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 mixed with damp earth rushed in through the half-open window, unfamiliar yet oddly calming.
It had been ten years since she last came here — as a teenager, arms crossed in rebellion, dragged by her parents to visit her grandmother. Now, she returned alone, thirty and heart-weary, not as a guest but as the sole heir to Saraswati Mehra’s crumbling cottage and dusty memories.
The driver pulled up before a rusting iron gate. A brass nameplate, almost eaten away by moss, still bore the name “S. Mehra.” The sight tugged at her unexpectedly. She pushed open the gate with effort, its hinges protesting like an old man roused from a nap.
Inside, the cottage stood like a forgotten photograph — sepia-toned, half-broken, still beautiful.
The interior smelled of closed spaces and old paper. A film of dust rested on everything — from the teakwood dining table to the upright piano Saraswati once played. Anaya dropped her bags with a sigh and opened the windows, letting the mountain air in.
Her phone had no network, which suited her fine. She wasn’t here to post pictures or update anyone. She was here to hide, to heal, and to sort through the remnants of a woman who had lived a quiet life but, in Anaya’s memory, always seemed to hold secrets behind her smile.
By late afternoon, Anaya had opened a few boxes in the living room — old saris wrapped in tissue, faded black-and-white photographs, stacks of yellowing books. One album caught her eye — a picture of her grandmother in her twenties, wearing a simple cotton saree and smiling not at the camera, but at someone just out of frame.
The expression felt too intimate to ignore.
The next morning, she climbed to the attic.
She’d always been afraid of this place as a child — the steep staircase, the dusty air, the creaks of the wooden beams. But now, in the soft glow of morning light, it looked less haunted and more forgotten. She pushed open the creaky trapdoor and coughed as motes of dust danced in sunbeams.
Old trunks lay scattered like a miniature battlefield. She opened one, revealing notebooks bound in cloth, pressed flowers between pages, and a stack of unopened envelopes tied with a silk ribbon.
And then she saw it — a letter, tucked between the pages of a weathered copy of Premchand ki Kahaniyaan.
The envelope was yellowed, the edges curling. It was unsealed.
Curiosity won over hesitation.
Ranikhet
June 17, 1968
Dearest D,
I should not be writing this. Every word I put on this page is a rebellion against what they expect of me. But silence is becoming a prison. Your absence has turned the air into glass — I move, but I can’t breathe.
They say our love is impractical. That the world does not allow the luxury of poetry between a Hindu girl and a Muslim boy.
But they don’t know what you mean to me.
Your eyes, your ghazals, the way you make the world quiet just by being in it.
I do not know what tomorrow will bring. But if you ever read this, know this: I loved you with the strength of a thousand unwritten poems.
Yours,
S
Anaya’s breath caught in her throat.
This wasn’t a love letter from a schoolgirl or a friend. This was her grandmother’s handwriting. Delicate, almost calligraphic. She remembered it from birthday cards and recipe notes.
“S.” was Saraswati.
And “D”… who was D?
For hours afterward, Anaya sat cross-legged in the attic, the letter in her lap. She read it again and again, trying to piece together the mystery.
Why had her grandmother never spoken of this man? Who was he? Where was he now?
That evening, she took the letter and the book downstairs. She made tea and sat by the window, the wind rustling the trees outside like pages in a diary.
She felt like she had stumbled into someone else’s unfinished story.
She wasn’t sure whether she was allowed to finish it — or if it was now hers to begin.
The next morning, Anaya walked into the local town market. The bookstore, run by an elderly man named Chawla she remembered from childhood, still stood by the bus stop.
“Namaste, beta,” he greeted, peering over his glasses. “Saraswati-ji’s granddaughter, isn’t it?”
Anaya smiled. “Yes. I’m staying at the cottage for a while.”
Chawla dusted off a stool. “Sit. Tell me, how was Saraswati ji’s final time? I hadn’t seen her in years.”
They spoke a while, sipping lukewarm chai. When Anaya mentioned a “D” and a letter, Chawla leaned back, eyes thoughtful.
“There was a boy. A poet. From Almora, I think. Muslim lad. Name was Danish or Daulat — something like that. He used to come for readings at the local school. Brilliant with Urdu. There were whispers, yes. People talk, you know.”
“Did he and my grandmother…?” Anaya hesitated.
Chawla simply said, “Some loves aren’t made for the world to approve of.”
Later that day, while walking back toward the cottage, Anaya spotted someone seated on a stone bench under the deodar trees. A man, around her age, sketching in a notebook.
He had a woolen scarf wrapped loosely around his neck and stubble that looked more forgotten than styled.
She might have passed by silently, but a gust of wind blew the pages of his notebook. He scrambled to catch them, and one landed near her feet.
Anaya picked it up. A black-and-white charcoal sketch of the hills — and a woman standing alone on a balcony.
She handed it to him. “Beautiful. You draw professionally?”
He looked up. Hazel-brown eyes, tired but sharp. “Just trying to remember better days.”
She offered a polite nod and started to walk away.
“Wait,” he called. “You’re Saraswati Mehra’s granddaughter, aren’t you?”
Surprised, she turned. “Yes. How do you know?”
“I’m Dev Sharma. I’m staying at the Rawat homestay down the road. Your grandmother used to teach me Hindi when I was a kid.”
Anaya studied him. There was something honest in his posture, but distant too.
“Well… small town,” she replied. “Everyone seems to know everything.”
Dev smiled faintly. “Not everything. Just the things people tried to hide.”
That night, Anaya couldn’t sleep.
She lay on the divan with the letter on her chest, the window open to the sound of crickets and the far-off bark of a mountain dog. The air smelled of pine, of nostalgia, and of untold stories.
Something was unfolding — not just the mystery of Saraswati’s lost love, but something within herself.
