my person."

But you're not nerdy enough to understand.

XII

my final act of love this

my final act of love that

how do you stop loving someone

to actually give them a final act of love?

XIII

I begged.

and begged

until I couldn't anymore.

XIV

i dont know how to continue being your nothing.

I was good.

I was so good.

I wish you were here to see my achievement.

I wish I could share this with you.

XVI

You were never present

and yet your absence bothers me a lot.

XVII

Uski jagah toh ab shayad wo bhi nhi le sakti.

XVIII

A part of me is still waiting for you.

I hate that.

XIX

i breathe her in without thinking.

if it wasn't her,

it won't be anyone.

XXI

I don't trust people who say they've "moved on."

Most of us just learn which thoughts to avoid

to keep functioning.

XXII

Does it get better?

No.

But it becomes worth it.

XXIII

Love is not a fairytale.

It is a fragile, fleeting emotion.

The opposite of love is not hatred.

It is indifference.

XXIV

Everything seems so beautiful

that it starts to hurt.

The sunset is beautiful because it is ending.

A song is beautiful because it fades.

A person is beautiful because they are mortal.

There's something bittersweet in beauty.

XXV

Everyone believes they are right.

Everyone has reasons.

Everyone has wounds they are protecting.

XXVI

Love demands courage.

They chose comfort.

XXVII

"I want you always to remember me.

Will you remember that I existed,

and that I stood next to you here like this?"

"Always," I said. "I'll always remember."

XXVIII

— You are perfect as you are…

— Maybe…

but I would still belong to someone

who doesn't belong to me.

Today and always.

XXIX

I never really learned emotional maturity.

I suppressed my own feelings

just to understand others,

maintain peace,

or avoid rejection.

Emotional maturity, I think,

is about respecting both yourself and others.

Knowing how to set boundaries.

How to say no without being disrespectful.

How to be honest without being cruel.

XXX

Some people are born only to save someone else.

XXXI

The flower doesn't bloom to be seen.

It blooms because it's a flower.

XXXII

I. is not Love.

Love is not I.

And yet somehow —

I only know both through her.

XXXIII

A man who has nothing of his own to take pride in

always turns to his caste, color, and religion.

So next time someone shames you —

about something that makes you you —

it's just their insecurities speaking.

It has nothing to do with you at all.

Just forgive, and move on.

XXXIV

Once you become a certain age,

it is your responsibility

to unlearn behaviors

that hinder your growth as a person.

XXXV

If the truth matters so much,

why do falsehoods flourish?

We all are selective liars.

XXXVI

People say obsession isn't love.

Maybe they're right.

But I know what I feel

and I know what I want

and I know that no amount of time,

no amount of distance,

no amount of reasonable advice

has changed a single thing.

I WANT HER.
SPECIFICALLY HER.
ONLY HER.

Call it what you want.

I call it knowing.

—

I called her Proo.

Her first alias. My private word for her.

She had other names in the world —

names her parents chose,

names her friends used,

names that belonged to everyone.

But Proo was mine.

The name that existed

only inside the small universe

we built and broke and rebuilt

in a game no one else understood.

I still can't explain why naming her felt so important.

I think it was the only way I knew how to say —

you are something specific to me.

You are not just anybody.

XXXVII

I imagine everything with her.

Every version of a future.

Every quiet morning.

Every ordinary moment made extraordinary

just because she is in it.

And then I remember none of it is real.

And then I imagine it again.

XXXVIII

I overthink. I overstress.

I replay conversations that ended long ago.

I rewrite things I should have said.

I rehearse things I will never get to say.

With everyone else — this never stops.

It is exhausting. It is constant.

BUT WITH HER — IT WENT QUIET.

That is what I miss most.

Not even her.

The silence she gave me inside my own head.

XXXIX

I don't say this lightly.

I have people who love me.

Family. Friends. People who stayed.

And I love her more than all of them.

That is not something I am proud of.

It is just something that is true.

And I have stopped pretending otherwise.

on love

—

I used to think the most important thing

was to have common interests —

the same books, the same movies, a favourite city.

But I've learned it's not about that.

It's about being similar in kindness.

In the way you treat people.

In the way you hold space for their flaws

and for your own.

It's about how you deal with anger —

not just whether you yell or stay quiet,

but whether you choose to return to each other

when the heat passes.

It's about knowing that you will both grow,

and that growing together

will require as much forgiveness as it does love.

— Gor

—

Being a good person is easy —

perhaps one of the most beautiful things in the world.

But it carries a cruel curse.

