Ami khub Sundar akta lovTitle: The Distance Between Two Heartbeats
In the city of Greyhaven, people believed distance was measured in miles.
Liam knew better.
Distance, he learned, could exist between two people sitting side by side, breathing the same air, yet living in different emotional worlds.
Liam was a watchmaker.
Not the famous kind.
Just a quiet man who fixed broken clocks in a narrow shop that smelled of metal, oil, and time itself.
He believed time could be repaired.
People, however, could not.
Then one afternoon, she walked in.
Her name was Aria.
She carried a broken pocket watch in her palm like it was a wounded bird.
"It doesn't tick anymore," she said. "But I don't want a new one."
Liam looked at the watch.
Then at her eyes.
They were the kind of eyes that had cried in silence many times.
"I can try," he said.
That was how everything began.
Aria started visiting often.
Sometimes with excuses—
a loose strap,
a cracked glass,
a watch that didn't need fixing.
Sometimes with no excuse at all.
She would sit quietly, watching Liam work.
"How do you know what's broken?" she asked once.
"I listen," he replied. "Broken things always try to speak."
She smiled at that.
Aria was a writer.
Or at least, she used to be.
She wrote love stories with hopeful endings until life taught her that hope could be temporary.
A love she trusted once had disappeared without explanation.
No goodbye.
No closure.
Just absence.
Liam never pushed her to explain more.
He understood silence.
His own past was filled with it.
Years ago, he had loved a woman who wanted a louder life.
A life with movement, ambition, and noise.
Liam stayed behind with his clocks.
They drifted apart not because of hate, but because of timing.
And timing, he believed, was cruel.
Days turned into months.
Their friendship deepened into something softer.
Something unspoken.
They shared lunches.
Rainy walks.
Long conversations about everything except what they felt.
The city changed seasons.
So did they.
One winter evening, the power went out.
The shop was lit only by candles.
Aria laughed softly. "Feels like time stopped."
Liam looked at her and realized something terrifying.
He wanted time to stop.
Because moments like this were rare.
Fragile.
"I'm afraid," Aria whispered suddenly.
"Of what?"
"Of loving again and losing myself."
Liam answered honestly.
"I'm afraid of loving and not being enough."
Silence filled the space between them.
Then Aria reached for his hand.
Just for a second.
But seconds can change lives.
They kissed that night.
Not desperately.
Not dramatically.
But carefully.
Like two people afraid of breaking something precious.
Love grew slowly.
Morning coffees.
Shared keys.
Comfortable routines.
They learned each other's fears.
Aria learned Liam avoided goodbyes.
Liam learned Aria wrote letters she never sent.
For a while, love felt safe.
Then life arrived again.
Aria's old manuscript was discovered by a publisher.
They wanted her in another city.
Another world.
A chance she once dreamed of.
Fear returned.
"So," she said one night, "what do we do?"
Liam's heart ached.
"I won't cage you," he said. "And I won't chase you."
Tears filled her eyes.
"I don't want to choose between love and myself."
"Then don't," he replied. "But know that distance changes people."
She left.
Promising calls.
Promising visits.
Promises weakened by time zones and missed moments.
Love turned into longing.
Longing turned into quiet pain.
One night, Aria stopped calling.
Not out of cruelty.
Out of confusion.
Liam waited.
Then stopped waiting.
Years passed.
Greyhaven stayed the same.
Liam repaired clocks.
Aria became successful.
Famous, even.
But success did not fill the spaces love once lived in.
One evening, Aria returned to the city.
The watch shop was still there.
So was Liam.
Older.
Calmer.
She entered quietly.
"I brought something to fix," she said.
He smiled sadly. "Time?"
She nodded.
They talked.
Not about the past.
Not about regret.
But about who they had become.
Outside, the city moved on.
Inside, time slowed.
"I loved you," Aria said.
"I still do," Liam replied.
They understood something then.
Love does not always mean staying.
Sometimes it means remembering without resentment.
They hugged.
Not as lovers.
But as two souls who once met at the right moment—
and survived the wrong timing.
Aria left again.
Liam watched the door close.
And for the first time, he didn't feel broken.
Because some love stories don't end.
They simply change shape.
And live quietly inside us forevere story likhate chai😉