The next morning, the house felt like a paused breath.
No one was moving. No footsteps. No television. No clanging of ladles in the kitchen. Just the dull, muffled heartbeat of a family figuring out how to exist after breaking.
I rose early. Not because I wanted to — because I had to.
There's something quiet and cruel about surviving a day like that. The sun rises again, like it doesn't care what it left behind. The walls stay upright, the fan keeps spinning, and the world continues — even if you don't feel like continuing with it.
But I had made a promise to myself: I wouldn't just witness this second chance. I'd live it.
I went to the kitchen. My mother was seated in the corner chair, unmoving. Her cup of tea had gone cold. Her eyes were open, but she was elsewhere — some inner storm of worry pulling her under.
I didn't speak.
I quietly reheated the tea, poured it back into the same cup, and placed it in her hands. Her fingers closed around it slowly, like muscle memory. She looked up at me.
"Thank you," she said, so softly it felt like a whisper trying not to cry.
By noon, I found myself cleaning the room I had shared with my brother. His scent still lingered on his pillow — a strange mix of talcum powder, sweat, and cheap hair gel. His clothes were half-hung, half-crumpled. On his desk, his old sketchbook lay open. I flipped through the pages — half-done sketches of motorbikes, fantasy swords, and a few messy comics he used to dream of publishing.
He never got to finish them.
I tore out one of the better sketches — a boy holding a shield in the rain — and pinned it on my wall. A quiet tribute. A promise.
"I'm not giving up on you."
In the afternoon, I stepped outside for some air.
That's when I saw her.
Anvi.
She was walking alone, along the road where we used to race bikes and talk about silly things like music videos and last bench pranks. Her hair was tied up, the way she always did when nervous. She looked older than I remembered — maybe because this time, I was seeing her without the filter of my teenage self.
I hesitated. My heart beat fast.
Should I talk to her?
This was the girl I had pushed away. The friend I had hurt the most.
And tomorrow — if time repeated itself — she'd stop talking to me.
Forever.
I walked up slowly.
She turned. Blinked. "Hey… weren't you sick yesterday?"
I smiled faintly. "I think I just needed a day to reset."
She raised a brow. "You sound... different."
I shrugged. "Maybe I am."
For a moment, we just stood there, facing each other, the wind playing with our silence.
"Want to walk a bit?" I asked.
She paused… then nodded.
We walked in slow steps, talking about little things — school, upcoming events, complaints about teachers.
But in every word, I searched for the moment where we had broken before — and when I felt it creeping close, I gently steered the conversation away.
It wasn't about rewriting the past.
It was about healing it — word by word, day by day.
That night, I wrote something in my old diary for the first time in years:
"Today wasn't a victory. But it was a beginning.
If pain echoes, maybe kindness does too."
I didn't know how many pieces there were to pick up.
But I had two hands.
And a second chance.
That was enough.