
You know that moment when the night’s too quiet…115Please respect copyright.PENANAjK7ujULRYe
and your phone screen glows a little brighter than usual?
That was me.
Lying on my bed, earphones in but no music playing,115Please respect copyright.PENANAr8qDurGuQJ
just the hum of the fan — louder than usual tonight —115Please respect copyright.PENANASKwADaC53v
and her last message on the screen.
It wasn’t anything romantic.115Please respect copyright.PENANAIqGaAXMCDr
Not a heart, not a wink, not even a punctuation mark that hinted at something.115Please respect copyright.PENANAXgxZ5W1hDw
Just words. Casual, comfortable. But from her.
And I just stared at them, like they were the final piece of a puzzle I wasn’t supposed to complete.
We were talking.115Please respect copyright.PENANA3OTvlzMfpT
Really talking.115Please respect copyright.PENANAbeVrYRx6NV
No layers, no sarcasm, no anime metaphors to hide behind…
But it felt real.115Please respect copyright.PENANAJZzBiyy0bf
The kind of real that makes you nervous — not because something’s wrong,115Please respect copyright.PENANATjbxEgVh6c
but because it’s too good. Too close.
And I began to wonder:
How much can you talk to someone before you say something you shouldn’t?
Before a joke turns into a confession,115Please respect copyright.PENANAZen8IJT5Lz
a casual text becomes a late-night heart spill,115Please respect copyright.PENANAlHRiQQXPIB
and silence feels heavier than words?
How much longer can we keep it buried?
I could feel it bubbling up.
The things I wasn’t supposed to say.
Like,115Please respect copyright.PENANAo5avzh6EGB
"I’ve been trying to get your attention since that first day."115Please respect copyright.PENANAv7WgMO95H2
Or115Please respect copyright.PENANAgCEDTaZFj9
"When you walk into a room, I pretend I didn’t see you first, but I always do."
Or the most dangerous of them all:115Please respect copyright.PENANAbOTJs9oOyK
"You called me 'bro' earlier... did you mean that like 'brother,' or more like... awkward placeholder for someone you don’t know how to place yet?"
But I didn’t send any of that.115Please respect copyright.PENANAhvBxcMO97J
Instead, I did what most cowards do when their heart starts to overthink:115Please respect copyright.PENANArX8rJQ5WBd
I typed.115Please respect copyright.PENANAy2k07JN6eI
Deleted.115Please respect copyright.PENANAPqQU2AMf9v
Typed again.115Please respect copyright.PENANA5QYSm3EPjj
Deleted.115Please respect copyright.PENANAQkCIL6AiVY
Typed again.115Please respect copyright.PENANAVGbxvTWgG9
Deleted.115Please respect copyright.PENANAz2GT800ckH
Typed again.115Please respect copyright.PENANAwxsUYx5mh2
Paused.
And somewhere between all that hesitation, I asked myself something even worse:
If I truly like someone… can I ask them to like me back?
And isn't that just the most foolish question in the world?
What gives me the right to expect love just because I give it?115Please respect copyright.PENANAeY5krZqikd
Does loving someone mean they owe me something?115Please respect copyright.PENANAst5mduLmU2
A reply? A smile? A place in their life?
No, right?
Because love… love’s not a job interview.115Please respect copyright.PENANAmZQSXe3biV
You don’t apply and wait for a callback.115Please respect copyright.PENANA9F23vouB3U
There’s no resume, no credentials, no guaranteed outcome.
You just feel.115Please respect copyright.PENANAGVMAg8UBMJ
And hope.
But here’s the brutal truth:115Please respect copyright.PENANAMmgOZI7Gkl
Hope is not a strategy.
I began to spiral.115Please respect copyright.PENANAIeKCd0BMGx
Thinking about arranged marriages, random unions born out of astrology and surnames.115Please respect copyright.PENANA1YPyuhxUok
People saying "yes" to strangers in mandaps because their families believed it was enough.115Please respect copyright.PENANA1OC2tFyFPB
And somehow, somehow, love blooms there too.
Is it just the absence of fear?115Please respect copyright.PENANAF7MFNHZt4K
Is it a choice? A decision made over and over again, like brushing your teeth or choosing peace over pride?
Or is it just a lucky accident?
So then what is love?
Love.
Four letters. Infinite confusion.
We throw it around so casually—115Please respect copyright.PENANA6Faq9LWi21
“I love pizza.”115Please respect copyright.PENANAVwmUj9joPj
“I love that show.”115Please respect copyright.PENANAGwNfCW3HLa
“I love her.”
when the night’s too quiet and your heart's louder than it should be,115Please respect copyright.PENANAlMrGucAase
you start to ask…
What even is love?
Is it the late-night texts that make you smile like an idiot?115Please respect copyright.PENANAlMURVyOulM
Or the effort to learn C just to help someone who might not even know your name?115Please respect copyright.PENANAKqFHAGY6NC
Is it being seen, truly seen—not for how smart or funny or helpful you are—but for just being you?
Because I wasn’t sure anymore.
If love means trying to be enough for someone... is that love?115Please respect copyright.PENANAozgphbFSxJ
If love means hiding your feelings just to stay close... is that love?115Please respect copyright.PENANAlXZAARtvwD
If love never gets returned, was it ever real?
Or maybe love isn’t about return policies at all.115Please respect copyright.PENANAoIYtCFlX2c
Maybe love is giving without expecting.115Please respect copyright.PENANAzJF4Upw73t
Hoping without demanding.115Please respect copyright.PENANAWgfk8eb0I5
Staying, even if the door never opens.
