November faded.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBhFSLcdoL9
December froze.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx7EoVhUlh8
January drifted by in silence.
Three months passed, and with every day, I kept asking myself the same questions.
What happened?120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSBPOZkKk8U
Why the sudden change?120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4pOUxKgOye
What about everything we planned for — the little things, the big things, the quiet promises, the late-night talks, the classes?
Had it all meant nothing?
While I kept overthinking and pretending to be okay, the third semester slipped by.
And the fourth began.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNJKftqWsN2
At the end of January.
Still no response from her.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgExpy7wFec
No message.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRarXcoRio8
No eye contact.
I told myself — maybe she’s just thinking about her future.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFn40w7yGCM
Maybe it’s a phase.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn8JHa3Yk6i
Maybe she’ll return when she's ready.
That’s when I got selected into Owl Coder. along with some other second years.
One of the most prestigious training programs our college had.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVtTzHQdoYW
It was meant for the third years.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1lIMos0lzj
But I got in — in my second year.
It should’ve felt like a crown.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqiQI7MPwBo
But all I felt was the hollow absence of someone to place it on my head.
She wasn’t there to hear the news.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd9hVBj6D4h
To congratulate me.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrT0au1u94O
To tease me.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC5eaBzaWxd
To be proud.
And that silence made the success… feel like ash.
The Owl Coder program was intense.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsmLulEM5VI
It started at 5 PM and ended at midnight — with just a dinner break in between.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtoDTn4jQDC
We were expected to stay in the hostel throughout.
No sunlight.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6hsjSQeSZD
No sleep.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSxUWv9hdUI
No time.
I was running on caffeine, coping with cold metal bunk beds and the constant hum of exhausted ambition.
So during the day’s technical hub sessions…120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvlCM7VUI29
I slept.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAi906dEYkv
An excuse disguised as exhaustion.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEroHOodvJr
A mask for what I couldn’t confess — that I just didn’t have it in me anymore.
This semester's subjects were Operating Systems and DBMS.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtCE6AfjZ7R
Three days a week in Thub, threee days in regular classes.
There went my attendance…120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbdjwPrX67Y
Flying out the window like a bird that no longer cared to return.
Inside Owl Coder, I got to know how selections happened.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRfliohn2Aa
How people were noticed.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡA4OXA7BcR3
How chances bloomed and vanished in a blink.
All I wanted to do was explain it all to her.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuNi7RuvV2S
To help her — even if I could no longer be near her.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhmPBptrVEO
Even if I was just a background character now.
I texted her.
Asked if she could meet in the library — just for a moment.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnWew5zZaOI
I waited.
She replied:
“I’ll be late. I have class.”
That was it.
A sentence.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYoXSriXphj
A dagger.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ9TDiTdy1D
A quiet way of saying, You’re not important enough to wait for.
And yet I still hoped.
Then one evening, everything cracked.
I was walking toward the hostel.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxs3JXGr4zw
From the buses, through the mango gardens — one of the quietest, most serene places in our campus.
I saw her.
Sitting under the trees.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIBrrbu46y8
With Ren.
Talking.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVFQShANWX7
Smiling.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡES325AYdZ8
Laughing.
I couldn’t stop.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqSsjFamM1y
I couldn’t go back.
I ran past them — like a ghost of someone who once mattered.
My heart screamed:
“Why… can you talk to him, but not to me?”120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6r5ME3yisr
“What did I do… that made me forgettable?”120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6wDiDcjMMi
Or its just maybe me, who is overthinking.
The following days blurred.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzpElPDt8H2
I wasn’t myself.
A haunted version of who I once was —120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2afgAJmPsT
Lost in old texts, lost in memories.
I texted her again.
This time, everything I had.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVyo225bTEo
Every unspoken word.
She replied.
It was reassuring.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmQ85wtwxti
Warm, maybe.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHWQBWamnzV
But it felt forced — like something written more out of duty than care.
And that’s when it happened.
She became a stranger.
The third name I gave her.
She said:
“I have a lot going on. I don’t want to get involved. I care for you…”
Then why did I feel like I only existed in her joy?
Was I meant to only be her comfort, her tutor, her support —120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGEQhls031l
and when the storms came, someone to lock away?
Was I disposable when I hurt, but valuable when she smiled?
Then the final blow.
I heard she wouldn’t be continuing in Technical Hub anymore.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxOw4sCHpHD
That she was stepping away from the journey we once shared.
My chest sank.
It was true.
She was walking a road I would never again walk beside her.
Still… I wrote to her.
One heartfelt message.
Encouraging her.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9DLiDi0275
Reminding her of how much potential she had.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJawMsWr4W8
That the world still waited for her — even if I no longer did.
She replied:
“That made my day…”
And maybe that was enough.
Maybe, sometimes, we don't get closure.120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2oO08JpVVn
We just get moments like this —120Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW6GAD23bNN
A soft echo that reminds us it was real… once.
Even if now, all that remains is a ghost, a third name, and a message.
ns216.73.216.25da2
