Chapter 2: Chapters We Couldn’t Write
Two years ago.
The evening sun filtered through the curtains of the college library, scattering golden patterns on dust-laced books and half-read notebooks. Nivedya had always loved this hour — the time when the world slowed down just enough to feel the silence between the words.
That’s when he saw her for the first time.
Kisha.
Wearing a faded yellow kurti and silver jhumkas that danced with her every move, she wasn’t reading. She was... feeling the book in her hands. Her thumb slowly caressed the corner of the page, her eyes held a kind of intensity that Nivedya had only seen in characters of his unwritten poems.
She didn’t notice him — not yet. But he noticed everything.
It wasn’t love at first sight. It was recognition — as if a missing line in his soul had finally revealed itself.
For the next two weeks, they exchanged nothing more than glances and soft head nods. He would sit at his regular spot near the poetry aisle. She would occasionally hover around fiction, pretending not to see him — while secretly hoping he’d notice her.
And he always did.
One rainy evening, as fate would orchestrate it, there were only two seats left in the library. One beside Nivedya.
She sat.
The silence between them stretched awkwardly at first. Until he noticed the book in her hand.
“Virginia Woolf?” he asked, his voice softer than the raindrops outside.
She turned, surprised. “Yeah. I like her madness. It's honest.”
He smiled. “I prefer Rumi. His madness heals.”
And just like that, a door opened between them — one made of metaphors, not small talk.
Over the next few months, their bond became a sanctuary. They would talk for hours — about broken dreams, about music that hurt in a good way, about pain that made them stronger.
Nivedya would write letters he never gave her. Kisha would draw sketches she never showed him.
And yet, they understood everything.
Because real connections don’t need declarations. They just… happen.
One night, after a small college fest, they sat under the banyan tree behind the auditorium. The air was thick with unspoken truths.
“Nivedya,” she said, hugging her knees, “do you believe in soulmates?”
“I believe in silences that feel like home,” he replied. “If that’s what a soulmate is, then yes.”
She didn’t say anything after that. She just rested her head on his shoulder.
That was the only time they touched — and the only time they didn’t need to apologize for it.
But life isn’t poetry. It doesn’t pause for perfect moments.
In the final semester, Kisha got selected for an international internship in Paris. A dream she had nurtured since she was sixteen. She was excited. Nivedya was proud.
But behind that pride was fear — of distance, of fading, of being replaced by her new life.
He didn’t tell her how he felt. Because he didn’t want to be a reason she stayed back.
She left with a smile. He stayed back with a story that never made it to paper.
The first month, they talked every day. The second, only twice a week. By the third, her messages had changed from “I miss you” to “I’m so busy, sorry!”
And he understood. Too well.
One cold January morning, she didn’t reply at all.
No explanation. No closure. Just... silence.
That silence slowly wrapped itself around him like a second skin. By the time she returned after six months, both of them had changed — too much to pick up where they left off.
They tried to meet. They even did.
But it wasn’t the same.
She talked about art exhibitions and Parisian cafes. He talked about freelance gigs and loneliness.
The rhythm they once had was gone. Yet... the emotion remained.
Back in the present, at the café table drenched in memory, Kisha and Nivedya were living through that one final silence.
One last time.
From the Book: Unsaid Yet Felt
This story is taken from Unsaid Yet Felt, a collection of 15 heartfelt stories written by Rishabh Bhatt. Each story explores emotions of love, heartbreak, healing, and self-discovery. If this chapter touched your heart, you can get the complete book and experience the journey.
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