Aditi sat beside Aanya's bed, her eyes following the steady rise and fall of her chest as she slept. There was a certain peacefulness about her today, a stillness that hadn't been there in weeks. The accident had shaken her, no doubt, but something else had shifted too — something deeper.
Aditi couldn't help but think about the scene she had witnessed earlier that day — the two of them standing under the morning sun, caught in a moment too delicate to interrupt. She had seen the way he looked at Aanya, and she had seen Aanya's response — hesitant, yet open. It would've been easier to hate him. Easier to tell Aanya to stay away. But Aditi wasn't a teenager playing watchdog anymore. She was her friend. A real one.
And real friends don't control; they protect. They guide, when needed. But most of all, they trust.
---
Across the campus, he sat alone at the edge of the cafeteria's outdoor seating, half-eaten sandwich on his plate, untouched coffee cooling in his hand.
He kept replaying that moment from earlier — the sunlight hitting her face, the messy bun with strands falling over her eyes, the way her fingers brushed his chest like she was checking if he was real.
Was he real? Was this real?
He didn't know how to process what he was feeling. All he knew was that it felt nothing like before. Not like confusion. Not like guilt. It felt like warmth. Like a new kind of gravity pulling him back to her — not because of what he thought she needed, but because of what she had become to him.
Not a chapter he skipped.
Not a story he ignored.
But someone his heartbeat had learned to respond to, in silence.
He thought about Aditi, too. The silent look she gave them. The decision she made in that one moment — to not pull Aanya away, not scold, not question. And for the first time, he saw her not just as a gatekeeper, but as someone who had seen Aanya in ways he hadn't.
Someone who had guarded the parts of her that were too broken to speak.
And he respected that. He wasn't going to take that lightly.
---
Back in the room, Aditi leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes for a moment. She didn't trust easily — not with Aanya. Not after the nights she had seen her cry quietly without saying a word, not after the way her light had dimmed the day he pushed her away.
But now… it was different. He was different.
She remembered the way his hand had lingered on Aanya's, not possessive — but present. The way his gaze hadn't wavered. And that smile, the unspoken one, the kind that doesn't come easy. She saw the uncertainty in him too. The conflict. The weight of something real dawning on him slowly, like rain that begins with a whisper and not a storm.
Aditi looked back at Aanya, who shifted slightly in her sleep, murmuring something incoherent. Her features were soft, lips curled ever so faintly. She was dreaming — Aditi was sure of it. Maybe dreaming of him.
She sighed and pulled the blanket a little higher over Aanya's shoulder.
"Please don't hurt her again," Aditi whispered, not to the sleeping girl — but to the boy whose name remained unspoken, yet ever-present in the room.
---
Outside the window, the last of the daylight faded. Inside, things were shifting — slowly, silently — just like the way real feelings grow.
And Aditi, for the first time, didn't feel the need to stand in the way.
And somewhere else, he felt that too.
Not with words. But in the way he was already thinking of her tomorrow.