🍒Prologue🍒
Prologue — "The Rain That Brought Him Back"
The rain in Bengaluru had a way of blurring everything — the glass, the traffic lights, even the memories you tried too hard to forget.
Avni Sharmastood at the edge of Christ University's main corridor, clutching a sketch folder against her chest. The smell of petrichor mixed with freshly brewed coffee from the campus café, and for a second, she let herself believe this was just another ordinary evening. But her pulse said otherwise.
Eight years.
Eight long years since Udaipur, since him.
She had left her city with dreams tucked under her arm and heartbreak stitched inside her heart — the kind that didn't scream, only lingered. Bengaluru had given her everything she thought she wanted: a life that looked calm, a voice that didn't tremble, and a version of herself that didn't wait for someone who once promised forever.
But fate had a strange sense of humor.
Because when she looked up, through the light drizzle falling like threads of silver, she sawKrivanChugh.
He was standing across the quadrangle, half-soaked, phone pressed to his ear. Same crooked posture. Same faint smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. Only his eyes — the ones that had once made her forget every reason to hate him — had changed. There was a quietness in them now, like a sea that had learned to keep its storms hidden.
He didn't see her at first. But she froze. Her fingers clenched tighter around the folder, her heart doing that painful skip it had promised never to repeat.
The campus noise faded.
Rain softened into whispers.
He turned — and their eyes met.
It wasn't the dramatic kind of moment novels exaggerate. No lightning, no thunder. Just two people realizing that time hadn't done enough to erase what they once were.
His lips curved slightly, hesitant yet familiar. "You still hate the rain?"
Avni's throat went dry. It was the first thing he'd ever said to her in school — years ago, on a monsoon afternoon in Udaipur. The memory hit her so hard she had to look away.
"No," she said softly, eyes fixed on the puddles forming near her shoes. "I just stopped waiting for people in it."
A pause. Long. Heavy. Uncomfortable.
He didn't move closer, didn't try to touch her — just stood there, watching her like someone who wanted to say everything and nothing at once.
"You're still angry," he murmured, almost like a confession.
"Anger fades," she replied, forcing a faint smile. "Some memories don't."
The rain fell harder. She turned before he could see the tear threatening to escape. Her sandals splashed against the wet marble, her breath shaky. But the more she tried to walk away, the louder the echoes of the past became — the laughter under neem trees, the fights that ended in tears, the note that never reached her.
The note that changed everything.
---
Eight Years Ago — Udaipur
Monsoon had just arrived in the city of lakes.
Udaipur's skyline shimmered under the weight of clouds, and the scent of rain-soaked earth wrapped itself around the old corridors of St. Hilda's International School.
Fifteen-year-old Avni Sharma was sketching by the window of Class XI-B, her hair tied loosely, a pencil tucked behind her ear. She wasn't one of those loud, popular girls — she existed quietly, like poetry written in margins. Her world was simple: art, Aafreen (her best friend), and the dream of studying design someday.
Then came Krivan Chugh — the new boy from Jaipur. Seventeen, sharp-jawed, perpetually late, and annoyingly confident. He had transferred mid-term because his father, Mr. Karthik Chugh, had a new business project in Udaipur.
He walked in that first day with his shirt untucked, a lazy grin, and eyes that scanned the classroom like he already owned it. The girls whispered. The boys rolled their eyes. Avni didn't look up — not until the teacher said, "Avni Sharma, please shift and share your desk with Krivan Chugh."
She blinked. "But ma'am, that seat is—"
"Now, Avni."
And that's how it began — with a glare.
He dropped his bag beside her, the chair screeching against the floor. "Hi," he said easily.
"Don't talk during class," she muttered.
He chuckled. "Strict, huh? Great. I like challenges."
She ignored him. But something inside her — something soft, curious, and reckless — didn't.
---
Back in the present, Avni exhaled shakily as her car splashed through a puddle on her drive home from university. Bengaluru looked nothing like Udaipur, but every drop of rain tonight felt like déjà vu.
She reached her apartment, kicked off her shoes, and collapsed onto the couch. Her sketchbook slipped from her hand and fell open on an old page — a charcoal drawing of a boy sitting on a bench under a gulmohar tree. His face half-hidden. His expression unspoken.
She stared at it for a long time. The past she thought she'd buried had been quietly waiting in her art all along.
Her phone buzzed. A message. Unknown number.
Krivan: "Still sketching in the rain, Sharma?"
Her breath caught. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed the way he said her name — the way it always sounded like a secret only he was allowed to keep.
Avni: "New city, new life, same rain."
Krivan: "Maybe some stories deserve a second ending."
She didn't reply. She closed her eyes instead, letting the silence fill the room. But her mind betrayed her, replaying the one scene she could never forget — the last day of school.
---
Flashback — The Day Everything Fell Apart
It was the farewell party. Balloons hung limp against the classroom walls, the scent of perfume and heartbreak mixing in the air. Avni had been waiting — waiting for him to explain the rumor she'd heard, waiting for him to look at her and say it wasn't true.
But he never came.
Instead, she found a crumpled note slipped between her sketch pages, in his handwriting:
"I'm sorry for everything. I wish I could tell you the truth, but maybe one day you'll know."
She'd torn it before finishing the last line.
Because when trust breaks, even apologies sound like lies.
That night, Krivan left Udaipur without saying goodbye.
---
Present — Bengaluru Again
Avni opened her eyes. Her heart was drumming too loudly for silence.
She wanted to delete his message. Pretend it never happened. But her fingers hovered above the screen.
Avni: "Some stories don't need another ending.Theyneed closure."
She hit send and immediately regretted it.
Moments later, her phone buzzed again.
Krivan: "Then meet me tomorrow, 5 p.m. Lakeview Café. Let's end it right."
Avni stared at the text until the words blurred. Outside, the rain softened into a drizzle. She looked out the window — the city lights shimmering against the puddles — and felt something she hadn't in years: hope mixed with fear.
Maybe this was her closure.
Or maybe... fate wasn't done writing their story yet.
---
The next evening, as she stood outside Lakeview Café, the rain started again — same scent, same sound, same ache. And when she saw him walk in, smile hesitant but real, the past didn't feel so far anymore.
"Hi," he said, breathless.
"You're late," she murmured, unable to hide her smile.
"Some habits never change."
Their eyes met — and the world, for a second, felt like Udaipur again.
---
Because first loves never truly end.
They just wait — patiently, stubbornly — for the day the heart finds the courage to return.
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