
You know that moment when the night’s too quiet…111Please respect copyright.PENANAvMFAnQtgJj
and your phone screen glows a little brighter than usual?
That was me.
Lying on my bed, earphones in but no music playing,111Please respect copyright.PENANAvqfwo4h6q8
just the hum of the fan — louder than usual tonight —111Please respect copyright.PENANACS8N8UnI3s
and her last message on the screen.
It wasn’t anything romantic.111Please respect copyright.PENANAbcPhc7wKvR
Not a heart, not a wink, not even a punctuation mark that hinted at something.111Please respect copyright.PENANAETTISTD7If
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.111Please respect copyright.PENANAUfxa01mVtU
Really talking.111Please respect copyright.PENANAfPbOdItrFg
No layers, no sarcasm, no anime metaphors to hide behind…
But it felt real.111Please respect copyright.PENANAGS4HGi5E0l
The kind of real that makes you nervous — not because something’s wrong,111Please respect copyright.PENANAv1sGWwydm4
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,111Please respect copyright.PENANAnPnVt0jwWd
a casual text becomes a late-night heart spill,111Please respect copyright.PENANAhWQ3fjKNhi
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,111Please respect copyright.PENANAcQWlwGuag1
"I’ve been trying to get your attention since that first day."111Please respect copyright.PENANAXNchlgE4XC
Or111Please respect copyright.PENANADBVchwh6V1
"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:111Please respect copyright.PENANAEQAp0Z8xvB
"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.111Please respect copyright.PENANAvTbiGalIcX
Instead, I did what most cowards do when their heart starts to overthink:111Please respect copyright.PENANAhrSBRj4wYw
I typed.111Please respect copyright.PENANAunCDUkYlxg
Deleted.111Please respect copyright.PENANARxtP2Uhwyk
Typed again.111Please respect copyright.PENANA2yH3TXhput
Deleted.111Please respect copyright.PENANA1YRoSn2K2a
Typed again.111Please respect copyright.PENANAv5Tl2dwHPr
Deleted.111Please respect copyright.PENANAOOS66wHiWm
Typed again.111Please respect copyright.PENANA9aFqdAS2b1
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?111Please respect copyright.PENANAb1lyTEzy0j
Does loving someone mean they owe me something?111Please respect copyright.PENANA18fZRWf2Jl
A reply? A smile? A place in their life?
No, right?
Because love… love’s not a job interview.111Please respect copyright.PENANAVDPFshbh07
You don’t apply and wait for a callback.111Please respect copyright.PENANADIDYxAlSMU
There’s no resume, no credentials, no guaranteed outcome.
You just feel.111Please respect copyright.PENANAr9zbPoKev7
And hope.
But here’s the brutal truth:111Please respect copyright.PENANAIr9rPlhONk
Hope is not a strategy.
I began to spiral.111Please respect copyright.PENANAMS1R0nHJel
Thinking about arranged marriages, random unions born out of astrology and surnames.111Please respect copyright.PENANA3wM1SM0Il8
People saying "yes" to strangers in mandaps because their families believed it was enough.111Please respect copyright.PENANA6I7ITxhZk7
And somehow, somehow, love blooms there too.
Is it just the absence of fear?111Please respect copyright.PENANATzXZ3lFHI4
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—111Please respect copyright.PENANAGccR3ZKESP
“I love pizza.”111Please respect copyright.PENANALL9knwzRue
“I love that show.”111Please respect copyright.PENANAyJMatM2yci
“I love her.”
when the night’s too quiet and your heart's louder than it should be,111Please respect copyright.PENANA8X9CCRaS75
you start to ask…
What even is love?
Is it the late-night texts that make you smile like an idiot?111Please respect copyright.PENANAslkXqLIxA9
Or the effort to learn C just to help someone who might not even know your name?111Please respect copyright.PENANA0oMAHw1Spv
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?111Please respect copyright.PENANArGOLlbdo5i
If love means hiding your feelings just to stay close... is that love?111Please respect copyright.PENANAby3be4TJef
If love never gets returned, was it ever real?
Or maybe love isn’t about return policies at all.111Please respect copyright.PENANANvV8kVhMkR
Maybe love is giving without expecting.111Please respect copyright.PENANARcpQkPeH9i
Hoping without demanding.111Please respect copyright.PENANAgdCWloO196
Staying, even if the door never opens.
And if it’s the latter — if love is just dumb luck —111Please respect copyright.PENANAkeriLD6UpT
then what does that make me?