When you become too good to be real for someone,

they choose to leave.

And you are left standing alone

with nothing but regret,

questioning whether goodness itself

was your mistake.

Sometimes even the most giving hearts

need reciprocity.

—

Sometimes the wrong people feel like home

because "home" was never the safe place

we romanticised.

It was simply the first place

we learned to survive.

—

And maybe we'll realise

that the truest form of love

isn't to stand in front of them or behind them.

But beside them.

Not to lead. Not to follow.

Just to be there. Unshaken. Unafraid.

—

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,

there is a field.

I'll meet you there.

— Rumi

almost

—

I don't tell anyone,

but I still look for you in crowds.

Not because I believe you'll be there,

but because my mind hasn't learned the truth

my heart already knows.

—

there's an intimacy in "how did you know that?"

that no grand declaration can touch.

a kind of love that lives in the smallest,

most ordinary gestures.

—

"How do I say 'hello' to the one who's always there?

In my heavy head, in my broken heart

and in the creases of my palms

clenched into fists full of longing.

You're always here but never near.

You never arrive; you never leave."

— s.i.n

—

maybe you don't end up with the person you love.

maybe that's not how life works.

maybe love changes —

from late night calls until dawn

to "i don't wanna talk, let me sleep."

from "i understand, i'm here,"

to "why are you overthinking so much?"

from "i love you,"

to "i love myself now."

—

Stuck between

"tu hoti toh, kya hota"

and

"tu hoti toh, ye sab nahi hota."

—

You're sunlight through a window,

which I stand in, warmed.

— Jessie Burton

to her

—

I would still choose you,

even knowing we only touch each other's lives

long enough to make leaving irreversible,

that everything I become

carries the shape of what I didn't keep.

But you're just not nerdy enough to understand that.

—

You, my love,

have the right to break me

piece by piece.

You, my love,

have the power to make me

whole again.

You, my love,

are allowed to do

whatever you want with my heart.

—

The ghar we built together,

the one you carried away with you —

keep it safe. take care of it.

For one day, I might come back to claim it again.

—

It is my privilege that I can cry over my love.

But you, my love, you are so strong.

Even without speaking to anyone,

you continue to love me.

I may never be able to do that.

Perhaps that is why you are greater than me.

—

मैं तुझे अपनी हर एक नज़्म में लिखूँगा,

मैं तुझे अपनी हर एक नज़्म से जीना चाहूँगा।

—

Ik dafa mujhse milne aa jao,

kuch na lao — tum khud aa jao.

—

I am afraid of some songs.

Some songs strip me bare,

exposing my very existence.

They throw all my memories at my face —

the ones I have been trying to escape.

They break me, piece by piece.

Every breath begins to ache.

My heart starts crying,

yet my eyes refuse to shed tears.

—

There's a part of you that keeps me breathing,

and another that breaks me a little more each day.

—

I am yours,

not in part, not in passing,

but utterly, irrevocably —

as breath belongs to life,

and flame to fire,

I belong to you.

december, november, january

—

January has always held a special place in my heart.

It carries a deep sense of nostalgia,

wrapped in warmth, familiarity,

and a homely comfort.

It feels like a homecoming

after a long, arduous battle,

where the soul finally finds rest.

—

Last year, around this very time,

I was with her —

and these flowers were a part of our days.

I used to send her photos of them,

never knowing their true significance,

yet somehow they always felt like her.

A few days ago, when I saw these blooms again,

her memory returned quietly —

and an involuntary smile touched my face.

A year has passed. New flowers have grown.

Seasons have changed.

But she's no longer here.

Still — these flowers and this November

will always carry her echoes.

—

I'm ending December without you.

I'm ending this year without you.

I'M ENDING MYSELF WITHOUT YOU.

—

It's not just December that has arrived —

it has come carrying your memories.

Maybe every December will remind me of you.

—

In December my grief becomes imprecise,

all is hurting,

all is blue.

— Vesmir

—

They say time isn't linear.

So somewhere, we're still laughing,

still whole,

still in love —

before the collapse.

—

You walked away,

but I was still there…

I'm still there.

I'm still here.

I'm still here…..

—

When you think you've finally moved far away

from your past,

it somehow drags you right back into it.

All the effort, all the growth,

suddenly feels pointless.

Those flashbacks hit you out of nowhere,

making you shiver —

and before you realize it,

your confidence drops back down to zero.

—

You never truly leave a memory.

You simply place it

in a different pocket of your soul.

But you feel its weight pressing against you

with every step you take.

