The train rattled forward into the fading dusk, and Aarav watched the world unravel past the window like a film he wasn't part of—yet somehow couldn't stop watching. The outside passed in darkness and steel, in fields blurred and half-seen towns. He thought, absurdly, that everything outside the window looked beautiful. Even the black emptiness of night. Even the broken lampposts. Even the trees that looked like shadows of what they were.
There was something strangely pure about it all.
He let his head lean against the glass, not to sleep, but just to feel something cold, something real. The train shook beneath him like a quiet pulse. Everyone else in the coach seemed busy with sleep or food or silence. But Aarav stayed with the world outside.
It was the beginning of winter vacation, and he was on his way home from Kota. Not forever. Just for a while. A break they said, as if life could be paused and then resumed like an exam timer. The coaching pressure hadn't disappeared. It had just stepped aside temporarily.
In his lap, he held a paper bag with handles about to tear. Inside it sat a small, square gift box. Not a keychain. He had avoided that on purpose. She had already given him one—the old typewriter keychain that now dangled from his pencil pouch like a secret. He wouldn't return the gesture by mirroring it. That would feel... incorrect. Unoriginal.
Instead, he had picked something more obscure, more peculiar—a pressed flower encased in glass, strung on a simple black thread. A real violet. Preserved forever. The kind of thing that looked delicate and pointless unless you understood what it meant. He had found it in a corner craft store run by an old lady who didn't speak much but smiled like she knew who it was for. He didn't know if the girl he'd give it to would wear it. Or even like it. But he hoped she'd at least hold it for a moment.
Maybe then she'd think of him.
He was back in the city the next morning. The station was familiar in that strange way only returning places are—both welcoming and indifferent. His parents were waiting. His father waved first, and his mother called out his name softly, just once.
In the auto, his mother asked about meals and sleep, and his father commented on how thin he looked. Aarav smiled, nodded. Didn't say much. It wasn't rudeness. It was simply the feeling of being back in a life he had briefly paused.
Later that evening, after putting his bags down and brushing his teeth longer than necessary, Aarav stepped into the living room. His mother was folding clothes, and his father was watching the muted television—some news channel arguing silently.
"Train was okay?" his father asked.
"Yeah," Aarav replied.
His mother looked up. "You brought less clothes this time."
"Didn't feel like packing much."
They didn't press. Maybe they sensed the quiet in him wasn't temporary. Maybe they mistook it for tiredness.
After dinner, he sat at his old desk, the one with scratches and a drawer that jammed every time it rained. He ran his fingers over it like greeting an old friend.
Then he brought out the gift.
He stared at it. Unwrapped it. Wrapped it again.
Should he even give it to her? Would it seem strange?
But this wasn't about what she'd think. Not anymore. It was about what he needed to say—without words, maybe, but with something honest. Something quiet.
He looked out his window again.
The sky was dark, yes. But not empty. A few stars blinked uncertainly, like they were thinking of something before fading.
He remembered the way she looked when she was reading—lips slightly parted, eyes fixed on some word that probably meant more than it said. He remembered how she once told him, "I like things that don't make noise." He had laughed then. But now he understood.
That night, he didn't sleep immediately. He thought about timing. About how the right thing at the wrong moment becomes meaningless. And how silence could sometimes say more than all the voices in the world.
He wasn't sure what would happen when he met her. He didn't even know if she'd meet him. But he had something now. Not just the gift. But a sentence. One small, folded sentence he would say:
"I saw this and thought of you. That's all."
He didn't want to explain more than that.
He didn't want to ruin it with meaning.
He just wanted to hand her something and walk away knowing he tried.
Maybe that's what surprises are meant to be. Not confessions. Not expectations. Just gentle interruptions in someone's day.
And if she didn't smile...
Well, at least he would've seen her.