Tamil Nadu, India
8:14 PM
The rain had just stopped, leaving the streets of Ayana's neighborhood shimmering under flickering streetlights. The scent of wet earth clung to the air, warm and heavy. A few motorcycles zipped past outside. A dog barked in the distance. But upstairs, behind a pale green curtain and a dusty glass window, Ayana's world was quiet.
Seventeen-year-old Ayana sat cross-legged on her bed, her back leaning against the wall. The hum of the ceiling fan circled lazily above her, casting soft shadows around her small, dimly lit bedroom. Her room was simple—plain beige walls, a wooden desk cluttered with textbooks, a shelf with a few old paperbacks, and a single poster of a moonlit mountain she'd never seen in real life.
In her hands, her phone glowed softly. It was the one place where she felt the world understood her.
She wasn't scrolling through social media or chatting with friends. She rarely did that. Ayana was reading. Her nightly escape.
A webnovel.
Letters to Someone I'll Never Meet.
The newest chapter had just dropped twenty minutes ago, and Ayana had already read it twice. Slowly, quietly, as if each word was sacred. The story didn't have magic spells or dramatic betrayals. There were no kings, warriors, or time-traveling teenagers. Just emotions. Letters. Honesty. Loneliness. All wrapped in words that felt too real to be fiction.
And somehow, those words always found the part of her she tried to hide from the world.
The author went by the pen name "D.A."
That was all.
No photo, no bio. No clue if D.A. was a boy, a girl, young, old, or even from her country. Ayana had tried looking it up once, but got nowhere. She liked it better this way. Mysterious. Pure. A voice that only existed through stories.
Tonight's chapter ended with a sentence that hit harder than most:
> "Some people live entire lives without ever being understood. If you find someone who sees you—don't let go."
Ayana reread the line, her thumb hovering above the screen, frozen in thought.
She had friends at school, sure. But none of them really knew her. Not the way this author did. Her classmates talked about college admissions, makeup, movies, boyfriends. Ayana didn't hate those things. She just never felt like she truly belonged in their world.
With D.A.'s stories, she didn't have to belong. She just had to feel.
A soft buzz from the streetlight outside flickered through her curtains. Her mother called faintly from the kitchen, probably about dinner. Ayana ignored it for a moment longer, choosing instead to open the comment box at the bottom of the chapter.
She stared at the empty space.
Typed.
Deleted.
Typed again.
Then, finally:
> AnonymousReader92:
I don't know who you are, D.A., but your words feel like they were written for me. On nights like this, when the world feels too heavy, your stories remind me that I'm still here. Thank you.
She hesitated for a heartbeat. Then tapped Post.
It felt silly, in a way. Leaving a message like that to someone she'd never meet. But there was a tiny part of her—just a whisper of hope—that maybe, just maybe, D.A. would see it. And know they made someone feel seen.
She turned off her phone and let it fall beside her pillow. Her gaze drifted to the ceiling fan again, spinning slowly like the thoughts in her head. Outside, the world kept moving. But in her little room, the night stood still.
Ayana pulled her thin blanket over herself, not because she was cold, but because it felt like protection. Like a soft shield from everything she didn't understand about her life.
Her parents had expectations. Her teachers had rules. Society had boundaries. But in her heart, she just wanted something—someone—to make the world feel less… silent.
And somewhere, on the other side of the ocean, in a place called Kalimantan that she only vaguely remembered from geography class, a boy was about to read the message she had just sent.
But Ayana didn't know that yet.
She only knew the ache in her chest—the kind of ache that came when something inside you was reaching out, hoping someone, somewhere, would reach back.