She hadn’t expected to feel this alive here.
Not after being told by her ex-fiancé that she was “too sentimental, too intense, too dreamy.”
But maybe, just maybe, she was beginning to remember who she really was.
A woman of letters.
Just like her grandmother.
Part 2: Strangers and Shadows
The next morning, the hills were soaked in rain. Soft drizzle whispered against the cottage windows, and clouds rolled in like quiet intruders. Anaya wrapped herself in a shawl and sipped on ginger chai as she stared at the letter once more, now kept safely inside a clear file sleeve.
The weight of the words her grandmother had written still clung to her. “I loved you with the strength of a thousand unwritten poems.” Who was this Danish, or Daulat? What had torn them apart? Why had her grandmother hidden that story like a buried gem, locked inside yellowed pages?
She couldn’t help thinking about Dev — the way he had said, “Just the things people tried to hide.” It was almost as if he knew exactly what she had stumbled upon.
Around noon, when the sky began to clear, Anaya took a walk down the winding road toward the town library. It had always been a quiet, dim place with the scent of old bindings and forgotten knowledge. She hoped it hadn’t changed.
It hadn’t.
Mrs. Deshpande, the librarian with spectacles that looked too big for her face, still sat behind the counter. She lit up when she saw Anaya.
“Arrey, Saraswati’s granddaughter! You look just like her in that shawl. Same sharp eyes.”
“I came for some local history,” Anaya smiled. “Particularly about Ranikhet in the 1960s.”
The librarian squinted. “Why that era?”
“I found a letter. My grandmother might’ve been… involved with someone. Someone named Danish Ali, perhaps? A poet?”
Mrs. Deshpande’s face tightened ever so slightly. “Yes… I remember that name. He used to come for readings at the Government Girls’ School. Urdu teacher in Almora. Very talented, very gentle. But then things got tense. Political. He left.”
“Why?”
“Because back then, a Muslim man in love with a Brahmin girl was not just scandal—it was war.”
The words stung more than Anaya expected. It wasn’t the first time she’d felt the weight of society’s rules. But hearing it from an older generation, so plainly accepted, twisted something in her chest.
“Do you have any of his poems?” she asked softly.
Mrs. Deshpande thought for a moment and disappeared into a back room. When she returned, she handed Anaya a thin, self-published booklet — “Khamoshi Ki Zubaan” by Danish A.
The cover was a faded sketch of a hill road, and inside were poems written in a mix of Hindi and Urdu. Anaya flipped to one at random.
तुम्हारी चुप से जो डर लगता था,
वही अब मेरी पनाह है।
(The silence I once feared in you,
Has now become my refuge.)
Her heart skipped.
She borrowed the book and stepped out just as the sun broke through the clouds, washing the hills in golden light.
She hadn’t expected to see Dev again so soon.
He was sitting on the same stone bench under the deodars, sketchpad open, pen moving swiftly. He looked up as she passed.
“You like this spot too,” she said, approaching.
“Only when it’s not crowded,” he teased gently. “Which, in this town, means always.”
Anaya smiled. “What are you drawing today?”
“Just the market square. Trying to capture its chaos without the sound.” He tilted the sketchpad. It was a stunning composition — shadows of umbrellas, kids playing near fruit stalls, the outline of a bookstore in the background.
“Do you do this for a living?” she asked.
“I used to take photos. For newspapers. Conflict zones. War stories.”
She blinked. “That’s… intense.”
“Too much, eventually,” he said, without looking up. “Now I just draw. Quieter world.”
There was a beat of silence between them, not awkward, but present.
“May I sit?” she asked.
Dev nodded.
They sat quietly for a moment, the wind rustling through the pine trees above.
“I found a letter,” Anaya said, surprising even herself.
Dev looked at her curiously.
“In the attic. From my grandmother to someone named Danish. They were in love, I think. But the world didn’t let them be.”
He nodded slowly. “That tracks. People here still talk about love like it’s a privilege, not a right.”
Anaya turned to him. “You said yesterday — that people know what others try to hide. Did you mean that about my grandmother?”
Dev hesitated. “Not exactly. But my mother told me about Saraswati ji. Said she was always… different. Kind. Intelligent. But with sadness in her eyes, even when she smiled.”
Anaya swallowed hard. “I never really knew her. Not deeply. But I feel like I’m just starting to.”
Dev closed his sketchbook. “Maybe some people aren’t meant to be known in life. Only remembered in pieces.”
That evening, Anaya sat on the veranda with her sketchpad open. She hadn’t drawn in months. Her last commission — a wedding invitation design — had been for her own wedding. The wedding that never happened.
She picked up her pencil and began drawing the outline of a girl standing at an attic window, holding a letter. Then she added pine trees, mist curling around the roof, and hills beyond. Her grandmother, perhaps.
But as she sketched, she realized: the face was turning into her own.
A few days later, Anaya went to the Rawat homestay to return a package accidentally delivered to her. She didn’t expect Dev to open the door.
He was barefoot, hair tousled, wearing a loose kurta with charcoal on his fingers.
“Anaya. You okay?”
She held out the package. “This came to my house. It’s yours.”
He took it and smiled. “Thanks. Want to come in for a coffee?”
She hesitated. “Okay.”
The homestay room was modest but filled with charm. A few travel books, a guitar, and walls lined with sketches — of markets, of sunsets, and faces. So many faces.
“Do you always draw people?”
“People tell the story,” he said simply. “Landscapes just listen.”
She nodded, fingers tracing the spines of books. One caught her eye: “The Forgotten Letters of Love” by Amrita Arora.
“You like reading about letters?” she asked.
“Maybe I’m just fascinated by what people say when they think they won’t be heard.”
They drank coffee on the porch.
Dev finally asked, “Why are you here, really?”
