They say your life doesn't really change overnight.
But I think sometimes, all it takes is one moment—a glance, a sound, a fall—for something inside you to shift forever.
After the winter marathon, I thought I'd forget her like a funny clip from school—laugh once and move on. But I didn't. I couldn't. Her fall—sudden, dramatic, almost slow motion—kept replaying in my mind. I wasn't laughing anymore.
The next day, I saw her again. She walked past me near the assembly stairs, hugging her books to her chest, wrapped in a muffler that looked twice her size. Her hair was tied up, a few strands escaping in the morning wind, brushing across her face like they were meant to be noticed.
There was something different about her, something not loud—but present. I didn't know her name. I didn't even know what class she was in. But in that moment, it felt like I had seen her for the first time… and somehow, also forever.
I started noticing her more. In the canteen, she'd sit with her group, almost always at the edge of the bench. Her laugh was chaotic and real—the kind that made people turn, not because it was loud, but because it was alive. One day, she laughed so hard she nearly fell off her seat, covering her mouth with both hands, her eyes squeezed shut. I had no idea what the joke was, but I found myself smiling like I did.
In the library, I saw her sitting near the window, fingers twirling through her hair while she read. She wasn't pretending to read like most of us did—she was lost in the book, her eyes scanning slowly, her lips occasionally moving in silent rhythm with the sentences.
Everything about her felt… unbothered. She never seemed like she was trying to impress anyone. That's what made it worse for me. Because without trying, she was pulling me in like gravity.
I'd see her helping a junior on the basketball court, tying her shoelaces near the tap, sometimes sitting alone on the last step of the auditorium stairs—always doing something, but somehow still existing in a world of her own.
And me? I had turned into a ghost in her story.
I didn't talk to her. I couldn't. Every time I came close—behind her in the stationery line, walking opposite her in the corridor—my courage would crack like old ice. I'd rehearse lines in my head all night:
"Hey, you were really fast in that race."
"Is that a good book?"
"You laugh like you're not afraid of anything."
But my mouth never agreed with my mind.
Of course, someone noticed.
"Tu usko ghoorta hai na?" my friend Adi said one afternoon, nudging me with his elbow while we sat under the neem tree behind the school building.
"No," I lied.
"Bhai tu toh national level ghurna chalu kar diya hai. Morning shift, lunch break, post-prayer bonus stare… sab milega." He grinned like a devil who just caught me red-handed.
I tried to brush it off, but he wouldn't stop.
"Bas ek baar bol de. Tu kuch bolega nahi, aur koi aur usse propose kar dega. Phir reh jayega tu diary likhta hua."
I laughed, but it hit me. I was already writing the diary—just in my head.
Because she was there, every night. In the spaces between thoughts. In the way I suddenly started caring about how my hoodie looked or if my hair was messed up. In the way I'd walk slower near the corridor she was likely to pass. In the way I remembered how she tucked her hair behind her ear when she was confused, or bit her nails when she was bored.
She didn't know me. Not yet.
But somehow, she had already made a home in the quietest parts of me.
I didn't know her name. But to me, she was "the girl who made winter feel like summer."
And maybe… that was enough.
For now.