Returning to college for my second year felt like returning to the scene of a crime. The campus, once a symbol of a bright future, was now just a collection of buildings that held memories I couldn't escape. My dorm room was the same, the walls were the same, but the silence in it was new. It was a thick, heavy blanket that smothered everything.
The first few weeks of the semester passed in a gray haze. I was a model student on the outside. I attended every class. I took notes. I submitted my assignments on time. But I was completely hollow. My body was going through the motions of being a student, but my mind was stuck in a loop, endlessly replaying the last conversation, the finality of the block, the crushing weight of my secret love.
The silence from Parveen had become a physical presence. It was a constant, low-frequency hum in the back of my mind. It was the empty seat next to me in my head where her commentary should have been. The world had lost its color, and I had forgotten what it felt like to be anything other than tired. A deep, soul-level exhaustion had set in, a weariness that sleep couldn't fix.
One evening in late September, the weight became unbearable. I had just finished a lab report, a meaningless document about fluid dynamics that felt like the most pointless exercise in human history. I looked around my small room, at the stacks of books and the cold, impersonal furniture, and I felt an overwhelming sense of being trapped. Trapped in my own head, trapped in a life that felt like it was no longer mine.
I needed air. I needed space.
I left my room and started walking, my feet moving without any conscious direction. I went up the stairs. And then up another flight. And another, until I reached the final, rusted metal door. The one that led to the roof of the eight-story hostel building. It was usually locked, but for some reason, tonight, the latch was broken. The door creaked open.
The night air was cool and heavy. The city spread out below me, a glittering carpet of lights under a starless, hazy sky. The distant sound of traffic was a dull roar. Up here, everything was quiet. Peaceful.
I walked to the edge. There was a low parapet, a concrete ledge no higher than my knees. I looked down. The cars below were tiny, moving specks of light. The people were invisible. From up here, the world looked simple. Distant.
The thought arrived not as a dramatic decision, but as a quiet, logical conclusion. A solution to a problem that had no other answer. The hum in my head went silent. For the first time in months, I felt a sense of calm.
I stood on the edge for a long time, just breathing. The wind tugged at my shirt. I wasn't scared. The part of me that was capable of feeling fear had been hollowed out long ago. All that was left was the ache. A constant, grinding ache that had become the background music to my life. And the thought of it finally ending was a relief. It was the promise of silence. Real silence.
I thought of her. Not with anger, not with blame. Just a deep, profound sadness for what I had broken. I hoped she was happy. I hoped she would never know how much this hurt. It was my final, selfish act of love: to take this pain with me so it could never touch her again.
I shifted my weight forward, my toes curling over the concrete lip of the ledge. This was it. The end of the ache. The final full stop.
I moved to jump. I wanted to jump. I wanted the sweet release of death.
But when I actually tried to jump, I couldn't.
My body refused the command. My legs, which I had willed to push off, were locked in place, rigid as stone. I leaned forward, my mind screaming JUMP!, but it was like I had run face-first into a solid, invisible barrier. I felt like there was a brick wall, and I couldn't jump even if I wanted to. My desire for oblivion was absolute, but my body's instinct to live was stronger, a primal, stubborn force that I had no control over.
My breath came in ragged, desperate gasps. The calm shattered, replaced by a wave of confusion and a terrifying, helpless frustration. I couldn't live with the pain, but my own body wouldn't let me die. I was a prisoner.
Tears streamed down my face, hot and silent. I was completely, utterly broken.
"ARJUN!"
The voice was a roar. A raw, terrified, furious sound that ripped through the quiet of the rooftop and slammed into me like a physical force.
I stumbled back from the ledge, my heart seizing in my chest. I whipped my head around.
Standing by the doorway to the roof, his face pale and his eyes wide with a horror I had never seen before, was Kapil. His backpack was slung over one shoulder, and his chest was heaving.
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" he screamed, his voice cracking with a mix of rage and fear.
I couldn't speak. My throat was closed tight. The sight of him, here, now, was so impossible that my brain couldn't process it.
He started walking towards me, slowly at first, like he was approaching a wild animal. "Get away from the edge, Arjun. Now."
I was frozen. My feet were rooted to the spot.
"I SAID GET AWAY FROM THE EDGE!" he bellowed, and this time he ran. He closed the distance between us in a few frantic strides and grabbed the front of my shirt, yanking me back from the ledge with a strength I didn't know he possessed. He dragged me towards the center of the roof and threw me to the ground.
I landed hard on the rough concrete, the impact jarring my bones. I looked up at him. He was standing over me, his hands clenched into fists, his body trembling with adrenaline and fury. Tears were streaming down his face, but his expression was pure rage.
"You idiot," he choked out, his voice thick with emotion. "You stupid, selfish idiot."
And then the anger broke. His face crumpled. He fell to his knees in front of me and wrapped his arms around me, pulling me into a hug so tight it felt like he was trying to fuse our bones together. He buried his face in my shoulder, and I could feel his body shaking with ragged, desperate sobs.
I was still in shock, my mind a blank slate. But as he held me, something inside me finally broke. A strangled, guttural sob escaped my lips, and then another. I wrapped my arms around him and held on, my fingers digging into his back. We knelt there, on the cold, hard roof, two broken friends holding each other together under the indifferent city lights.
I found out later that Kapil had decided to surprise me. His parents had an urgent errand in the city, and he'd hitched a ride, planning to crash in my dorm for the weekend. He had been walking towards the hostel when he'd looked up and seen a figure standing on the roof, silhouetted against the night sky. A cold, sick feeling had gripped him. He had run.
He didn't ask me what happened that night. He didn't demand an explanation. He just got me off the roof, walked me back to my room, and put me to bed like a child.
He didn't leave the next day. He didn't leave for a week.
He became my anchor. He slept on a mattress on my floor. He dragged me out of bed in the morning. He walked with me to my classes and sat outside the lecture hall, waiting. He made sure I ate, sitting across from me in the mess hall in silence, just watching me push food around my plate.
We barely talked about anything important. We talked about cricket. We talked about his classes. We watched stupid movies on his laptop. He didn't try to fix me. He didn't offer platitudes or easy solutions. He just stayed. His presence was a constant, silent statement: You are not alone. I am here.
Slowly, painstakingly, he tethered me back to the world. The crushing weight in my chest didn't disappear, but it lessened, made more bearable by the simple fact that someone else was helping me carry it.
At the end of the week, he packed his bag.
"I have to go," he said, standing by the door. "My dad will kill me if I miss any more classes."
"Okay," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
He walked over and pulled me into another hug, this one softer, less desperate. "Call me," he said, his voice firm. "Don't you dare go quiet on me. I don't care if it's three in the morning. You call me. Understood?"
I nodded, unable to speak past the lump in my throat.
He gave me one last look, his eyes filled with a deep, unwavering concern. Then he turned and left.
I stood in the silence of my room. It was still there. The ache was still there. But for the first time in a long time, it didn't feel like it was going to swallow me whole. My best friend had walked through fire to pull me back from the edge. I didn't know how I was going to heal. But I knew, for the first time, that I had to. I owed him that much.