Anaya looked at the hills, their green folding into the distance. “Because I was tired of pretending. Tired of Delhi, tired of my life looking perfect on paper. My fiancé broke up with me because I… ‘feel too much.’ Because I write long texts, and design things with too many flowers, and cry during ghazals.”
Dev laughed quietly. “Sounds like you escaped just in time.”
She smiled. “What about you? Why did you stop photography?”
His eyes darkened slightly. “Because one day, in Aleppo, I was framing a shot of a child standing in rubble. And I realized I was more focused on the lighting than the crying.”
Anaya said nothing. She just looked at him.
“I came here to remember how to feel without being afraid of it,” he added.
They sat in silence, side by side.
Strangers, yet somehow not.
That night, Anaya opened Danish’s poetry book again. At the back, someone had scribbled something in pencil — barely legible.
“Raat ki chithi, subah tak ka intezaar nahin karti…”
(A letter written at night does not wait for morning.)
It was in a different handwriting. A woman’s, perhaps.
Her grandmother?
Anaya shivered.
Love stories didn’t die. They simply waited — in attics, in books, in the spaces between two strangers who might find each other at the right moment.
Part 3: The Ghosts They Carried
It was raining again in Ranikhet. A slow, steady drizzle that made the world look like it was drawn in watercolor — trees melting into hills, rooftops into fog, and memories into moments.
Anaya sat on the floor of the attic, surrounded by papers, books, and dust. The attic had become her refuge — a shrine of the past, thick with the scent of old wood and the faintest trace of jasmine, her grandmother’s favorite perfume.
Today, she found a faded envelope tucked inside a tin box, carefully sealed, unlike the first. No address, no date. Just the words:
To be read only if you remember how it felt.
Anaya hesitated. Then she opened it.
My Dearest D,
We are ghosts now, you and I.
Ghosts of things we dared to want.
They told me to forget you. They tried to marry me off. They burnt your poems.
But how do I forget something that lives in the marrow of my bones?
Even now, when I close my eyes, I can feel the warmth of your voice reciting Faiz in the school courtyard.
Do you remember?
I wore blue that day. You said it reminded you of the sky after monsoon.
They never understood that we never wanted to change the world — only love in it.
But perhaps loving you was a rebellion too big for this small town.
Yours in silence,
Saraswati
Anaya clutched the letter to her chest.
Her grandmother had lived her whole life with this wound—never shared, never healed. Anaya wondered how many of us walk the earth with unfinished stories like this, tucked away in drawers, whispered only to the wind.
That evening, she walked to the town’s poetry café, a small sunroom turned into a weekend gathering space. A signboard outside read:
“Yaadein: An Open Mic Evening”
Inside, lanterns cast a warm glow on shelves of books, mismatched cushions, and posters of Ghalib, Amrita Pritam, and Gulzar. There was already a small crowd.
She hadn’t planned to read, only to listen. But when someone recited a couplet that sounded eerily close to Danish Ali’s words, her ears perked.
After the event, she approached the speaker — an old man in a woolen shawl, sipping kahwa.
“Excuse me,” she said. “The poem you recited — it sounded familiar. Was it by Danish Ali?”
The man smiled. “You know of Danish sahab?”
“I think… I think he knew my grandmother. Saraswati Mehra.”
The man’s eyes widened. “Ah. Saraswati madam. How could one forget her? She was the brightest light in this town once.”
“Did you know them both?”
“I was their classmate. I saw it happen — the letters, the glances, the day her father found out.” He paused. “There was a storm that evening. Real and metaphorical. Danish left the next day.”
“Did they… ever meet again?”
The man shook his head. “Not that I know of. But Danish never married. Lived in Nainital. Wrote under pen names. Still came to Ranikhet once every few years. Walked past her house, never rang the bell.”
Anaya felt a lump rise in her throat.
“Do you know where he is now?”
The man looked away. “He passed. Two winters ago. But his nephew still visits his old house. Maybe he has the letters. Or the truth.”
The next morning, Dev found her standing in front of the Rawat homestay gate.
“You’re up early,” he said, sipping from a steel tumbler.
“I need your help,” Anaya said, straightforward. “You’re a journalist, right? Can you find someone for me?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Missing person?”
“No. A dead one. But his memories might still be alive.”
On the drive to Nainital, Anaya explained everything.
The second letter. The old man at the café. The unfinished story.
Dev listened in silence, steering the car carefully around bends. The rain had stopped, but the air was thick with mist. Every few miles, he glanced at her — the way her fingers fidgeted with the ribbon tied around the letters, the distant look in her eyes.
“You know,” he finally said, “you’re carrying more than just her story now.”
“I know,” she whispered. “But maybe I need to. Maybe we all have to finish what the last generation couldn’t.”
Dev didn’t respond. But he gripped the steering wheel tighter.
In Nainital, they reached a small stone cottage near Bhimtal. It had a rusting gate, ivy-covered walls, and an old guava tree leaning protectively over the porch.
A young man in his late thirties opened the door. He looked like a version of Dev — same quiet eyes, same tired smile.
“I’m Amaan,” he said. “You’re here for Danish chacha?”
Anaya nodded. “I found some letters. From my grandmother. I think they loved each other. She passed too, last year.”
Amaan led them inside. The living room was filled with books, papers, and framed verses on the walls.
“He never spoke about her. But he never forgot her either,” Amaan said. “Would you like to see something?”
He brought out a wooden box with intricate carving.
Inside were letters — dozens of them — all in Danish’s hand. None were ever sent.
Anaya picked one.
S,
I saw your house today. The yellow curtains are still there.
The guava tree leans a little more now — like it, too, carries weight.
I don’t know if you think of me. But every poem I write is a prayer in your name.