—

And when I am gone,

don't look for me in photos —

look for me

in the pauses

of the songs we both loved.

— Harvey

—

After you,

I will stop decorating our incomplete home

with flowers.

I will ensure every future bloom

is reserved for my funeral.

to yourself

—

Whenever you feel sad —

try to talk to little children if you can.

And if you can't,

watch videos of cute children online.

Somehow they bring a gentle sense of comfort

and heal parts of you

they never even hurt.

—

We laughed, we hurt, we grew apart,

but in the end,

I'm grateful for every shared second —

because even fleeting warmth leaves a mark.

—

To be seen, when you're quiet.

To be loved, when you're not strong.

To be held, without asking.

To be understood, without words.

To rest, without guilt.

To heal, without rushing.

To laugh, without pretending.

To be enough, just as you are.

To stop providing, and start existing.

To trust the silence that once scared you.

To find peace in the pieces that stayed.

To love softer.

To walk slower.

To feel deeper.

To finally come home — to you, yourself.

what love actually is

—

Love hurts. That's the deal.

It'll wreck your sleep, blur your appetite,

make you care about things

that used to roll off your back.

You'll write texts you'll never send.

You'll stare at doors they won't walk through anymore.

And you'll survive it. Barely.

But god — wasn't it beautiful?

Wasn't it holy for a moment?

We were not put on this planet to hoard safety.

We were built to burn for someone.

And even when they leave,

even when it ends with silence or slammed doors —

you loved. That's the point. That's the meaning.

Don't mourn the heartbreak.

Be grateful you felt anything at all.

—

We accept the love we think we deserve.

I just read that somewhere.

I haven't stopped thinking about it since.

—

People will come and say, "you deserve better."

Maybe they're even right.

But it was never about deserving better.

It was always about being with that person.

Love isn't something done logically.

Love is simply done —

through their soul, their voice, their eyes,

the way their hair ties up in a bun,

the two cups of tea you make together

and the conversations that fill those moments.

It's in remembering every tiny, lovely thing about them.

So it was never about deserving better.

—

A person says "I love you"

but still doesn't choose you.

People will love you when they want to,

or under certain conditions.

Unconditional love is just a lie.

—

Remember — dying for someone you love

is an act of honor.

But living for them

is godly.

It's a blessing. And way harder.

Take care of people you love by being better,

not by giving it up.

—

To love someone long term

is to attend a thousand funerals

of who they used to be.

the small things

—

My love language?

Taking screenshots after every call

just to keep our moments close.

—

I wonder if the things

that remind me of you

remind you of me.

—

तोहफे में क्या लाऊ?

फूल, कंगन, झुमके, पायल, काजल, किताबें

या

मैं ही आ जाऊ।

—

I never stopped writing you.

I just stopped signing it "us."

—

How do you know

when you love someone?

You just know.

And then you spend the rest of your life

trying to unknow it.

—

जब कहा था मोहब्बत गुनाह तो नहीं —

फिर गुनाह के बराबर सजा क्यों मिली?

things I want to do with you, and for you

—

I have this whole life I've been building in my head.

Not a fantasy. Not something vague.

Something specific, detailed, ours.

And the unbearable thing about loving someone

you haven't been given yet

is that the list just keeps growing.

Every day, something new I want to do for you.

Every day, something I'm saving.

Here's what I've saved so far.

—

Buy you lilies and sunflowers.

Carry your worries so you don't have to.

Hold you close when you feel low,

kiss you softly,

and run my fingers through your hair.

Take you out for panipuri and chai.

Surprise you with dinner at that little cafe you love.

Listen for hours to the story of your first crush

and your hardest heartbreak.

Make you small gifts with my own hands.

Write you long texts when I can't say things face to face.

Share earphones on crowded metro rides

while the world blurs around us.

Wait for you.

Pick up your heel on a rainy day

so you can walk barefoot — just the way you like.

Cook your favourite childhood dish

that your dadi used to make for you.

Look deep into your eyes

and never stop noticing their colour.

Remember the shade of the kurta you wore on our first date,

the colour you said suits me best,

and the pink-orange sky from the first time I saw you smile.

Kiss your forehead when you're tired.

Trace the scars on your hands

and listen to their stories —

because every mark is a part of your strength.

Take you to concerts where indie music fills the air.

Hold you close as we dance and sing along.

Visit art galleries that make you smile

and watch your eyes light up

when you find your favourite painting.

Cheer with you when India's playing cricket,

then share idli sambhar and dosa at our favourite roadside eatery after.

