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.63Please respect copyright.PENANAqaPByqsOJx
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.63Please respect copyright.PENANAPJCtzmDdKn
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 495.63Please respect copyright.PENANAFKeZwcSzxz
And sat by the window.
Cold.63Please respect copyright.PENANA5cDU0kimwC
Yet somehow warm.63Please respect copyright.PENANAYFiqrCl1qj
Bittersweet, like holding hands in a dream just before waking up.
That evening —63Please respect copyright.PENANAFTSdZqzL70
she messaged me:63Please respect copyright.PENANAjGNn9yeW4r
“It’s been a while since we talked like this…”
And my heart quietly broke.63Please respect copyright.PENANA5X1lubrTrA
Not from pain.63Please respect copyright.PENANAbFRWlvDvhS
But from the gentle ache of knowing that this — this fleeting, shared moment —63Please respect copyright.PENANALx66nGnU32
was all I’d ever asked for.
The silences. The rain.63Please respect copyright.PENANAmOIVUijydK
The way we forgot the world together.63Please respect copyright.PENANACHWXffSvqc
Just for a little while.
And so, once again, I gave her a name.
Forevermore.
Not some name I pulled from the air.63Please respect copyright.PENANAt8fkjLuJRA
Not just for the poetry of it.63Please respect copyright.PENANAo1oDj7gqk6
But because I’ve been naming all the versions of her I’ve seen.
Not her, exactly.63Please respect copyright.PENANA3cq7E1hlZ7
But the her I’ve met at different crossroads.63Please respect copyright.PENANANZ0Zv2IXiv
The her who felt like home in passing moments.
Each one of them…63Please respect copyright.PENANA2XVUMXviJI
so very different.63Please respect copyright.PENANAQPV1DH1MOp
And yet, so unmistakably her.
Days passed.63Please respect copyright.PENANAg6K4RGndH3
The storm that was my heart calmed too.63Please respect copyright.PENANA9AA4zfd4Ms
Life didn’t stop — it never does.
Semester 2 had begun.63Please respect copyright.PENANAevbBI9y1N5
We were already halfway through our first year.63Please respect copyright.PENANAio9HMULRiR
Funny. Five months vanished like mist in morning sunlight.
Thub remained the constant — our place to learn and forget ourselves.63Please respect copyright.PENANAO0E2sErqsQ
This time, they were teaching DSA.63Please respect copyright.PENANAwtm8Nu9Q6R
Classes now held at Ratan Tata Bhavan, a little more formal, a little less raw.
It felt the same as the first semester…63Please respect copyright.PENANAIAYrQkVCfR
Except now, Ren was often with us.63Please respect copyright.PENANAgKjbgBfWf5
Or rather, with her.63Please respect copyright.PENANAIM3burGIha
And I?63Please respect copyright.PENANA8un5c2b3Ab
I floated somewhere in between.
Still, I shared my world with her.
I introduced her to my seniors — people who meant something to me.63Please respect copyright.PENANAxLdyCvSsV5
And among them, she grew fond of Ariel.63Please respect copyright.PENANAzMJiH8xh9I
A not-so-innocent senior, playful and sharp,63Please respect copyright.PENANAaje3nTT547
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.63Please respect copyright.PENANAtmQb36WyO1
People who walked up to me not for who I was,63Please respect copyright.PENANAhkjLQtEhm6
but for what I could do.
They saw the coder.63Please respect copyright.PENANAfgHEheAN34
The guy who wins contests.63Please respect copyright.PENANABvEQ3ZwGn5
The guy who can explain recursion in five minutes.
But never me.63Please respect copyright.PENANAyoGzntZ3Op
Not the full picture.
I didn’t mind.63Please respect copyright.PENANA3OaH0fbnQT
I had grown used to it.63Please respect copyright.PENANAznv6UKAycc
People don’t really care —63Please respect copyright.PENANAkkNNooGwxx
they care about what’s useful.63Please respect copyright.PENANAjI0KjMhjud
What they can gain.
And honestly,63Please respect copyright.PENANAxWmAHZ61Sj
I never really cared about them either.
Because I had her.63Please respect copyright.PENANATL3KTckm7G
Forevermore.
And the name itself said everything I couldn’t.
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