Yours, in another life,
D
Tears welled up in Anaya’s eyes. She had spent her whole life thinking of her grandmother as composed, detached, almost cold. But now, she realized — Saraswati had simply built walls to survive a world that wouldn’t allow her kind of love.
“I want to do something with these,” she said. “Publish them. Make sure they’re remembered.”
Amaan nodded. “They deserve that.”
Dev quietly took out his sketchpad and drew — a window, a guava tree, and two letters drifting in the wind.
That night, back in Ranikhet, Anaya couldn’t sleep.
She stepped outside into the cold, where the sky had cleared to reveal stars scattered like spilled rice on black velvet.
Dev was sitting on the steps, guitar on his lap, softly strumming an old tune.
“You always play at night?” she asked.
“Only when the ghosts are loud.”
She sat beside him. “I found a part of myself I didn’t know I needed.”
He looked at her. “You found a legacy.”
Anaya turned to him. “Do you ever feel like… maybe we aren’t meant to find love in our generation? That everything’s too fast, too confused?”
Dev shrugged. “Maybe. But maybe we’re just afraid of love that asks us to slow down.”
She watched his fingers pause on the strings.
“Do you think they would’ve been happy?” she asked. “Saraswati and Danish?”
Dev smiled faintly. “They were. In the lines they wrote. In the letters they never sent. Maybe happiness isn’t always in staying. Sometimes it’s in remembering.”
Their eyes met in the soft silver of the moonlight.
And for a moment, the ghosts went quiet.
Part 4: Letters Never Sent
The cottage was no longer just a home for Anaya — it had become a living archive. Every room, every drawer she opened now seemed to whisper fragments of a story too long buried. Her mornings began with tea and letters, and her nights ended with poetry and the quiet ache of the past.
But something was shifting in the present too.
Dev had become more than just a helpful neighbor or a curious listener. He had slowly woven himself into her daily life — showing up with steaming aloo parathas from the dhaba, scribbling poems on paper napkins, fixing the wobbly garden bench without being asked. Yet, they never spoke about what was growing between them. It stayed unspoken — fragile, like dew on a thread.
One evening, as the orange sun bled into the Kumaon hills, Anaya sat cross-legged in the veranda, Danish’s unsent letters spread before her like offerings.
Each letter was raw, intimate — sometimes tender, sometimes furious. He had written to Saraswati across years, from different towns, at different ages. Some letters were short — a single line. Others spanned pages, each word trembling with longing. None had been mailed.
She picked one at random.
September 12, 1978
S,
I saw a girl wearing blue today, the exact shade of the sari you wore that day under the gulmohar tree.
My chest caved in with the memory. I almost smiled. But grief is greedy — it doesn’t like to share space with joy.
Tell me — did you ever think of me while cooking? Did my name float through your mind during monsoon storms?
You don’t have to answer. I already know.
Love,
D
Anaya wiped her eyes, the ink now blurring on the page. She took out her own sketchbook and began to write — not a poem, not a letter, but something in-between.
She wore blue too,
But her sky never met his rain.
And yet, they thundered
In each other’s silence.
She didn’t notice Dev watching her from the gate, hands in his pockets, eyes thoughtful.
“May I?” he asked.
She looked up, startled, then nodded.
He walked in slowly and sat beside her.
“You’ve been quiet,” he said.
“So have you.”
“Because some feelings come with silence first,” he said, his tone soft. “Like music before lyrics.”
Anaya looked at him. “Why does it feel like we’ve known each other longer than a few weeks?”
Dev smiled. “Maybe some stories don’t need introductions. They just pick up where others left off.”
He picked up one of Danish’s letters and read it silently. Then, gently, he placed it back.
“You think she ever saw these?”
“No,” Anaya said. “He never sent them. And she never stopped waiting.”
Dev leaned back, resting his head against the wall. “Maybe we’ve all written letters we never sent.”
She turned toward him. “Have you?”
He hesitated. “Yes. One in particular.”
“To whom?”
“Myself. The version of me before Syria.”
Anaya reached for his hand, slowly. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
He didn’t pull away. “We were in Aleppo. My best friend was covering a story. I told him not to go down that alley. He went anyway. A bomb fell, and I photographed the smoke instead of running to him.”
Anaya’s heart twisted. “You froze.”
“I framed. That’s worse.”
“No, it’s not,” she said gently. “You did what you were trained to do. But it’s not who you are.”
Dev closed his eyes. “I stopped taking pictures after that. Switched to sketches. At least they can’t bleed.”
They sat there for a long time, their fingers now quietly entwined.
Over the next few days, Anaya and Dev grew inseparable.
They combed through more letters, cataloged poems, scanned pages for digital preservation. Amaan, Danish’s nephew, even sent them a recording — a rare radio interview where Danish spoke of “a woman who shaped every word I ever wrote, though she never read a line of it.”
Dev suggested creating a coffee-table book — Letters Never Sent: The Lost Love of Saraswati & Danish. Anaya loved the idea.
They started drafting layouts — pairing letters with illustrations, poetry with sketches, interspersed with hill town imagery and old photographs. It felt like stitching a torn love story into something whole again.
And somewhere between design and dusk, between storytelling and silence, their own story began to take root.
One night, as the sky cracked with thunder and rain lashed against the windows, there was a power cut. The room turned black except for the flickering oil lamp on the dining table.
Anaya lit candles and brought them to the living room, where Dev sat tuning his guitar.
“I miss the city sometimes,” she said, sitting on the rug beside him.
“I don’t,” he said. “I miss silence more.”
She watched him play — soft, meandering chords. She closed her eyes and leaned against his shoulder. Her hair smelled of sandalwood, and his hand brushed against her wrist as he played.
Suddenly, she looked up. “Have you ever fallen in love before?”
He stopped playing. “Yes.”
“And?”
