[Scene: Empty campus music room. A dusty upright piano in the corner. Guitars on the wall. Warm light. Rainoutside again.]
Maya
(setting down her bag)
You sure we're allowed to use this room?
Aryan
(sitting on the floor with his guitar)
Technically, no.
Emotionally? We've suffered enough to deserve it.
Maya
Wow. Is melodrama part of your band's brand?
Aryan
Only on Tuesdays.
(winks)
Narration – Maya's Thought
It's strange.
I've known him only two weeks.
But somehow, writing with him doesn't feel like a beginning.
It feels like remembering something that never happened.
Aryan
(tuning his guitar)
Okay, Maya. Ready to ruin my perfectly moody melody with your sharp-edged words?
Maya
(pulls out notebook)
I brought five verses.
Three of them were written during heartbreak.
One while drinking chai and regretting my ex.
And one… after our first coffee.
Aryan
(softly)
You wrote about that?
Maya
I write when I don't know how to feel.
That's… often.
Narration – Aryan's Thought
She looks fragile but doesn't act like it.
Like a girl who's been breaking quietly for years and calls it "healing."
How do I destroy someone who's already learned how to bleed in silence?
Maya
(reading)
"You sang to my sadness like it was yours to carry. But your silence was louder than the notes."
Aryan
(freezes)
That's...
That's going in the chorus.
Maya
(smiling)
You don't even know what the song's about yet.
Aryan
Doesn't matter.
That line already knows the whole story.
(He strums a soft chord, then plays a slow progression.)
Aryan
(singing)
🎶 "You found me in the thunder
Where I thought I could hide.
But your smile was the storm
That I forgot how to survive…" 🎶
Maya
(sits beside him, quietly)
You sing like someone who's been betrayed by love.
Or used it to betray someone else.
Aryan
(stiffens)
What if it's both?
Maya
Then we're writing the perfect tragedy.
Narration – Aryan's Thought
She doesn't know.
She has no idea that the boy she's sitting beside…
Is the same boy who came to ruin her.
And still—
She writes me into something I don't deserve.
Maya
You okay?
Aryan
Yeah. Just a memory.
(Pause)
Do you believe people can start over?
Maya
Not really.
But I believe some people lie better when they sing.
(She looks at him, teasing—half truth, half dare.)
Aryan
Do you lie?
Maya
Every day.
"I'm fine." "It's just a headache."
"I'll live forever."
(She laughs, but her eyes flicker with something unspoken.)
Narration – Aryan's Thought
That last lie didn't sound like a joke. What are you hiding, Maya? And why does it scare me more than the mission I came here to complete?
Maya
(changing subject)
Okay. Song structure: verse–verse–chorus–bridge? Aryan
Let's go cliché. Keep it real.
Maya
Cliché is your hoodie.
This is emotional art.
Don't insult it.
(They laugh. The wall between them cracks—slightly.)
Aryan
(noticing her notebook)
You draw too?
Maya
Just doodles. Helps when words get stuck.(He flips a page. A rough sketch of a broken heart being stitched with guitar strings.)
Aryan
That's beautiful.
(Pause)
Or tragic. Or both.
Maya
You'd be surprised how often those two overlap.
Narration – Maya's Thought
Why does he look at me like that? Like he's trying to remember something he never had. Or like he's already planning how to leave.
Aryan
(after a moment)
You want to record it someday?
Maya
Only if you promise not to forget me when you become famous.
Aryan
(quiet)
I don't think I could forget you even if I tried.(She goes still. He didn't mean to say it. But he did.)
(They sit quietly. The rain continues. A lyric is born in the silence.)
Both (writing in sync):
🎶 "We never meant forever,
But we wrote it anyway…" 🎶
Narration – Aryan's Thought
That's the thing about songs. They know the ending, even when we pretend not to. And hers might kill me… before I can destroy her.