The scent of old ink and fresh coffee filled Meera's apartment as she sat before a blank document, titled simply:
Two Days After You – A Memoir
The blinking cursor at the top of the page felt like a challenge.
How do you compress a love story that nearly destroyed you into words that strangers will read?
She didn't want to dramatize it. Didn't want to sanctify it either.
She wanted to tell the truth.
For three days, she wrote.
Poured over journals, video transcripts, letters. She included the mess—the confusion of their first kiss, the guilt that followed, the nights she traced his ribs as if they were counting down his breaths.
She described Aarav not as a saint—but as a man who loved ferociously, imperfectly. A man who lied, and regretted it. Who held the truth like a shard of glass—afraid to let go, afraid to bleed.
And she told the truth about herself too.
How she broke. How she wanted to die with him. How the days after his death tasted like metal and static and salt.
But also— How she found a heartbeat again, in silence. How she learned that grief isn't about forgetting.
It's about carrying.
On the fourth day, she sent a draft to her editor.
She received a reply within two hours.
Subject: We Need To Talk.
Body:
Meera,
I stayed up and read the entire thing. Couldn't stop. I cried.
I've never read something so raw. So flawed. So human.
We're going to publish this. Unedited. No filter. The world needs it.
Prepare yourself. They're going to ask questions. And some people won't be kind.
—L.
Two weeks later, Two Days After You went to print.
The publisher launched it quietly, unsure how it would land.
But by the end of the week, the book had gone viral.
Headlines rolled in.
"Grieving Girlfriend Reveals Her Lover Might've Been Her Brother."
"A Love Story or a Lie?"
"Meera Sharma's Memoir Divides the Internet."
Social media erupted with opinions.
Some called it brave. Others called it disgraceful.
But most… read it.
And shared it.
And cried.
One message from a reader stayed with her.
"I lost someone to cancer too. I also stopped breathing for a while. Your story reminded me that grief doesn't end. It becomes a second soul living inside you."
Meera did one interview.
A live podcast.
The host asked: "Would you have still loved him if you had known everything from the start?"
She looked into the mic and said, without hesitation,
"Yes."
The host blinked. "Even if you were related?"
Meera answered softly, "We weren't. But even if we had been… the love came before the truth. And love, in its purest form, doesn't ask for permission. It just happens."
The clip went viral.
People dissected every word.
But Meera didn't care anymore.
Aarav's voice lived in every page she'd published. And the world could do what it wanted with the echoes.
Three months later, the book reached #1 on the bestsellers list.
The proceeds, she donated entirely—to a foundation for terminally ill patients with no family support.
She named it: "The Aarav Trust."
And then one morning, while sipping tea beside the cedar tree, her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
"Is this Meera Sharma?"
"Yes."
"This is the Sundance Film Festival Committee. We've seen your documentary. And we'd like to screen it."
To be continued…