“It didn’t survive the wars inside me.”
Anaya exhaled slowly. “Maybe we don’t fall in love. Maybe we remember it — from another lifetime.”
Dev smiled faintly. “You always talk like a poem.”
She tilted her head. “Is that a compliment or a warning?”
He didn’t answer.
He just leaned forward and kissed her — soft, slow, the kind that makes the world tilt slightly.
When they parted, he whispered, “Maybe we were meant to write a letter of our own.”
The next morning, everything was sharper — the air, the colors, the ache.
Anaya smiled as she made breakfast. Dev was humming in the garden. The manuscript draft sat on the table, the words Letters Never Sent typed in a clean serif font.
But as Dev stepped inside, phone in hand, his expression shifted.
“I have to go to Delhi,” he said.
Anaya turned, surprised. “Why?”
“My editor. He saw the draft we sent. He wants to publish it. Big feature. Interview. Full spread.”
“That’s great!”
Dev looked away. “He also offered me something else. A chance to return to photography. A long-term fellowship.”
Anaya’s heart stilled. “Where?”
“Kashmir.”
She said nothing.
He stepped forward. “I haven’t said yes. I don’t even know if I want to.”
“But you might,” she said quietly.
He nodded. “I might.”
They stood in silence. The birds chirped. A tea kettle whistled. The manuscript sat between them like a child of two people who didn’t know how to stay.
That night, Anaya returned to the attic alone. She opened the last box — the one she hadn’t dared touch.
Inside was a photo. Saraswati and Danish — sitting side by side under the gulmohar tree. Neither smiling. Just looking ahead. Steady. Sure. Silent.
And another letter.
If you’re reading this, then you’ve found the things I never told.
I never regretted loving him. Not for one moment.
But I do regret the silence. I let fear write my ending.
If you, whoever you are, ever love someone —
Say it.
Loudly. Clearly. Even if the world drowns you.
Because silence is not noble. It is a thief.
Anaya’s hands trembled.
She stood up, ran downstairs, and found Dev packing his sketchbooks into a duffel.
She held out the letter.
He read it slowly. His face changed.
“I don’t want to write this ending again,” she said. “I don’t want to be another Saraswati.”
Dev looked at her, torn.
“I want to be here,” she said. “With you. But I can’t chase you. I won’t.”
He nodded. “And I can’t promise I’ll stay. Not yet. But I’ll write. Every day.”
She smiled, eyes glistening. “Then write me a letter I’ll never have to find in an attic.”
Part 5: The Mirror Cracks
Two months passed.
The hills were quieter without Dev. The afternoons were longer, and Anaya had returned to her old solitude — but this time, it felt lonelier than before. She went about her days editing the manuscript, mailing drafts to publishers, curating old letters for a special exhibition at a Delhi literary fest. On the outside, she looked composed. But within, something trembled — not with heartbreak, but with a hesitant hope.
Dev had kept his promise.
Every day, like clockwork, a letter arrived. Not emails. Not texts. Real, handwritten letters. Sent from Srinagar, Baramulla, Anantnag. He wrote about the mountains, about the children who posed for his camera, about the moments of beauty between conflict. And every letter ended with one line in the same ink:
“Save a chair for me in your garden.”
One evening, as Anaya sipped tea on the veranda, she noticed an old lady watching her from across the fence. Frail, draped in a faded white sari, her silver hair tied in a loose bun. Her eyes—sharp. Watchful.
The woman raised a trembling hand. “You’re Danish’s girl?”
Anaya stood. “His niece. Sort of. You knew him?”
The woman walked closer, slow but steady. “I was Saraswati’s sister.”
Anaya’s breath caught.
They sat in the garden as the sky turned pink.
The old woman, Meenakshi, spoke in halting rhythm — as though each memory had to be coaxed.
“Saraswati was fire,” she said. “Bright, fierce. She loved him. My God, she did. But our father hated his poetry. Thought he was unstable.”
Anaya nodded. “She never told him she was pregnant.”
Meenakshi looked stunned. “You know?”
“I found a letter she wrote. She didn’t send it.”
Meenakshi closed her eyes. “We lost the baby. In the eighth month. And her heart broke. She never recovered fully. She married a lawyer. Lived in silence. But every spring, she’d walk past this cottage… just to see if he was still here.”
“She never stopped loving him.”
“No,” said Meenakshi. “But she couldn’t say it out loud. She was trained to survive, not to feel.”
Anaya felt something crack open in her chest — not sorrow, not guilt, but a fierce, generational ache. The kind that travels through time and blood, like inheritance.
She reached out and held the woman’s hand. “I’m going to tell their story. The real one.”
The old woman smiled. “Then tell it loud.”
A week later, Anaya flew to Delhi. The LitFest was grand — long lines, spotlights, media panels. Her book Letters Never Sent had already received preorders from three countries. One review called it “a quiet storm of forgotten intimacy.”
She sat onstage, speaking about Danish’s poetry, Saraswati’s silence, and the beauty of things that don’t end with resolution — but with resonance.
When the moderator asked, “Why do you think he never moved on?”
Anaya replied, “Because some people are not bridges. They’re destinations.”
A hush fell over the audience. Cameras clicked. Applause rose like a wave.
And then she saw him — in the third row, quiet, smiling.
Dev.
After the session, he waited for her backstage.
“You came,” she whispered, half-smiling.
“You kept my chair,” he said.
They didn’t rush into each other’s arms. There were no cinematic declarations. Just the kind of gaze that feels like coming home after a storm.
Later, at a nearby café, over steaming kulhad chai, they spoke like two people who had grown in different directions — only to find their way back to the same root.
“I thought I was healing in Kashmir,” Dev said. “But I realized I was preparing — to come back whole.”
Anaya looked at him. “Do you want to stay?”
