Riyan had never hated silence so much.
The hostel buzzed with the usual clamor—boys shouting over cricket scores, someone playing music on tinny speakers, laughter echoing down the corridors—but for him, every sound only deepened the void where Ananya's voice should have been.
He lay sprawled on his bed, staring at the ceiling fan spinning its endless circles. In his hand was the stub of a pen, tapping, tapping against the page of a notebook already scarred with restless scribbles of her name.
Had the note reached her?
Kabir had been confident, handing the slim book back after slipping the folded paper between its pages. The milk woman was reliable, he said. No one suspected her. The plan had been clean.
But clean plans rarely stayed clean in Ananya's world.
Riyan sat up, raking a hand through his hair. His mind painted every possible outcome—her cousin finding the note, her mother burning it, her father locking her away tighter. The thought of her reading his words made his chest ache; the thought of her losing them made him want to smash his fists through walls.
Kabir walked in just then, a cricket ball in hand, his shirt half-tucked as usual. He took one look at Riyan and sighed. "Still no word?"
Riyan shook his head, jaw clenched. "It's been two days."
Kabir sat on the edge of the bed, tossing the ball up and down. "Patience, bro. You know she's under watch. It's not like she can wave a flag from her roof."
"That's not enough." Riyan's voice cracked sharper than he meant. He closed his eyes, exhaling hard. "I need to know she's okay."
For a moment, neither spoke. The hostel noises swelled outside—the clang of a steel plate, someone arguing about exams. Life moved on around them, indifferent. But for Riyan, time felt like a noose.
The next morning, he was at the tea stall near the banyan tree before sunrise, his body restless with waiting. Students drifted past in pairs, heading toward class or the temple road. Every face he scanned, every step made his chest tighten.
Would she send something? A ribbon tied where only he would see? A slip of paper left beneath the roots?
He lingered, pretending to sip the bitter chai until it went cold, pretending to read the morning paper he couldn't see. His eyes kept darting to the tree, to the shadows beneath it. Nothing.
When Kabir joined him, his tone was lighter than his eyes. "You're going to make yourself sick if you keep this up."
Riyan didn't answer. His jaw worked, his shoulders taut. He wanted to believe. He wanted to trust she'd find a way. But every minute without her felt like a blade twisting deeper.
That night, sleep mocked him again. He tossed under the dim yellow bulb of the hostel room, ears full of noise, mind full of silence. He imagined her room, her barred windows, her cousin's sharp eyes. Did she still have the note? Did she read it by moonlight the way he'd dreamed?
At last, near dawn, his body gave up. He wandered outside, bare-footed, the hostel grounds cool with dew. He ended up at the banyan again, the old roots curling like veins through the earth.
And there—
A ribbon.
Green silk, knotted low around a root. Not obvious, but not hidden either.
His breath caught. His hand trembled as he crouched, touching the fabric. It was hers. It had to be.
The air rushed out of him in one harsh exhale. Relief, fierce and aching, flooded through his chest. She had read it. She had answered. She was still with him.
He pressed the ribbon to his lips, closing his eyes. For the first time in weeks, the suffocating silence cracked open.
Kabir found him there minutes later, crouched like a man praying at a shrine. "Well?" he asked, softer than usual.
Riyan rose slowly, the ribbon clenched in his fist. His voice was low but burning. "She answered."
Kabir studied him, then nodded. "Then we move forward. The game's not over yet."
But Riyan wasn't listening. His gaze was on the horizon, where dawn spilled light over the campus walls. His pulse throbbed with a new certainty.
She was trapped, yes. Surrounded, watched, silenced. But not broken. She was fighting in the only way she could, and now she'd reached him.
And if she could fight from inside her prison, then he would fight harder from outside it.
That night, back in his room, Riyan lay with the ribbon looped around his wrist. He didn't sleep, but for once, it wasn't from fear. It was from the weight of resolve.
Wait for me, Ananya. Whatever it takes, I'll break through these walls.
The hostel door banged open. Kabir's voice was tight this time: "Riyan—we may have a problem. Someone else saw the ribbon."