And if it’s the latter — if love is just dumb luck —115Please respect copyright.PENANA7Q2ZlwVPhj
then what does that make me?
A gambler?115Please respect copyright.PENANAAuoLE99XX1
A poet with no ink?115Please respect copyright.PENANARjQJBqEzub
A fool tossing feelings into a wishing well that’s been dry for years?
All I know is this:
Love, the real kind, the scary kind — it doesn’t demand.115Please respect copyright.PENANAwm5ECBHdZ7
It doesn’t ask for returns.115Please respect copyright.PENANAKy8KjvXrAa
It just… is.
Like the moon.115Please respect copyright.PENANAFT0fwxa3AD
Distant. Cold sometimes.115Please respect copyright.PENANAw2B5htnVU7
But still shining. Still pulling tides.
So I made a decision.
One I thought I’d regret.115Please respect copyright.PENANARHI0eIfSlE
One that felt like surrender.115Please respect copyright.PENANAsYVLjQwirV
But maybe it was the only honest thing left.
I typed:115Please respect copyright.PENANASkrAJhDfSt
"Let’s be friends."
And I meant it.115Please respect copyright.PENANAtBL1352R6c
Not because I wanted to.115Please respect copyright.PENANAIYj5um6PGW
But because I had to.
Because I know — deep down — even if I poured out every syllable of my soul,115Please respect copyright.PENANAvVvBQZO7W7
let the poet in me die trying,115Please respect copyright.PENANAjY0COGEAFn
the answer would still be silence, or worse… pity.115Please respect copyright.PENANAWlCQKO9knu
time won't change the answer,115Please respect copyright.PENANAR1waPPJXBf
in this moment or in the future.
And I don’t want pity.115Please respect copyright.PENANAkEUkEU5A2F
I want her to smile when she sees my name.115Please respect copyright.PENANAphNseiQSRI
Even if it’s only ever as a friend.
So yeah, laugh all you want.
But that was my truth:115Please respect copyright.PENANAchM7YPZP2Q
Maybe I’ll never be someone important in her life.115Please respect copyright.PENANAhM4NXMCYPW
But I can be someone good.115Please respect copyright.PENANAda0QnkFIWs
Steady. Loyal. Low-maintenance. Someone she doesn’t have to second guess.
Hopeless romantic?
Guilty.
But hopeless doesn’t mean worthless.
So when she replied:115Please respect copyright.PENANAEzSpzTyDSo
"Sure, of course."115Please respect copyright.PENANA8IuJO9E46h
I smiled.
Because that’s more than most people get.115Please respect copyright.PENANAhqBKAO06Ip
And sometimes, friendship is the love story that doesn’t get written into poetry —115Please respect copyright.PENANAXODCNIWVqh
but it still matters.
The night grew older.115Please respect copyright.PENANAxVa9tjMnRh
The conversation faded into a simple:115Please respect copyright.PENANAX0kpam0gBg
“Goodnight.”
And I lay there.115Please respect copyright.PENANANiosxsubPc
Phone resting like a heartbeat on my chest.115Please respect copyright.PENANAnAQaEtfLxJ
Ceiling fan humming.115Please respect copyright.PENANAipHoyTWtYO
Eyes open.115Please respect copyright.PENANAAIDvjskOcj
Thoughts louder than sleep.
But slowly, everything softened.
The fan blurred into background.115Please respect copyright.PENANAFND4ns8nyg
The silence turned into a lullaby.115Please respect copyright.PENANAOd42S34zEp
And Nova... drifted.
Not into a dream of her,115Please respect copyright.PENANAzbqLDaoYnN
not even of love,115Please respect copyright.PENANAfbVwtQUpna
but something stranger.
He stood at the edge of a nameless rooftop, under a starless sky.115Please respect copyright.PENANA3pJROZIssN
No moon. No wind.115Please respect copyright.PENANAUXSKlX5EdX
Just an ocean of lights flickering below — like forgotten wishes.
A voice — his own, but older — whispered beside him:115Please respect copyright.PENANAB0lFtWRULm
“Do you think love makes you whole?115Please respect copyright.PENANArXkqVWzZpp
Or does it just reveal the parts you’ve been missing?”
Nova didn’t answer.115Please respect copyright.PENANAzZRD67cdlj
He couldn’t.
Because in that dream,115Please respect copyright.PENANAJO22Np49nI
he wasn’t searching for love anymore.
He was searching for something deeper.115Please respect copyright.PENANAIO6gRc8m66
A reason.115Please respect copyright.PENANABzZwyAwg2k
A pause in the chaos that made it all make sense.
But life doesn’t hand you clarity like that.
Sometimes it just gives you115Please respect copyright.PENANAhuuV14uNIG
a feeling.115Please respect copyright.PENANAOghvTeq2IK
A choice.115Please respect copyright.PENANAi8SPVekDak
And the hope that in some parallel version of now,115Please respect copyright.PENANAUyPyi8XVDW
you say the thing you never said —
and someone stays.
But in this world, in this moment?
Nova slept.
A little sad.115Please respect copyright.PENANAnKaad6P5YW
A little wiser.
And somewhere between the real and the not-quite-real,115Please respect copyright.PENANAmQe28wL5ll
he whispered one last thing to the darkness:
“If love is a question no one knows how to answer...115Please respect copyright.PENANADnTOE2HwAQ
maybe I’ll spend my life learning how to ask it better.”
Then darkness.
And for once...115Please respect copyright.PENANAQAmMsNnBSx
peace.