He reached into his bag and handed her a letter.
Dear Anaya,
I took a photograph last week. A child smiling through barbed wire. Behind him — wild flowers.
That’s how I see you. Wild and soft. Brave and bright.
I don’t want to send this letter years from now. I want to read it to you tonight.
If you’ll have me — I’d like to build something with you.
Not perfect. Not planned.
But honest.
Dev.
She folded the letter, smiled, and said, “You always write better when you think I won’t read it.”
Back in the hills, seasons changed.
Their life wasn’t dramatic. There were no violins in the background, no lingering kisses in the rain. Just laughter over burnt rotis, quiet nights with books and old songs, the occasional fight about silly things — like whose turn it was to feed the cat they never planned to adopt.
One day, while sorting out Danish’s belongings for a local museum exhibit, Anaya found a sketch — an unfinished one. It was Saraswati, standing at the edge of the hill, wind in her hair, eyes closed.
She looked free.
Anaya added the last stroke — a letter flying from her hand, drifting toward the sky.
She framed it.
Dev titled it “Set Free”.
And somewhere, beneath the gulmohar tree, the past rested. Not forgotten. But finally at peace.
Part 6: Gulmohar Ke Neeche
(Beneath the Gulmohar)
The monsoon returned like an old friend. The hills glistened with rain-washed greens, the skies thundered with stories, and the red flowers of the gulmohar burst into full bloom—just like that year when Danish and Saraswati first met.
And beneath that very tree, Anaya now sat with Dev, wrapped in a shawl, sipping ginger tea, a notebook open in her lap.
“Do you think love always needs an ending?” she asked.
Dev leaned back, watching raindrops slide down the edge of the umbrella. “Maybe not. Maybe some loves just change form.”
“Like water into steam,” she mused.
“Or like letters into stories.”
They smiled. They were different people now—not just two souls who had met by chance, but two hearts who had made the choice to stay.
Three Months Later
Life in the cottage had settled into its own rhythm. Dev started teaching part-time at a school nearby, capturing candid portraits of the children. His photo series, Faces of the Fog, was selected for a gallery in Shimla. Anaya’s book was being translated into Marathi and Malayalam, and she’d begun work on a second novel—this time fiction, inspired by real letters from strangers across India who had written to her after reading Letters Never Sent.
And every Sunday, under the gulmohar tree, they hosted something unexpected—a “Letter Circle.”
The idea had been Dev’s.
“Everyone has something they’ve never said out loud,” he’d said. “Let’s create a space for them.”
They placed an old typewriter and stationery on a table outside. Whoever came could write a letter—to someone they missed, someone they loved, or someone they’d lost. No names were required. No return addresses. Just honesty.
The letters were folded and placed in an antique wooden chest. Some people left crying. Others stayed back for tea. It became a ritual. A healing.
One letter said:
*“To the woman I never proposed to—
I see you every morning in the yellow sari of the flower-seller. I wonder if you ever knew. I wonder if it matters now. But just in case it does, I loved you. From behind bookshelves. From afar. In silence.”*
Another read:
*“To the father I never understood—
I wore your watch today. It’s heavy. Like the grief I never admitted. Maybe that was your way too. Maybe silence was our language. I forgive you. Please forgive me.”*
One Sunday, a letter arrived addressed simply to “The Girl Who Believes in Forgotten Things.”
Anaya’s fingers trembled as she opened it. The handwriting was jagged but delicate.
Dear Girl,
You once came to my clinic with a poetry book and a broken voice. You didn’t speak much. But you cried when I asked if you wanted sugar in your tea. That’s when I knew your pain wasn’t physical.
I was too much of a coward to say anything. But I saw something in your eyes that night. A fight. A flicker. I’m glad you lived. I’m glad you wrote.
The world needs more people who believe in the magic of unposted letters.
With quiet admiration,
A silent witness.
Anaya folded the letter and pressed it to her chest.
Not everything needed answers. Some things were beautiful in their mystery.
That night, Anaya dreamed of Saraswati again—standing under a lamppost, wearing a white dupatta with rain stains. She wasn’t crying. She looked… proud.
“Did he know?” Anaya asked her dream.
Saraswati smiled. “He didn’t need to. He waited. That was enough.”
A Proposal, Almost
Dev was not a dramatic man. He didn’t believe in grand proposals with violins or flash mobs. But he had an old ring—his mother’s—that he kept hidden in the pages of Gitanjali, under “Where the mind is without fear…”
He had planned to ask her under the gulmohar, with fairy lights and hot samosas and maybe a dog or two watching awkwardly from the side.
But life, as always, had other plans.
Because two days before his plan, Anaya came home breathless, waving a telegram.
Yes, a telegram.
It read:
To: Anaya Rao
From: Indian Postal Archives, Mumbai
We’ve located additional correspondences belonging to Danish Mehra and Saraswati Deshpande, dated 1972–73. Originals in good condition. Requesting author’s visit for verification and permissions.
She looked up at Dev, eyes shining. “Their story isn’t over. There’s more.”
Dev smiled, sliding the book back on the shelf—ring still inside.
Mumbai Diaries
Anaya had not been back to Mumbai in years.
The noise, the humidity, the sea—everything felt like a distant life. But walking into the Postal Archives Department was like stepping into a time capsule.
A kind-eyed archivist handed her a sealed brown folder.
Inside were six letters, all unsent. Four by Danish. Two by Saraswati.
And the last one—marked with an ink stamp, but never posted—was dated November 14, 1973.
Anaya read them slowly, the paper soft, the ink faded.
Danish wrote:
I saw you across the temple steps today. You didn’t see me. Or maybe you pretended not to. Either way, it hurt like only love can. But I’ll wait. Until your heart speaks louder than your fear.