Argue about silly things

and then laugh so hard

that we forget what we were even fighting about.

Share chocolate chip ice cream on lazy afternoons — or midnight.

Plan our first small home.

Hold you close on cold nights.

Tell you every day how much I love you —

and somehow love you a little more

than I did the day before.

—

अगर सिमट जो उसकी बाहों में

तो भूल जाऊं सारे गम।

the house I grew up in

—

I grew up in a house

where love came with receipts.

be good.

be useful.

be quiet.

don't cry.

don't question.

don't need too much.

affection was a transaction.

apologies were currency.

approval was survival.

they called it care

but it felt like surveillance.

every move documented.

every mood dissected.

i learned to predict storms

by the way the floorboards creaked.

to shrink my volume

before their tempers rose.

in public, we were a picture —

smiles with cracked edges.

the kind of family that photographs well

and heals badly.

i became the calm one,

the fixer,

the apology machine.

a child pretending to be gravity

just to hold everything together.

and now —

i flinch at kindness.

i over-explain silence.

i confuse peace for boredom

and chaos for home.

i'm still learning

that love doesn't have to mean control,

that safety shouldn't feel like walking on eggshells,

that i don't have to earn my right to exist.

i'm learning to be a house

where the walls don't listen for anger.

where the air stays gentle.

where i can breathe

without permission.

what remains

—

There's a strange comfort in heartbreak.

It reminds you that you once had something

so alive it could die.

—

You still exist in the soft corners of my memory,

but you no longer own the whole room.

—

Tere pyar mein, dil haar ke —

maine kya paya,

kya gavaya.

—

I am yours,

not in part, not in passing,

but utterly —

There's this girl.

She's someone who can't be mine.

And I love her.

—

I wish I was special.

—

And if this is the last time

I speak of you in verse,

let it be known —

I never stopped waiting

for your eyes in the mirror,

for your breath in the silence,

for your name

to feel like home again.

But spring never had any mercy,

and neither does memory.

So I press my palms

to the broken glass and whisper —

"I loved you even when it hurt."

And let the final shard fall.

who I am

teenage years · hostel rooms · somewhere I never belonged

the boy who never
came home.

My entire teenage life was a hostel room. Four walls, a bed, a window that looked out at nothing that belonged to me.

While everyone else counted down the days to go home — packed bags early, called their parents, smiled the way people smile when they know something warm is waiting — I just watched. I didn't have that particular kind of happy. I didn't know where to put it even if I did.

Home wasn't a relief. Home was just another place where I didn't quite fit. At least in the hostel, the loneliness had a logical reason. At home it had no excuse — and that made it worse. I'd sit in the same house as my family and feel like I was watching them through glass. Present. Invisible. Both at once.

I don't talk much at home. I never forced anyone to give me anything — not attention, not affection, not even a conversation. Somewhere along the way I decided it was easier to need less than to ask and not receive.

So I became someone who asks for nothing. Who expects nothing. Who is quietly, completely fine — and quietly, completely not.

I don't mix well with people. Not in the easy way others seem to — walking into a room and just being there, effortlessly. I can't do that. I talk to myself more than I talk to anyone else. Full conversations, in my head. Arguments. Things I wish I'd said. Things I'll never say. I am my own most frequent company. And most days, I prefer it that way.

I like being alone. Not always loneliness — sometimes exactly what I choose. The screen. The quiet. The world at one remove. No performance required. No face to maintain. Mostly online, where the distance feels safer and the silence is less personal.

But here's the thing about people like me — people who have learned to need nothing, ask for nothing, make themselves small and silent and self-sufficient. When someone finally makes us feel like we don't have to do any of that. When someone just — sees us. Without explanation. Without performance. Without us having to shrink first.

We don't recover from that.
We were never built to recover from that.

the hostel years

class 9 onwards · every friday · a corridor that emptied without me

—

Every Friday,

the corridor would empty.

Bags dragged across floors.

Voices getting louder, then gone.

The smell of someone's mother's food

packed in tiffins they'd carry home.

And I would stand there

watching all of it —

the way you watch a film

you are not in.

Not sad, exactly.

Just — outside of something

everyone else was inside of.

I learned to call that normal.

I called it that for years.

—

The loneliest thing

isn't being alone.

It's being in a place

that is supposed to be home

and feeling nothing.

At least in the hostel

the loneliness made sense.

At home, it just sat there

with no excuse.

inside this particular kind of mind

—

It comes without warning.

One moment I'm fine.

The next —

something behind my ribs

starts collapsing.

And I can't explain it to anyone

because there is nothing to point at.

