The Silence That Killed Us

The rain tapped gently on Poornima’s apartment windows. The city was alive outside, but her world felt frozen.

She sat cross-legged on her bed, a half-empty coffee mug in one hand and an old wooden box in the other.

It had been years since she opened it.

Inside—photographs.

Memories of a love so pure, so wild, it still made her chest ache.

There they were:

Veeresh carrying her piggyback across the college campus.

Their first Diwali together.

A selfie under the Cubbon Park rain—him laughing, her teasing.

The last one—Veeresh asleep on her lap, his fingers still intertwined with hers.

Her fingers trembled as she picked up that last photo.

She clutched it to her heart…

And broke down.

---

🕰️ Flashback – One Year Ago

Poornima was working late at BEL when her phone buzzed.

> Unknown Number: “I need to meet you. Now. It’s urgent.”

It was Aarthi, a junior she mentored.

That meeting changed everything.

> Aarthi (teary): “I need to confess something… it’s about Veeresh. He’s… not who you think he is.”

She told her things—messages, screenshots, a supposed affair Veeresh was having with Bindu, a colleague Poornima barely knew.

Aarthi showed Poornima messages Bindu had forwarded. Ones where Veeresh was joking about Poornima being too controlling.

And that was Poornima’s trigger.

She didn’t confront Veeresh.

Didn’t verify.

Didn’t even think clearly.

> "So he wanted an escape. And he found her."

So she left.

One silent message:

> “Don’t call. It’s over.”

And she disappeared.

---

🖤 Regret That Burns

Veeresh had called.

Again. And again. And again.

> “What happened, Poornima?”

“Talk to me.”

“Don’t do this. Please. We’re not a one-message goodbye.”

But her anger and heartbreak choked her.

By the time she came to her senses, Veeresh had already married Bindu.

---

📦 Present Day

Poornima stood now, staring at the mirror.

> "He moved on in a month... Was I so easy to replace?"

But then she saw the photo of a baby girl tucked into Veeresh’s wallet in the elevator that morning.

Thoshini.

His daughter.

Not hers.

Not theirs.

She hadn’t just lost Veeresh.

She had lost every dream they had painted together.

---

😭 The Breakdown

She clutched the photographs, tears falling freely now.

> “I was stupid, Veeresh… I should’ve trusted you.”

She whispered through sobs.

> “I left you. You didn’t leave me. And now… you hate me. You have every right to.”

She opened a locked drawer and pulled out a small box—a ring. The one he gave her.

She wore it silently on her finger again.

Not as a promise of love.

But as a reminder of the woman she used to be. And the man she had once destroyed.

---

🕯️ Chapter Ends on a Cliffhanger

Her phone buzzed.

Message from HR:

> “Project review meeting with Veeresh Suryavanshi at 10 AM tomorrow.”

Poornima wiped her tears, her face stone-cold now.

> “No more crying. No more regrets. You may hate me, Veeresh. But I’ll protect what we had… even if you never know the truth.”