The school library was the quietest place I remembered from those days. Back then, it used to feel like a punishment — being sent to a corner to read, away from the noise, the laughter, the fun. But today, it felt like the eye of a storm. A sanctuary.
I stepped into it during lunch break, half-ignoring the stares of classmates as I walked past them. It was strange being sixteen again. I'd forgotten how much pressure lived in the hallways — judgment in glances, insecurities stitched into uniforms, laughter that was both a weapon and a shield.
But the library — it hadn't changed.
Same dusty shelves. Same rickety fans. Same narrow windows spilling tired sunlight onto rows of forgotten books.
I wasn't here for nostalgia.
I was looking for that moment.
Back then, this was the day someone had slipped a cruel note into Anvi's desk. A note that started a chain reaction of rumors, bullying, and isolation — one I hadn't stopped, one I had shamefully laughed at.
But I remembered now.
And I wasn't going to let it happen again.
I found her sitting near the far end of the reading room. Her head was down, eyes glued to a novel she never finished that year. Her fingers were curled tightly around the pages, not turning them. Just gripping. Like she knew something was coming.
I sat across from her quietly.
She looked up. "Following me again?"
"Protecting you," I said.
Her expression twisted slightly, confused but curious. "From what?"
Before I could answer, a voice behind me muttered, "Lovers hiding in fiction again?"
I turned. It was Nikhil. The guy who had always smiled too wide when he was about to do something cruel.
He walked by, dropped a folded paper on the desk near her elbow, and snickered.
In the old timeline, she would have read that note. It would've called her names. Rumors would've spread by the next period. She would've gone quiet for weeks. And I would've said nothing.
But not this time.
Before she could reach for it, I picked it up, opened it, and read it aloud — not to her, but to the librarian across the room.
"'You don't belong here, freak. Go back to your hole. Everyone hates you.'"
The room froze.
The librarian looked up from her desk, startled. Nikhil's smirk vanished.
I held the note high. "This was dropped by him."
Gasps. Eyes. Silence.
The librarian rushed over. "Where did you find this?"
"On her table," I said. "He dropped it."
Nikhil sputtered. "I— That's not mine—"
"I saw him," I interrupted, calm but firm. "And I'm willing to write it down and sign it."
It was like watching a storm reroute itself.
The librarian took the note. Nikhil was told to report to the principal. And Anvi... she stared at me like she didn't know me at all.
"Why did you do that?" she whispered once he was gone.
"Because I should have done it the first time," I replied.
That evening, as we walked back together, she didn't speak for a long time.
Finally, just as we reached the street where we'd part ways, she said quietly, "I think... I trust you again."
Those words felt like forgiveness.
Not full, not perfect — but real.
And in a world I was trying to rebuild, real was everything.