Some partings are not made of words. They are made of silences too full to carry anything else, of moments that move past before we understand they are ending. Of eyes that look down instead of ahead.
I didn't tell her.
Not because I wanted to disappear like a mystery, or because I was too noble or poetic to say goodbye. I just didn't know how to.
It started on a Monday. My father knocked on my door after dinner. That kind of knock that sounds polite but feels final. Like he was informing me, not inviting me.
"We're finalizing the paperwork," he said. "You leave in two weeks. Kota."
Two weeks. And just like that, my world shrunk.
I wanted to protest, say something wild and teenage and selfish. I wanted to yell that maybe I didn't want to become an engineer, maybe I wanted to be a writer, maybe I wanted to sit in a quiet classroom and glance sideways at a girl who smiled like autumn leaves and gave me typewriter-shaped keychains. But I didn't.
I only nodded. My father didn't notice I hadn't blinked in a while.
---
The days that followed were like watching my own life through a dusty window.
I still went to school. Still laughed a little when Yuvaan said something stupid. Still looked for her in the corridor like my eyes were attached to a string only she held. Still wrote, though the pages grew heavier.
I didn't tell her.
I thought about it. Each time she smiled at me, I thought, "Say it now."
Each time she asked, "What are you writing these days?", I wanted to answer, "Goodbyes."
But the words never shaped themselves. They stayed inside like unposted letters, afraid of rejection, or maybe worse—acceptance.
---
One day, after school, she lingered at the gate. I knew she was waiting for me.
She held the keychain I hadn't expected her to carry every day. It dangled from her bag like it belonged there. And maybe it did. Maybe I never did.
"You look tired," she said.
"Studying," I lied. And then truth slipped through: "And... thinking."
"About?"
I paused too long.
"Nothing you'd want to hear," I said.
She frowned but didn't push. That was the kind of friend she was. Gentle. Curious. But never forceful.
We walked halfway together. I memorized the way her braid swayed. The way her fingers sometimes curled around the strap of her bag when she was thinking. The small things. Always the small things.
The next morning, I skipped first period and sat in the library. I wrote her name seventeen times in the margin of a page, each time in a different way. Niya. Niiya. Niyaa. Ni. N.
I didn't know if I was practicing how to let go or how to hold on.
---
The night before I left, I didn't sleep.
Not out of drama. Just restlessness. I kept thinking about how places feel different when you know you're leaving them. My room. The fan that clicked on every third rotation. My desk, cluttered with pens that didn't work but I didn't throw away. My notes, filled with doodles. My heart, filled with things I hadn't said.
I packed everything. Except that letter I almost wrote her. It stayed folded in the drawer.
I woke up before my parents. Car horns hadn't even started their morning chorus yet.
When I stepped out of the gate, the air was too still. I imagined her waking up in two hours, brushing her teeth, picking her uniform, unaware. I would already be miles away.
I didn't leave a note.
Didn't text her.
Didn't even wave.
---
The train moved like it had somewhere better to be.
I sat by the window, trying not to look out. Outside felt too much like goodbye.
I stared at my hands. They looked older already. Or maybe more alone.
Someone across the aisle asked, "First time leaving home?"
I nodded. Didn't explain what kind of home I was leaving. Or who.
I thought of her face—not the clearest version, but the way it looked when she smiled with one side more than the other. I thought of her voice, how she said my name like it wasn't boring. I thought of the keychain.
I almost wanted to send her a message.
But what would I write?
I'm sorry I didn't say goodbye?
I was afraid you'd say, "Okay"?
I was afraid you'd not say anything at all?
Instead, I just wrote it down in my notebook:
"I left without a goodbye. Because some goodbyes break you more when they're answered."
---
In Kota, the rooms smelled like pressure. Every wall had old posters of rank holders. Smiling kids who looked too sure of themselves. I hated them immediately.
My roommate was already asleep when I arrived. I put my bag down gently, sat at the desk, and opened my notebook.
There were no stars visible that night. The sky was too clouded. Too shy.
I didn't cry.
But I wrote this:
"There's a girl back home who gave me a keychain. It looks like a typewriter. I think she knew I was a writer before I did."
---
That night, I placed the keychain beside my pillow. Like it was a lucky charm. Like it could whisper stories to me in the dark. Like it could remind me who I was.
Or who I had almost been.
The boy who didn't say goodbye.
The boy who wrote instead.
The boy who still loved her — not loudly, not selfishly, not even in hope.
Just... quietly.
Like a letter never posted.