Anjali Reddi
Chapter 1:
Maya Sharma hated mornings. Not in the poetic, “oh I need coffee before I can function” way people posted on Instagram. No, she actually hated mornings—because mornings meant meetings, meetings meant people, and people meant expectations. And expectations were just heartbreak in PowerPoint form.
Her alarm blared at 7:30 AM sharp—set to an aggressive tabla remix that could probably revive the dead. She sat up on her bed in her neat Indiranagar apartment, looked out at the half-sunny, half-smoggy Bengaluru sky, and groaned.
“New day, new inbox full of garbage,” she muttered, grabbing her phone.
Fifty-two unread emails. She scanned through the usual suspects: newsletters she forgot to unsubscribe from, a Swiggy coupon that expired yesterday, and three team threads titled URGENT (that weren’t).
And then, she saw it.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: If mornings had a face, they’d look like yours before coffee.
She stared.
No name. No signature. Just a random Gmail address and a line that walked the tightrope between creepy and… oddly charming?
She clicked. The email was short:
I saw you yesterday. You were sipping black coffee and glaring at the world like it owed you an apology.
It was glorious.
Some people wear perfume. You wear presence.
Yours (anonymously, for now),
—The Other Inbox
Maya blinked.
What the hell?
She immediately checked the headers. The IP was masked. Whoever this was knew what they were doing. Great. Another tech-savvy Bangalore creep with too much free time.
She marked the mail as “Read,” rolled her eyes, and went about her day. But something inside her refused to fully delete it.
By 9:15 AM, she was in the office, which occupied the 6th floor of a glass-fronted building off Outer Ring Road. A startup with a name like “ZyraBox” (that meant nothing but sounded like it could raise funding in California), her company did AI-driven marketing tools for e-commerce platforms. Or something like that. Maya just ran the branding team.
“Maya! Did you see Karan’s pitch deck for the SnapKart collab?” barked Trisha, her manager, a woman who seemed permanently powered by kombucha and condescension.
“I did. I also saw my will to live slowly drain with every slide,” Maya replied dryly.
Trisha didn’t laugh. She rarely did. Maya didn’t mind.
Lunchtime meant heading up to the building’s rooftop café—half open-air, half overpriced—and trying not to make eye contact with people from other startups.
That’s when she saw him. Again.
The guy with the messy curls and the laptop held together with stickers. He was sitting in his usual spot by the terrace railing, sipping chai, typing furiously, and occasionally smiling at his own screen. Probably another aspiring “content creator” writing about how to manifest success with turmeric lattes.
He caught her eye and gave a small nod. Maya nodded back, reluctantly. They had a rhythm now—shared silence across tables. They’d never spoken, but she’d nicknamed him Writer Guy.
That night, back at her flat, Maya slouched on the couch beside Ritika, her best friend and roommate.
“You got another one,” Ritika said, scrolling through Maya’s phone without permission—again.
“What?”
Ritika held up the screen.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: The art of glaring like a queen.
You walked past my table today.
Black kurta, fierce walk, like you were about to fire someone just for sneezing too loud.
I didn’t say hi. I never do.
But maybe you noticed me this time.
—The Other Inbox
“Okay. Who is this mysterious romancer?” Ritika asked, wide-eyed. “Please tell me it’s not your building watchman. That man gives major Shakespeare-villain energy.”
“I don’t know,” Maya muttered, staring at the message. “But he’s not entirely wrong.”
The next few days passed in a blur of emails, presentations, and caffeine. And slowly, surely, the messages kept coming.
One every morning.
They were never sexual. Never pushy. Just… thoughtful. Observational. The kind of compliments Maya didn’t even know how to accept.
“You don’t smile often, but when you do, it feels like breaking news.”
“Your playlist is chaos—Mehdi Hassan followed by Megan Thee Stallion. I approve.”
“Sometimes silence is the best kind of conversation. You’re fluent in that.”
Maya found herself wondering who it could be.
Was it someone at work? A prank? A stalker?
Or was it… Writer Guy?
A week later, on a particularly boring Thursday, she decided to test a theory.
She left work early and walked up to the rooftop café, ordered chai instead of her usual espresso, and sat at the table next to Writer Guy.
He looked up and smiled. “Finally switching to the dark side?”
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
He pointed at her chai. “You always drink black coffee. Today—chai. Strong choice.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You’ve been watching me?”
He shrugged, charmingly. “This café is like a sitcom. Same cast, same timing. You’re kind of the lead character, you know?”
Maya didn’t reply. She just sipped her chai and studied him.
