Class 12 had already begun.
Not like a dramatic announcement or a sudden shift—but like a quiet pressure settling into Ira’s chest, day after day. The same classroom. The same benches carved with years of names and half-hearted promises. The same teachers repeating the same warnings: this year decides everything.
Ira sat by the window, sunlight falling across her notebook as she copied notes carefully. Outside, the school ground buzzed with noise—students laughing, shouting, living. Inside, she tried to keep up the act of being fine.
She wasn’t alone.
Isha sat beside her, chewing on the end of her pen, whispering complaints about the math teacher. Kartik sat two benches ahead, turning around every few minutes to crack a joke. Kamiyar sat near the aisle, pretending to listen while secretly sketching random things in his notebook.
This was her world.
With them, Ira laughed easily. With them, she didn’t feel invisible.
“Boards will kill us,” Kartik said dramatically during lunch break.
“Speak for yourself,” Isha replied. “I plan to survive and glow up after.”
Ira smiled, watching them banter. Moments like these felt stolen—small pockets of happiness squeezed between expectations and fear.
But even here, even in the middle of laughter, her mind wandered.
The boy next door.
The one who had shifted to Sharma uncle’s place just yesterday.
She didn’t know his name. Didn’t know where he came from. Only knew the quiet intensity of his eyes and the strange stillness that had passed between them on the terrace.
“Earth to Ira,” Isha whispered, nudging her. “Where did you disappear?”
“Nowhere,” Ira replied quickly.
Isha raised an eyebrow. “Liar. You look like someone’s living rent-free in your head.”
Ira laughed it off. “You imagine too much.”
Isha was her best friend—the kind you told everything to. And yet, there were corners of Ira’s heart even Isha couldn’t reach. Some feelings were too confusing, too fragile to name.
School days passed like this.
Classes. Tuitions. Homework. Laughter during breaks. Stress during exams. Slowly, steadily, time moved.
Four months slipped by.
The pressure increased. Boards felt closer. Teachers became stricter. Parents more anxious.
And somewhere along the way, Isha forgot about the boy next door.
Ira didn’t.
She never spoke about him again. Never mentioned the way she sometimes glanced at the terrace at night. Never admitted that some evenings, she hoped to see a familiar silhouette.
Because while Ira tried to move on, Aarav hadn’t.
Aarav’s life existed in a completely different rhythm.
His mornings began in a spacious apartment near his college—clean, quiet, efficient. No shouting. No chaos. Just expectations hanging heavy in the air.
He was pursuing engineering in computer science.
Top college. Top branch. Exactly what was expected of him.
In classrooms filled with ambition, Aarav fit in effortlessly. He answered questions without hesitation. Submitted assignments on time. Scored well without celebration.
He had one real friend.
Vardaan.
Vardaan was loud where Aarav was quiet, expressive where Aarav was guarded. They had met during their first semester and somehow stuck.
“You’re not human,” Vardaan often joked. “No stress. No panic. Just existing.”
Aarav only smiled.
Vardaan knew almost everything—his habits, his moods, his silence.
But not his past.
Not the nights that still woke him up. Not the memories he refused to name. Not the girl whose tears had carved a permanent space inside him.
Aarav never talked about Ira.
He didn’t need to.
She existed quietly—in the way he paused on his terrace some nights. In the way his eyes searched familiar rooftops without logic. In the way he sometimes walked to the nearby CG flat, pretending he needed air.
He told himself it was coincidence.
He knew it wasn’t.
Vardaan noticed his restlessness.
“You disappear a lot,” Vardaan said one evening as they sat outside the hostel. “Everything okay?”
“Just tired,” Aarav replied.
Vardaan studied him for a moment but didn’t push. “You know,” he said lightly, “if you ever want to talk—”
“I’m fine,” Aarav cut in.
He always was.
Or at least, that’s what everyone believed.
Back in school, Ira felt herself changing.
She studied harder. Spoke less. Laughed when needed.
At home, nothing changed. Expectations remained unspoken but heavy. Comparisons continued quietly.
At school, Isha tried to keep things light.
“After boards, we’ll breathe,” she promised.
Ira nodded, unsure if she believed it.
Some nights, she climbed to the terrace with her books. Some nights, she just sat there, staring at the sky.
Sometimes, she thought she saw movement across the wall.
Sometimes, she imagined it.
She never waved.
Neither did he.
Two lives.
Two worlds.
Running parallel—close enough to feel, far enough to never touch.
For now.
Because some connections don’t need conversation to survive.
They wait.
And time, sooner or later, forces them to collide.
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