The monsoon arrived without warning that afternoon.
The sky had been a dull gray all morning, heavy with secrets it refused to tell. People hurried through the bazaar, bargaining faster than usual, glancing upward as if the clouds were eavesdropping. And then, as though someone had torn open the heavens, the rain came crashing down.
Ayaan stood beneath the tin shade of a tea stall, watching the streets dissolve into silver streams. He had always loved the rain — not for its poetry, but for its honesty. Rain never pretended. It fell when it needed to.
That was when he saw her.
She wasn't running like everyone else. She walked slowly through the downpour, her white scarf clinging to her shoulders, her hair darkened by the rain. In her hands, she held a stack of books pressed tightly to her chest, as if they were more precious than shelter.
Their eyes met.
It lasted only a second — maybe less. But something unexplainable passed between them, like a promise written in a language neither of them knew.
Ayaan forgot the rain.
He forgot the tea growing cold in his hand.
He forgot the world.
And in that moment, without knowing her name, he understood one terrifying truth:
Some people enter your life like weather.
You don't see them coming.
And once they arrive, they change everything.