Aarav Sen. She finally remembered his name. It had been on a scribbled receipt once. He was a freelance writer. Something about working on a novel and ghostwriting LinkedIn posts for CEOs in the meantime.
“So, what are you writing that makes you smile so much?” she asked, casually.
“Hmm,” he said. “Mostly love letters I’ll never send.”
Maya froze.
He looked at her, amused. “Relax, I didn’t mean you specifically.”
She gave a tight smile, but her mind was already racing. That couldn’t be a coincidence… could it?
Later that night, she got another email.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: Chai looks good on you.
I almost spoke to you today. You sat close. Ordered my favorite.
But some things are better left unread—like good poetry, or those two-year-old WhatsApp texts from exes.
Still, you looked beautiful. Fierce, as always.
Yours,
—The Other Inbox
Now she was sure.
It had to be Aarav.
Didn’t it?
Chapter 2:
Maya had never been good at subtlety.
When she was six, she once told a dinner guest that his cologne smelled like expired mosquito coil. At twenty-four, she’d accidentally revealed to her friend’s fiancé that she was planning a surprise bachelorette. And now, at thirty, she was about to do something equally ungraceful: trap a man into confessing that he’s secretly writing her anonymous love letters.
Romantic? Maybe. Practical? Definitely not. But at least it was better than refreshing her inbox every hour like a hopeless teenager.
Friday, 11:32 AM. Rooftop café.
She waited until Aarav was alone—headphones in, typing away—and casually approached his table.
“Hey,” she said.
He looked up, removing one earbud. “Well, look who’s converted. Chai again?”
“No,” she said, plonking her steel coffee tumbler on his table. “I just came to ask you a question.”
“Ominous,” he grinned. “Shoot.”
She sat down across from him. “You write love letters?”
He blinked. “I… write many things. Depends on the client. Sometimes I ghostwrite wedding vows for awkward NRI couples.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
He tilted his head. “Then?”
“Let’s not pretend, okay?” she said, folding her arms. “You send anonymous emails. To me. Every morning.”
He stared at her. Then laughed.
It was not the reaction she expected.
“Oh wow,” he said. “That’s flattering. But also not true.”
She frowned. “You literally said yesterday you write love letters you never send.”
“To everyone, Sharma. It’s a writing exercise. Keeps my brain alive.”
“You write to random strangers?”
“Sometimes. You’d be shocked how much content I’ve written about the security guard’s obsession with Kannada soaps.”
Maya narrowed her eyes. He looked completely honest. Or an excellent liar.
“Okay, then prove it. Show me your inbox.”
Aarav leaned back, amused. “You’re asking me to violate the sacred privacy of a struggling writer’s Google drafts?”
“You’re hiding something.”
“I’m hiding ten half-written book outlines, two abandoned screenplays, and one cringey poem about Rajma-Chawal. But not secret emails.”
Maya didn’t budge. Aarav, still smiling, turned his laptop to her.
The tab he had open?
Google Docs titled “Love Letter 113 – To the girl who walks like she’s late to a war meeting.”
She clicked.
It wasn’t addressed to her. It was addressed to no one.
And yet… it sounded exactly like the messages in her inbox.
She looked up. “So you write these, but don’t send them?”
“I told you. Writing exercise. I like collecting moments.”
She didn’t know what to say.
“So,” Aarav said, gently, “if someone is sending you anonymous emails… maybe it’s not me.”
That evening, back at home, Maya sat on the balcony while Ritika watered a potted basil plant that refused to grow.
“Could still be him,” Ritika said. “Writers lie for drama.”
“True,” Maya said. “But it felt real.”
Ritika sat beside her. “Let’s say it’s not him. Then who? Anyone at work fit the profile?”
“God, I hope not,” Maya muttered. “Most of them can’t spell ‘empathy,’ let alone write it.”
She paused. “It’s someone who sees me. Who notices chai orders and playlists.”
“You sure it’s not a prank?”
“I don’t know,” Maya said softly. “But the way they write… it makes me feel like someone is paying attention in a way Rahul never did.”
Ritika softened. “Well, if it’s genuine, they’ll reveal themselves.”
“Or keep hiding forever,” Maya said, sipping her tea. “Like feelings I refuse to deal with.”
Saturday. 7:43 AM.
Another email.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: A war meeting, indeed.
You confronted someone yesterday. Bold move.
I watched from three tables away and admired your style.
You don’t like mystery. You like clarity. You want control.
But maybe, just maybe, not all beauty comes with certainty.
Here’s a thought:
Let something unfold without dissecting it.
Let yourself be curious, not suspicious.
