emotional healing
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Before the Sky Falls
Saanvi A. Menon The rain started sometime after midnight, stealthy at first, tapping like fingers on the tin awning outside Mira’s fourth-floor window. She didn’t get up to look. Mumbai rain, especially in late June, had a way of arriving without ceremony but leaving a trail. The fan above her bed slowed, hiccuped, and then…
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Woh Chitthi Wala Pyar
Arjun Sharma Part 1: The Letter in the Attic The hills of Ranikhet were wrapped in their usual mist, like a half-remembered dream refusing to fade with morning light. Anaya Mehra sat in the back of the shared taxi, her fingers clenched around the strap of her leather sketchbook bag. The sharp scent of pine…
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When We Danced That Summer
Ira Mehrotra The Town That Smelled of Salt and Silence The train screeched to a stop like it wasn’t ready to let go of Rihan Bose. He stepped down onto the sun-bleached platform of Kavar, a small town that clung to the southern coastline like a secret. The salty wind stung his skin, and gulls…
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A Cup of Yesterday
Vinita Sharma Part 1: The Letters No One Reads The café sat at the edge of the road like a forgotten comma in a long sentence. Half hidden by a wild bougainvillaea vine and mist that never quite left, “Yesterday’s Brew” had no signboard—just a brass bell that rang softly when someone entered and the…
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Saffron Skies
Shreya Mehra ONE Aaravi stepped off the plane into the crisp, cool air of Kashmir, her senses immediately overwhelmed by the beauty around her. The mountains, dusted with snow at their peaks, loomed majestically in the distance, while the air was thick with the scent of earth and pine. This was supposed to be a…
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Skin Deep, Soul Deeper
Tara Mitra Part 1 — The First Gaze The sky over Goa wasn’t just blue—it was bold, like a canvas splashed with reckless abandon. Rhea stepped into the quiet artist residency nestled between palms and silence, her duffel slung over one shoulder and her thoughts as heavy as clay. She had come here to escape,…
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दोपहर की खिड़की
सौरभ मेहता भाग १ शहर की उस पुरानी गली में जहाँ मकानों की छतें एक-दूसरे के कंधे पर टिकी होती हैं और गलियों की साँसें भी धीमी पड़ चुकी होती हैं, वहीं तीसरे नंबर का मकान सबसे चुप है। दीवारों की सीलन अब तस्वीरों के किनारों तक पहुँच चुकी है, और खिड़कियों से झाँकती धूप…
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My Boss, My Ex
Rhea Jha The conference room was freezing, or maybe it was just her hands that had turned cold. Aisha Kapoor adjusted the cuff of her blazer for the third time in five minutes, a nervous habit she thought she’d long abandoned. The team sat around the glass table, murmurs of speculation buzzing in the air—new…
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Midnight Maps of Meghalaya
Aneesha Marak Part 1: The Broken Route It was past nine when the cab took the sharp bend near Cherrapunji, the headlights cutting through curtains of mist that clung to the hills like secrets. The driver muttered something in Khasi, tapped the dashboard thrice, and the engine made a coughing sound that didn’t feel reassuring.…
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Halfway Home
Shreya Mukherjee The air in the Bangalore metro smelt faintly of wet concrete and deodorant. Anaya Sen adjusted her tote bag, balancing herself as the train jerked forward. Her headphones were in, but the music was off. She wasn’t in the mood for playlists. Not this morning. Outside, the city passed by in a blur…
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The Days We Wandered
Ritoban Mukherjee The Escape Begins It started with a silence between four friends who had known each other since college but hadn’t spoken properly in months. The kind of silence that grows not out of absence but the slow sediment of routine. It was Pramit who broke it one humid Kolkata afternoon by posting a…
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Between Lectures
A. K. Menon It started with a spilled cup of coffee and a Shakespeare quote. Dr. Aanya Roy, Head of Literature at St. Helena’s College, was pacing across the staff lounge, a worn-out copy of King Lear in one hand and a cappuccino in the other, when Dr. Kabir Mehta entered, unsuspecting, balancing his own…