"It's the texts we never send,
the words we never say,
that echo the loudest when we're finally alone."
It started with a notification.
One of those "memories" your phone throws at you - cruel little fragments of the past dressed up as nostalgia. A picture of us from school, blurry and perfect. Me, grinning like a fool. Her, looking away, mid-laugh.
I hadn't seen that photo in years. But it hit me like it was yesterday.
And just like that… I opened our old chat.
The messages were still there - from both sides - but it wasn't the ones she sent that I got lost in.
It was the ones I never did.
Drafts.
Buried deep in the "notes" folder of my phone. A collection of messages I had written and rewritten a hundred times.
Unsent. Unread. Unheard.
"I miss you again today. But you probably don't care. Or maybe you do. I don't even know anymore."
"You looked so tired in class today. I wanted to ask if you're okay. But I didn't. I'm sorry for loving you quietly."
"Meera said I'm hurting you. I think I'm just hurting myself. But it's okay. I'm used to it now."
Some were long, broken paragraphs.
Some were just one line:
"Please don't forget me."
"It still hurts."
"Are you happier without me?"
I read them one by one, like letters from a version of me who never gave up.
But each message…
Felt like a scream inside a bottle I never had the courage to throw.
One night, I typed a new one.
"Hey, it's been a while. I hope you're okay. I'm not. But I will be."
I stared at the send button.
I didn't press it.
Instead, I walked.
Through empty corridors. Past the canteen where we used to sit. Past the bench where she once made me laugh so hard I cried. Past the wall where I'd once written her name in pencil, just to see it there.
It had faded.
Like everything else.
When I got back to my room, Reyan was waiting.
He looked up from his notebook. "You good?"
I shrugged. "Define good."
"You eat?"
"No."
He tossed me a pack of biscuits. "Eat. Then talk."
So I did. And then I opened up. Told him about the unsent messages, the fake smiles, the way every song seemed to carry her voice.
He didn't interrupt. Just listened - the kind of listening that feels like holding someone's hand without touching them.
After I finished, he said:
"She didn't deserve all of it, man. But you didn't deserve none of it either."
I looked at him. "What if I'm always like this? What if I can't stop loving her?"
"You will," he said. "Or maybe you won't. But you'll grow around it. The pain will be a part of you - not all of you."
That night, I wrote her one final draft:
"I never hated you.
I just hated how easy it was for you to leave me behind."
I didn't save it.
I deleted it.
And for the first time in a long while…
I slept.