Yours—still anonymously,
—The Other Inbox
Maya’s breath caught.
They knew.
They saw her confrontation with Aarav.
So it wasn’t him.
Unless… this was reverse psychology.
“Goddamnit,” she muttered.
That afternoon, Maya did something uncharacteristic.
She wrote back.
To: The Other Inbox
Subject: Curiosity is a curse.
You think you’re clever.
Watching me from a distance. Sending poetic observations like I’m some main character in a book you’re too afraid to finish.
But you also keep hiding.
Why?
If you have something to say—say it.
If you want to be known—let me know you.
—Maya
No reply.
Not that day. Not the next.
Monday. 8:11 AM.
A new message.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: The fear of being known.
I wasn’t always this way.
There was a time I believed that showing up—fully, honestly—was enough.
Then I did. And I got hurt.
So now, I send thoughts instead of flowers.
Words instead of presence.
It’s not because I don’t want to be known.
It’s because I don’t know if I’d still be wanted after.
Still yours,
—The Other Inbox
Maya sat with the message for a long time.
This wasn’t just clever wordplay anymore.
This was wounded honesty.
And suddenly, the story wasn’t about who it was.
It was about why they were hiding.
And whether Maya—whose walls were built stronger than most—could offer someone else a bridge to step out of the shadows.
Chapter 3
Maya had never been afraid of confrontation—but this was different.
This wasn’t about proving someone wrong or winning an argument in a boardroom. This was about being seen, and worse, being vulnerable. She had spent the last year building thick, quiet walls. The kind that didn’t allow feelings in or let them out.
But now, someone was peeking over them. And she wasn’t sure if she wanted to reinforce the barricade… or open the gate.
Tuesday, 10:04 AM. Zyra Box Office
She sat at her desk, pretending to be deep in a spreadsheet while everyone around her did their usual startup things: loud Slack messages, frantic project meetings, and too many people pretending to understand KPIs.
Her inbox was empty today. For the first time in ten days, there was no message from The Other Inbox.
And it unsettled her.
Maybe her last reply had scared them off. Maybe the courage it took for them to say “I wasn’t always this way” had come at a cost. She kept checking her Gmail like a teenager waiting for a text from a crush.
By 12:15 PM, she’d had enough.
Subject: Seen.
I got your message.
I know what it’s like to be afraid of being known.
I’ve spent the last year making myself invisible in all the wrong ways—emotionally, at least.
But I read your words. I felt them.
You see me?
Here’s me seeing you back.
Let’s make a deal.
For every message you send, I’ll reply.
Anonymous for anonymous. Thought for thought.
Let’s build a story. Together.
—Maya
She stared at the screen for a long second. Then hit Send.
Wednesday. 7:55 AM.
A reply.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: Storylines
A story, then.
Alright, Maya. You’re on.
Here’s the first question:
What’s the one thing you’ve never said out loud—but wish someone just knew?
I’ll go first.
I hate birthdays.
Not because I fear aging, but because I’ve spent the last three pretending I didn’t care that no one showed up.
Your turn.
Maya exhaled sharply.
She wasn’t expecting this level of honesty at 8 in the morning. Not before coffee. But it was her rule: reply for reply. Thought for thought.
Subject: Secrets and Celebrations
I miss my mother.
Everyone thinks I’m over it because it’s been seven years.
But I still can’t hear Lata Mangeshkar without tearing up.
She used to hum Lag Jaa Gale while cleaning the kitchen.
I avoid that song like it’s made of glass.
There. That’s mine.
The emails continued.
Day after day, a slow, careful correspondence unfolded.
They wrote about silly things:
The weirdest thing they’d ever eaten (Aarav once had chocolate dosa. Maya judged him hard.),
Their guilty pleasure playlists (Maya had a soft spot for early 2000s boy bands. Aarav secretly loved Bhojpuri remixes.).
But they also wrote about heavier things:
Loneliness in crowded spaces,
The art of pretending you’re okay at work,
The fear that maybe, just maybe, your best emotional days are behind you.
Saturday Evening. Koshy’s Café, Bengaluru.
Maya sat with Ritika, eating cutlets and nursing a second cup of coffee.
“So… you’re basically pen pals with a ghost?” Ritika asked, skeptical.
“Anonymous email partner,” Maya corrected. “It’s a story now. Ours.”
“And you’re falling for this guy?”
Maya paused.
It was the first time someone had said it out loud.
“I don’t know who I’m falling for,” she admitted. “But I am falling. For the way he writes. For the way he listens. It’s scary.”
“You know this can’t go on forever, right?”