Saraswati wrote:
I heard you left town. I hope you find someone who sings when you share your silence. But I hope she knows that you once loved a woman who never learned to say yes out loud.
Anaya cried.
For them. For the almost-love. For the quiet courage.
And then she smiled. Because now, their story would never be forgotten again.
Back in the hills, under the gulmohar, she placed copies of those letters inside a weatherproof glass frame and mounted them on a stone beside the tree.
Above it, a single plaque read:
Here bloomed a love that never died.
Here begins every letter that dares to dream.
Dev watched her from a distance.
She turned, the wind catching her dupatta, and walked toward him.
“I’ve told their story,” she said. “Now I want to live ours.”
He didn’t say a word.
Just took out Gitanjali, opened the page, and held out the ring.
She laughed, cried, and said yes before he could even ask.
Part 7: Chitthiyon Ke Paar
(Beyond the Letters)
Autumn arrived quietly. The hills turned golden, the winds gentler. Life, like the weather, had begun to settle—into a rhythm that felt less like a fairytale and more like a promise.
Dev and Anaya had been engaged for two months now. No big announcements. No social media posts. Just a quiet ring on her finger and a growing garden in the back of their cottage.
Their Sundays beneath the gulmohar tree were now famous in nearby towns. People brought stories, memories, pain—and often, joy. Letters poured in from all corners of India, even overseas. Some were anonymous. Some came with return addresses and drawings. A few were stained with old tears.
And yet, the most remarkable thing was not the letters they received—but the healing they witnessed.
The Man With a Red Diary
One Sunday, an elderly man with a neatly ironed kurta and trembling hands came to the Letter Circle. He carried a red leather diary, worn at the edges.
He said his name was Colonel R. Mehta (Retired).
“I haven’t written a letter in thirty years,” he said. “But I used to. Every day. To the same woman.”
He opened his diary and began to read.
October 14, 1971
Dear Amrita,
They’ve posted me to the border. The mountains are colder than I remembered. Every night, I touch the locket you gave me and feel a little less afraid. Write soon. I miss your poetry.
February 2, 1972
My dearest,
I heard of your engagement to someone else. I won’t pretend it didn’t break something inside me. But I still write. Not because I hope. But because it helps me breathe.
He closed the diary gently. “I never sent these. She died in 1976. I’ve been carrying her in my words ever since.”
Everyone was silent.
Anaya touched his hand. “May we archive your letters?”
He nodded. “I’d like her voice to live beyond me.”
A Letter from Herself
That night, Anaya wrote a letter for the first time in months.
Not to Dev.
Not to her father.
But to herself.
Dear Me,
You survived. You loved. You lost. You loved again. You were not perfect, and that’s okay. You gave people stories. But more importantly, you gave yourself permission to begin again.
You have made peace with the past. Now promise yourself to live the future.
With all my love,
Anaya
She folded it carefully and placed it in the wooden chest under the gulmohar.
Some letters don’t need readers. Just writers brave enough to write them.
Dev’s Journey Home
A few weeks later, Dev received a phone call.
His mother had fractured her hip. She needed someone to stay with her for a while in Delhi. He packed quickly but hesitated at the door.
“I can postpone,” he said.
Anaya shook her head. “Go. Your mother needs you.”
“I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll write to you,” she smiled. “Like the old days.”
And she did.
Every day.
One letter a day. No WhatsApp. No calls. Just ink and heart.
Her first letter read:
Dear Dev,
You should see the way the gulmohar looks without you. It sulks. I do too. Today I made tea and forgot to put ginger. It tasted like absence. But the cats still come by. And the sun still rises. Funny how life continues even when hearts pause.
Come back soon.
P.S. Your maroon scarf smells like you. So I’ve decided to wear it all week.
Dev’s replies were fewer, but every word was wrapped in affection.
Dear Letter-Girl,
Delhi is noisy. Maa complains but secretly enjoys the attention. I cooked today. Burnt the dal. It reminded me of you. Come visit soon, or send parathas. I’ll settle for either.
P.S. I dreamt of our wedding. You were wearing red. I forgot the vows. We laughed anyway.
Weddings & Whispers
When Dev returned after three weeks, Anaya was waiting at the train station.
She wore a yellow kurta and had a flower tucked in her braid. He hugged her like he hadn’t seen her in years.
“I missed the hills,” he whispered.
“And I missed the stories,” she smiled.
A week later, under the gulmohar tree, they married.
No pandit. No rituals. Just a quiet promise.
They exchanged vows written on old postcards. The same ones once used by Danish and Saraswati.
Anaya read:
I vow to listen. To sit in silence when you don’t want words. To bring you chai on sad days. And to laugh with you in all seasons.
Dev read:
I vow to write to you even when we’re in the same room. To never forget that love is a daily choice. And to be the tree you can lean on, always.
They kissed as rain fell softly around them.
The gulmohar bloomed brighter that day.
Letters That Found Their Way
The wooden chest was now full.
They began archiving the most moving letters online—anonymously—with permission. The project was titled Chitthiyon Ke Paar—a tribute to stories that went beyond words, beyond time.
A publisher reached out. A documentary filmmaker visited. News channels wanted interviews.
But Dev and Anaya remained rooted.
Their joy wasn’t in fame.
It was in the quiet crackle of paper. The ink stains. The moment when a stranger folded their pain into a page and left a piece of themselves behind.
A Letter From a Name They Knew
One morning, an envelope arrived with no stamp—just handwriting Dev recognized instantly.
To Anaya & Dev,
I read about you two in a magazine. I had to write. I don’t know if you remember me—my name is Ria Deshpande. Saraswati was my aunt.
She died before I was born. But my father kept all her letters. And her diary. It mentions a place with a gulmohar and a boy who wore loose kurtas and smelled of sandalwood. I think that was Danish.
