ARYA
I never thought I'd start over like this.
A few months ago, my world made sense. I had someone — a boyfriend, a routine, a version of love I thought was stable, solid. The kind you let wrap around your life like a warm coat in winter. But it didn't last. It ended — quietly, completely — just before I stepped into this new job. One day I was certain of who I was with and where I was going… and the next, I was standing alone in a life that no longer looked familiar.
So here I am. Heart freshly broken. Pretending to be fine while the world keeps spinning without asking if I'm ready to catch up.
People say heartbreak makes you stronger. That with time, you heal. That the pain fades into the background and becomes just another scar.
But I don't feel stronger.
What I feel is hollow.
There's a silence inside me now. The kind that wraps around your ribs and stays there, quiet but heavy. Some days it's softer, like a dull ache. Other days it clenches so tight I forget what breathing used to feel like.
My name is Arya — though some people call me Eira, depending on how well they know me. I don't like explaining it. Both names belong to me, but only one of them feels like home. Arya is who I am in the daylight — quiet, capable, careful. Eira… she's the part I try to keep hidden. The softer part. The dangerous one. The part that still believes in love stories.
My days are filled with phone calls, scribbling addresses, checking boxes, making sure deliveries are on time. It's not the life I once imagined for myself, but it's the one that keeps me afloat.
I don't drive — not yet. So I work alongside my dad. He handles the roads, I handle the rest. It's not glamorous, but there's comfort in the rhythm. We settle into a quiet routine that doesn't ask much from either of us, and that's what I need right now: something still. Something simple.
Every morning starts at the same store — small, forgettable, tucked away behind a main road most people barely notice. It smells faintly of cardboard and worn-down mornings. The only sounds are forklift wheels rolling and the occasional cough or clipped conversation. No smiles. Just stress. Just motion.
It's not a job for dreamers. It's a job for survivors. People who need to keep moving because stopping might mean sinking.
Same as every morning, I crouch near my crate, pen in hand, flipping through a clipboard and checking if all the parcels are in place, like always. Routine. Predictable. My way of keeping the ache at bay.
And then, I feel something.
I can't explain it — a flicker, a shift. Like something has changed in the air around me.
I look up.
I don't hear his steps. Don't catch any warning.
But I feel it.
The shift.
Like the static in the air before a storm.
I look up — and he's there.
I don't know who he is. He doesn't belong to the usual faces I've grown used to ignoring. There's something distinctly new about him — not just in the unfamiliarity of his features, but in the way the air itself seems to pause around his arrival.
He moves with a quiet confidence. Unbothered. Calm. Like he has nothing to prove, and somehow that makes me want to look twice.
But none of that is what stops me.
It's his eyes.
He looks up just as I do. And for one long, startling second, we lock eyes.
There's no greeting. No smile. No nod. Just that — a look. Still. Focused. Curious, maybe. Or maybe I imagine that.
There's something unreadable about him. Something that keeps its distance even while standing in front of you. His expression gives nothing away — not boredom, not curiosity, not even indifference.
And somehow, that makes me stare longer.
It's not just that he looks good — it's that he looks like a question I can't answer.
Everything about him feels like a contradiction. Confident, but quiet. Present, but distant.
And for the first time in what feels like forever, my thoughts don't drift back to everything I've lost.
I stare. I don't stop myself. He doesn't either.
The world doesn't move for a few seconds.
And then, just like that — he keeps walking. And I'm left standing still, heart suddenly aware of itself, clipboard forgotten in my hand.
I don't smile. Neither does he.
But something passes between us.
A glance.A silence.A beginning.
I stand there, heart doing something strange in my chest. Something stirs. Unexpected. Uninvited. And yet — unmistakably there.
I don't know his name. He doesn't know mine. We don't speak.
He's quiet, like me. Doesn't make small talk. Doesn't try to charm anyone. But there's something about him — something unreadable. A stillness. An intensity. A way of existing like he knows how to disappear into the background yet somehow draws your attention without even trying.
He has this perfect beard — neat, sharp, dark. It suits him. Frames the quiet strength in his face. It's the kind of detail you wouldn't usually dwell on… unless, of course, you've already started looking.
And I have.
Now, I lie in bed replaying that moment — the way he looked at me like I wasn't invisible. Like maybe I'm not.
That stare — it's intriguing. Like it pulls something loose inside me. Like I just stepped into the first page of something I'm not ready to name.
I don't like him. Not yet. That'd be ridiculous.
But there's something there. Something I can't ignore.
And even though I won't admit it out loud…
I hope to see him again tomorrow.