“I know.”
Monday Morning. 7:43 AM.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: What scares you more?
Loving someone who might never love you back?
Or loving someone too late?
Maya sat with the message for an hour.
Then opened a new window.
Subject: Fear, meet your match.
Both scare me.
But you know what scares me more?
Loving someone and never telling them.
I spent two years with someone who never really knew me.
And I never even realized I was lonely—until I wasn’t with him anymore.
But with you?
I feel known. Fully.
So I’m saying it.
I like you. Whoever you are.
And if you’re not ready to step into the light, I get it.
But if you ever are…
I’ll be here. Waiting.
—Maya
And this time, she didn’t check her inbox ten times.
She just… waited.
Chapter 4:
By Tuesday, the silence had returned.
It wasn’t unusual now. The Other Inbox had grown quieter lately—messages arriving every few days instead of every morning. But this time, the silence felt heavier. Like a pause that meant more than just a missed email. Like a goodbye that didn’t know how to say itself.
Maya tried not to obsess. She failed spectacularly.
Tuesday. ZyraBox Office. 5:20 PM.
The tech team had organized a “Casual Hour”: an excuse for samosas, overhyped memes, and foosball games in the breakroom. Maya usually avoided these events. But today, she needed a distraction. Something that didn’t involve Gmail or phantom poets.
She wandered in, grabbed a plate of aloo puffs, and hovered near the corner where Aarav and his dev team were laughing over an aggressive round of Street Fighter II.
“You actually play Chun-Li like you have a vendetta,” Aarav was saying to someone, grinning.
Maya smiled despite herself. He looked lighter today—head thrown back, sleeves rolled, eyes lit with something she didn’t usually see in the café corner: ease.
And then, like a glitch in a movie, her gaze landed on his laptop.
Unlocked. Open.
The screen blinked, unattended. A Google Doc titled:
“Love Letter 119 – She waits, even when she says she won’t.”
Her chest tightened.
No. No way.
She looked away. Ate a bite of samosa. Looked back.
Still there.
She tried to focus on her snack. On the room. On the chaos of background banter. But the words wouldn’t leave her alone.
“She waits, even when she says she won’t.”
Was he quoting her email?
No. Maybe it was a coincidence. Aarav was a writer. He wrote vague, poetic things all the time. Maybe he just liked the phrase.
Still.
She couldn’t leave it alone.
That night.
Ritika was brushing her teeth when Maya barged into the bathroom.
“I think Aarav is The Other Inbox,” she said, toothpaste foam be damned.
Ritika, mouth full of mint, raised a brow.
“You said he wasn’t.”
“I know I said that,” Maya groaned. “But he had a draft open on his laptop. A love letter. The line was something I literally said in my last reply.”
“Maybe coincidence?”
Maya shook her head. “It’s too close.”
Ritika spat into the sink. “Okay. So what’s the plan? Spy more? Break into his Google account? Interrogate him over dosa?”
“I don’t know,” Maya whispered. “What if it is him? And he’s been pretending all along? Or worse—what if it’s not, and I confront him again and look insane?”
“Or,” Ritika said gently, “what if you just ask him?”
Maya didn’t reply.
Because the truth was: she wasn’t ready.
Wednesday. 8:02 AM.
No email.
Just… silence.
Until 8:13 AM.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: Close. Too close.
I think you’ve started to guess.
And that terrifies me.
I wasn’t supposed to let this go on so long. I thought I’d stop after a week. Or two. But then you started replying. And suddenly, I was addicted to the possibility.
But now we’re close. Too close.
You’re asking the right questions.
And I’m running out of reasons to hide.
—The Other Inbox
Maya stared at the screen.
He knew she was circling in.
And yet—still no name.
That evening.
ZyraBox was closing up. Maya stayed late, claiming she needed to finish an ad brief. Aarav was still there too, alone in the café corner, typing away.
She walked up slowly.
“You always work this late?” she asked.
He glanced up. “Deadlines don’t respect time zones.”
“You’re always writing,” she said. “Not just for work. Other things, too.”
He nodded, cautious. “Helps me think.”
She sat across from him. “I saw one of your drafts yesterday. On your laptop.”
He stiffened.
“I didn’t read it,” she added. “Just the title.”
A pause.
Then Aarav closed his laptop, gently. Looked her in the eyes.
“What do you want to know?”
She held his gaze. “Is it you?”
Aarav exhaled.
“No,” he said softly. “But I wish it was.”
Her heart stumbled.
“What?”
“I’ve known it wasn’t me for a while,” he said. “But I’ve read some of your replies. Once. Accidentally.”