*Your story gave our family a gift we never expected: closure.
I’d love to visit someday. And read one of her poems under your tree.
With gratitude,
Ria
Anaya clutched the letter with trembling fingers.
“She existed,” she whispered. “She lives on.”
As night fell, Dev and Anaya sat on the porch.
No music. Just crickets and clouds.
“I sometimes wonder what it means—to go beyond the letters,” Anaya said.
Dev thought for a moment. “Maybe it means to start living the story, instead of just telling it.”
She nodded. Then picked up a pen and began writing the last line of her second book:
Some love stories never begin.
Some never end.
And some… bloom like gulmohars in forgotten corners—waiting to be found.
Part 8: Woh Chitthi Wala Pyar
(The Love That Came in Letters)
Two years later.
The hills remained gentle. The gulmohar tree now had a wooden bench beneath it, hand-carved by Dev with the words:
“Where stories rest, and love begins.”
The Letter Circle had grown from a small Sunday gathering to a quiet movement. Every third Sunday, people came not just to write or read—but to listen. Some drove down from Delhi, some flew from Bangalore, and some simply walked from the nearby tea gardens carrying letters in folded saris or coat pockets.
Anaya’s second book, Letters to the Ones Who Left, had become a quiet bestseller—praised not for grandeur, but for the aching truth in its pages. It wasn’t fiction. It was a collection of real letters, strung together with her gentle commentary. Each one credited only by the city it came from—Lucknow, Siliguri, Amritsar, Jaipur…
People wrote not to be remembered, but to remember.
The Old House in Nainital
One afternoon, a letter arrived with no return address, just a simple note:
If you’re reading this, please come to the old house near Hanuman Mandir in Nainital. It’s time you saw something.
— A Friend of Danish & Saraswati
It wasn’t signed.
Something about it tugged at Dev.
“Let’s go,” he said, holding the letter to Anaya.
They drove up the next weekend, a long, winding road through mist and memory.
The house was easy to find. It had peeling green windows and a wooden swing out front. A middle-aged man welcomed them with chai and quiet eyes.
“My name is Gopal,” he said. “I was Danish’s roommate in college. I kept this house locked all these years. But after reading about you two… I thought you should have this.”
He handed over a small tin box.
Inside were over forty letters, wrapped in red thread. Letters from Danish to Saraswati. And a diary. Hers.
Anaya read the first line aloud:
I loved him even when I married someone else.
I loved him through silence.
And I loved him till the day I drowned in my own poems.
Her hands shook. Dev placed his hand over hers.
Gopal wiped his eyes. “They weren’t allowed to love openly. He was Muslim. She was Brahmin. This town tore them apart. But they never stopped writing. You brought them back to life.”
That evening, they sat near Nainital lake, reading the letters aloud. Tourists passed by, unaware that two love stories were unfolding—one from the past, and one still being written.
The School That Grew From a Letter
A year later, Chitthiyon Ke Paar Foundation officially opened its first center: The Letter School.
Not a traditional school. This one taught storytelling, emotional literacy, journal writing, oral history, and the art of listening. Children wrote their first letters by hand. Elders came to share forgotten folktales. Postmen were invited to speak on their favorite deliveries.
It wasn’t about education alone. It was about healing.
In the hallway, framed letters from strangers lined the walls—like holy scripts of a secular temple.
One child, Ruksar, wrote:
Dear Abba in Heaven,
I don’t remember your face. But Mummy says I smile like you. Today I helped an old man cross the road. I think you would have liked that.
Love,
Your daughter who is learning to be brave.
Letters Between Lovers Turned Lifemates
Dev still wrote letters to Anaya.
Every month, without fail.
Even when they lived under the same roof. Even when her hair turned grayer. Even when her hands ached.
Dear Anaya,
You made khichdi today. And yet, it tasted like joy. How do you do that?
Also, your giggle when the cat chased the rooster—I’ve archived it in my memory. Will play it on loop tonight.
Love,
Your annoying poet
Anaya wrote too.
Dear Dev,
The world is loud, but your silence still feels like home.
Your back has started to bend a little. I still think you walk like a hero in a forgotten Urdu film.
Come home early today. I miss you for no reason.
P.S. Check the kitchen drawer. There’s besan laddoo.
Their mailbox remained full. Of each other. Of life.
The Last Letter
One winter, Dev fell ill. Nothing serious at first—just tiredness, headaches. But tests followed. Then hospital stays. Then long silences between doctor visits.
Anaya wrote him a letter every night in the hospital.
He read them with a weak smile, eyes crinkling like old envelopes.
Dear Dev,
The gulmohar misses you. The cats are misbehaving. I told them their father would return soon.
I made your favorite soup today. It tastes like longing.
Come back. I’ll write you ten letters a day. Just don’t go where I can’t reach.
Dev held on for a year.
Then one evening, with Anaya holding his hand, he whispered:
“Promise me, you’ll keep writing. Even if I’m gone. Write to me. Maybe the wind will carry your words.”
And he left.
Quietly.
Like a well-folded letter, sealed with peace.
Letters in the Wind
Today, Anaya is 72.
She still writes one letter a day. To Dev. To strangers. To the girl she once was.
The Letter School has ten branches now. The gulmohar still blooms. The wooden chest under it is full of voices from across decades, languages, and silences.
And every year, on their anniversary, she reads the very first letter he ever sent her.
To the girl who reads letters like prayers,
I don’t know if you’ll write back. But if you do, let it be the start of something impossible.
Something real.
Maybe love isn’t in grand gestures.
Maybe it’s in the quiet rustle of pages that carry our breath.
Yours (if you allow),
Dev
Final Line
And thus lived a love story—
Not told through grand declarations,
But through paper, patience, and the poetry of small things.
This was Woh Chitthi Wala Pyar.
END
