03/05/20xx

She was reclining on the lounger, book in hand and a steaming hot cup of coffee on the side. Today was 3rd May. It had just been a year but seemed like a decade to her. A decade of emotions, a decade of ambition, a decade of unrequited love, a decade of hurt and pain, a decade of broken promises , a decade of lust , a decade of picking up the broken pieces again and again..but it had just been another year.. 365 days..8760 hours..

She recalled the times they had spent together at her place. There wasn't a corner where she didn't have memories with him. Of him teasing her. Of them arguing. Of them making out. Of them laying sprawled on each other, drawing patterns on each others skin. Of them talking about their future. Kids. Family Get-togethers.They had dreams.Not only their own individual but ones they had started making together.Beautiful dreams that were adorned and enriched by both of them. She wanted it and at time she felt like he wanted it too. She knew it was hard work of breaking down brick by brick of his defenses but she knew that the man behind those walls was worth every ounce of that effort.

Many a times when she lay on her bed, she would imagine the way he held her when she was pissed and then tickled her, which led to her trying to kick him and him (at times) getting his ass kicked. The warmth she felt when he had held her hand the last time, hadn't gone off yet. She still felt the last lingering kiss on her forehead. Every time she caught the smell of his cologne, it would make her stop in her tracks and she would get plagued with rapidly sinking stomach. Their times together played in front of her eyes like a silent film, where each and every moment was emoted. The soulful eyes had started to turn bleak. And the worst of all was that while all this was happening to her, she was aware about all these changes in her. He haunted her. Even the sweet memories haunted her. As much as she wanted to go back to him, she couldn't. It was just out of self-preservation. She had to keep it together now.She couldn't just let him come back and crumble her life again and move on after saying sorry.

A kid's bawling pulled her out of her zoned state back into reality and she got up to check on her. A year ago if anyone would have told her that she would be a mother, she would flip that person off. She had a lot of dreams to fulfill. Promises to keep. But she never regretted having Rumi,  yes it was tough but she would take it all for her daughter.
Her birth was a tough one. She wasn't progressing right and went into distress and ended up getting meconium in his lungs. She sometimes stopped breathing and a machine was helping her to stay alive.

She wished he was there with her then. Wished he had chosen them. Wished he would be there next to her, telling me that everything would be okay when she was scared shitless, alone in the dark holding the baby, terrified to sleep because the only thing between Rumi  and death was an electronic monitor that was supposed to go off if she stopped breathing. She didn't need him to stick with them and be totally dependent on him. She needed a partner, not a doormat. Not a guy who wouldnt stand up for her.

When I was young, a girl back in  our school had broken glass vase by mistake and while helping her clear the mess, our craft teacher entered the room. She told us to stay away from the glass and after she threw the glass pieces in the trash, she said," Many a time while trying to pick broken pieces we hurt ourselves. Be careful".Like a typical romance novel reader she thought she could break his walls and find her man. Her Mr. Darcy, but she didn't. She has a tendency not only to see the best in everyone, but to assume that everyone was emotionally capable of reaching their  highest potential. She had fallen in love with the highest potential of a man, rather than with the man himself, and had hung on to the relationship for a long time, waiting for the man to ascend to his own greatness. In Love she have been a victim of her own optimism.

There are many things that people forgive. Many incidents. Many mistakes. But some times are testing times. They tell you whether you've got someone who would stick with you if shit went down. They are, many times, a litmus test for relationships. They had one too. Obviously as you would have guessed, they failed. Its normal to stay away from things that hurt you or may have caused hurt in the past. Love hurts people. Or they say it does but I don't believe it. Love didnt hurt you. Someone who doesn't know how to love hurt you. Don't confuse the two.


After putting the baby back to sleep she walked up to her kitchen for a refill. Her eyes caught the date 3rd May again. It was the first time they met. He had walked up to her and said 'Hey..'. A night before she had gotten a call from him since he wanted to break the ice and was calling all the art majoring students in their batch.
" I wanted him. I wanted him so badly,.", she sighs, setting the cup on the kitchen counter.
"Thought he wanted me too, but it turns out he didn't. We had amazing sex but what he felt for me wasn't love.". She has a mirthless smile on her face.
"I guess no matter how much you want someone, even if its with every fibre of your being. If they don't love you back, it'll never be enough. Somewhere between the war of our relationship and his career, His career won."
And with that I see her getting lost in her thoughts. But this time I am not able to read them, all I know is that once it was a real deal, once, if only for a moment, she wanted to be like the air that surrounded him. That unnoticed and that necessary.
But then she was also a strong woman, who would prefer to stay alone than be treated like an option.