Maya’s eyebrows shot up. “How?”
“I… saw your screen in the café. A few weeks ago. You left it open while ordering tea. I wasn’t snooping. But I saw the name. The Other Inbox. I googled the phrase.”
He looked down, a little embarrassed.
“And then?” she asked.
“I didn’t find anything. But I started writing again. My own letters. For no one. For maybe you. I don’t know. I just—” he hesitated. “I admire how open you’ve been. I wish I could write like that to someone who would listen.”
Maya was stunned. Her brain couldn’t untangle this.
“So… you’re not him. But you… wanted to be?”
He nodded.
And suddenly, it all made a strange, aching kind of sense.
They were both lonely people. Both craving connection. Both hiding in words.
That night, back home, Maya stared at her ceiling.
She had been chasing a mystery, hoping for a face.
But maybe this wasn’t about just one person.
Maybe she was becoming someone who saw people better—herself included.
Thursday. 7:31 AM.
No email yet.
She opened her inbox anyway.
Refreshed.
Waited.
8:03 AM.
From: The Other Inbox
Subject: Tomorrow.
You saw someone else.
And for a moment, I thought it was over.
But I saw the way you looked at him. And it wasn’t the way you look at these letters.
Which means maybe… there’s still a window open.
Tomorrow. 7:45 PM.
Cubbon Park. Near the old stone bench by the banyan tree.
I’ll be there.
If you don’t come, I’ll understand.
If you do…
I’ll finally tell you my name.
Chapter 5:
There are few moments in life when everything slows down:
When a message hits Send.
When a door opens you weren’t ready for.
When you walk toward someone and don’t know if your life is about to change.
Maya felt all three at once.
Friday. 7:36 PM. Cubbon Park.
The air smelled of old trees and summer rain. Maya wore her simplest kurta—white, cotton, creased from the way she’d clutched it all day in nervous hands.
Her steps were slow but deliberate.
No more wondering. No more pretending she was just curious.
She reached the banyan tree. The bench was empty.
Her heart sank for a breath.
Then—
A figure approached from the far path.
Blue shirt. Tan satchel. Slightly nervous gait.
Maya’s pulse quickened. She stood up.
And froze.
It was Kabir.
Not Aarav. Not a stranger. Not a ghost.
Kabir. From the finance team. The quiet guy who always came in five minutes late with chai in a steel tumbler. The one who rarely spoke unless asked. Who sat two pods away and never raised his voice.
He looked as shocked as she did.
“I didn’t think you’d come,” he said softly.
“I didn’t think it was you,” she replied.
They stood there, two halves of the same unread email, blinking in disbelief.
“I almost didn’t hit send that first night,” he said. “You looked like you had the world figured out. I didn’t.”
“I didn’t,” Maya said, half-laughing. “I still don’t.”
Kabir gave a small, sheepish smile. “I never meant to keep it a secret this long. But then your replies started… and I couldn’t stop. You listened in a way nobody ever had.”
Maya sat down slowly on the bench. “You saw me.”
“And you wrote me back to life,” Kabir said, sitting beside her. “Every day I opened my inbox hoping you hadn’t stopped.”
Maya looked at him. Really looked.
He wasn’t the usual hero of a romantic story. He didn’t have Aarav’s cool charisma or smooth speech. But he had something quieter—sincerity, steady eyes, and the kind of presence that didn’t demand attention but kept it anyway.
“Why me?” she asked.
Kabir paused. “You were the only person who smiled at me without needing a reason.”
They sat in silence as the park lights flickered on, casting soft halos over the ground.
“So… what now?” she asked.
Kabir took a breath. Then opened his satchel and pulled out something wrapped in brown paper.
“I printed them,” he said. “Every message we ever sent. Yours, mine. I kept them in order. It’s… our story.”
Maya reached out, touched the packet. Her fingers brushed his for a moment.
“This is the most un-corporate, most poetic spreadsheet of emotions ever,” she joked.
He laughed. And it was beautiful. Unscripted. Real.
“I don’t know where this goes,” she said. “But I want to know. Together.”
Kabir looked at her with something soft and certain.
“Then let’s write the next chapter.”
And for the first time in a long while, Maya didn’t feel like she was waiting.
She felt found.
One Year Later, The email thread was closed now. But every Sunday morning, Maya and Kabir sat in the same café corner, working on their book: Love, Unsubscribed. It was half fiction, half truth. Fully theirs. And in every author bio they drafted, they wrote the same line:
“Sometimes the best stories aren’t sent.
They’re felt.”
End