No event.

No trigger that would make sense

to someone who doesn't live

inside this particular kind of mind.

IT JUST HAPPENS.
AND I JUST SURVIVE IT.
ALONE. QUIETLY. AGAIN.

And then I say I'm fine.

Because what else do you say.

—

Social anxiety is not shyness.

It is the constant calculation

of whether you are too much

or not enough

before you've even opened your mouth.

It is rehearsing sentences

before you say them.

It is apologizing in advance

for taking up space.

It is going quiet in a room full of people

and telling yourself

you chose to.

I've been telling myself that for years.

I'm starting to not believe it.

—

I talk to myself

more than I talk to anyone.

Full conversations.

Both sides.

I know what they'd say.

I know what I'd say back.

I know how it ends.

The real ones never go that smoothly.

So I stick to the ones in my head.

before · after

before

I needed no one.

I expected nothing.

I asked for nothing.

I spoke mostly to myself.

I lived online because online was safe.

I kept the world at exactly the distance

where it couldn't disappoint me.

I called this independence.

I called this fine.

I believed both.

after

I check my phone first thing.

I replay conversations I shouldn't still have.

I notice songs differently.

I notice everything differently.

I want things now.

Specific things.

Her things.

And the distance I kept so carefully

means nothing anymore.

Because she was already inside it

before I thought to close the gate.

—

She didn't fix me.

She just made me realize

how much I needed fixing.

That's worse.

That's so much worse.

—

I spent years becoming someone

who didn't need anything from anyone.

And then she showed up.

AND I NEEDED EVERYTHING.

All at once.

From her.

Only her.

—

I grew up in a hostel.

Learned to sleep through other people's homesickness.

Learned to be fine.

Learned to be quiet.

Learned that needing things

was a problem I could solve

by needing less.

She undid all of it

in a few weeks

without even trying.

I don't know whether to be grateful

or wrecked.

I am both.

a letter I never sent

written in tears · 2–3 hours · Priyansh

Papa,

I kept waiting for the day your voice would soften when you said my name. I thought maybe if I tried harder — broke myself quieter, became smaller — you would finally see me as something worth holding gently.

But love shouldn't feel like something you have to earn by hurting.

And I was just a child, learning how to breathe in a place that always felt like I was drowning.

I don't hate you. I never did.

I just wish you had loved me in a way that didn't make me question if I deserved to exist at all.

I'm still learning how to forgive the silence, how to unlearn the fear, how to believe that I am not a mistake.

And maybe one day, I won't feel the need to apologize for being your child.

— Yours, still trying
Priyansh.

I don't know why I wrote this letter.
I hope none of you can relate to it.

learning to heal

—

Crazy how trauma isn't your fault

but it's your responsibility to heal.

—

I comfort myself through imaginary conversations

with the people I love.

—

In another life,

I hope I don't have to explain

how I want to be loved.

Or beg to be treated right.

—

I love when someone returns my efforts.

And that's so rare.

—

Even the strongest man

melts in the arms of his woman.

—

Jisko jana hoga — wo jayega.

Jisko rehna hoga,

wo kuch din rukega,

fir chala jayega.

—

I hope when love finds you

it feels like home.

I hope it is the kind of love

that doesn't make you feel like

you have to change or be someone else.

I hope you find a person who stays

when things get hard,

and who makes the good days feel even better.

You deserve someone who listens to your stories,

understands your silence,

and makes you feel safe.

I just want you to find a love that is steady and kind —

a place where you can finally stop searching,

because you know you are exactly where you belong.

notes to self

—

its actually funny

how i say nobody understands me

as if i understand myself enough.

how i say i wanna be loved the way i am

when i don't even like the way i am.

how i crave to be someone's priority

knowin damn well how narcissistic i am.

how i feel calm in chaos

and dull when it's actually calm.

how i desire to have everything

where detachment is something i've skilled over time.

i can't hold onto anything longer.

I WAS ALWAYS THE REPLACEABLE ONE.

—

some people just feel mad mid, fr —

not even cause their taste is bad,

but cause they remind me of my old self.

same cringe humor. same outdated slangs. everything.

I don't even hate them.

It just hits weird —

like, just evolve a lil.

The world already moved on.

Why are you still stuck there.

—

The irony of a job is —

even if you once loved the work,

turning it into a duty

slowly drains the joy out of it.

Like painting.

heralways. only. her.

we met in a game.we were never supposed to.

the boy who nevercame home.

we met in a game.
we were never supposed to.

the boy who never
came home.