A gambler?111Please respect copyright.PENANACS0YQN2j72
A poet with no ink?111Please respect copyright.PENANAFLhi88KEFe
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.111Please respect copyright.PENANAYNwq91opqM
It doesn’t ask for returns.111Please respect copyright.PENANAHw9lBMjDyw
It just… is.
Like the moon.111Please respect copyright.PENANAMWScKjAQEc
Distant. Cold sometimes.111Please respect copyright.PENANAHw8ObssYW9
But still shining. Still pulling tides.
So I made a decision.
One I thought I’d regret.111Please respect copyright.PENANAF8KMAqiW02
One that felt like surrender.111Please respect copyright.PENANA9s3pxqESic
But maybe it was the only honest thing left.
I typed:111Please respect copyright.PENANAkhBBumkYRS
"Let’s be friends."
And I meant it.111Please respect copyright.PENANAEq427kYuKj
Not because I wanted to.111Please respect copyright.PENANAISBLGRmV2y
But because I had to.
Because I know — deep down — even if I poured out every syllable of my soul,111Please respect copyright.PENANAh8x5X6Q5lb
let the poet in me die trying,111Please respect copyright.PENANAMwfr9ghYV3
the answer would still be silence, or worse… pity.111Please respect copyright.PENANAAxJbEgttpB
time won't change the answer,111Please respect copyright.PENANAdUkJQ2FbQ3
in this moment or in the future.
And I don’t want pity.111Please respect copyright.PENANAKBW3mr12oF
I want her to smile when she sees my name.111Please respect copyright.PENANA3wDDqA1Kwo
Even if it’s only ever as a friend.
So yeah, laugh all you want.
But that was my truth:111Please respect copyright.PENANANC7CXhZvy4
Maybe I’ll never be someone important in her life.111Please respect copyright.PENANA1NLmjQNbS6
But I can be someone good.111Please respect copyright.PENANABwxcLZ25M0
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:111Please respect copyright.PENANAeBsHjwxgwG
"Sure, of course."111Please respect copyright.PENANAyXZJC04cFj
I smiled.
Because that’s more than most people get.111Please respect copyright.PENANAPwfPgXauok
And sometimes, friendship is the love story that doesn’t get written into poetry —111Please respect copyright.PENANAcUUgFzldva
but it still matters.
The night grew older.111Please respect copyright.PENANAmgP0rlyiJ7
The conversation faded into a simple:111Please respect copyright.PENANAszUCTk1wd0
“Goodnight.”
And I lay there.111Please respect copyright.PENANAfE6FXV76kr
Phone resting like a heartbeat on my chest.111Please respect copyright.PENANANTlO2VzNbm
Ceiling fan humming.111Please respect copyright.PENANAsGiHHtNBDd
Eyes open.111Please respect copyright.PENANA1UaSgNrIf9
Thoughts louder than sleep.
But slowly, everything softened.
The fan blurred into background.111Please respect copyright.PENANAFSwBODTHds
The silence turned into a lullaby.111Please respect copyright.PENANAtaNFMn5f0O
And Nova... drifted.
Not into a dream of her,111Please respect copyright.PENANAW62OfhpSfp
not even of love,111Please respect copyright.PENANAiff7cW0Jtc
but something stranger.
He stood at the edge of a nameless rooftop, under a starless sky.111Please respect copyright.PENANA34jPMNRlIN
No moon. No wind.111Please respect copyright.PENANAHDZWHn88da
Just an ocean of lights flickering below — like forgotten wishes.
A voice — his own, but older — whispered beside him:111Please respect copyright.PENANAPbd9OHQJQD
“Do you think love makes you whole?111Please respect copyright.PENANAUvsqnMvPke
Or does it just reveal the parts you’ve been missing?”
Nova didn’t answer.111Please respect copyright.PENANAAhZek4dMyp
He couldn’t.
Because in that dream,111Please respect copyright.PENANAgDnGZWthfg
he wasn’t searching for love anymore.
He was searching for something deeper.111Please respect copyright.PENANArVrXTn0Nk2
A reason.111Please respect copyright.PENANAsIDO8JfD9z
A pause in the chaos that made it all make sense.
But life doesn’t hand you clarity like that.
Sometimes it just gives you111Please respect copyright.PENANA9i2dHqhKiw
a feeling.111Please respect copyright.PENANA0s56N6rllM
A choice.111Please respect copyright.PENANAtPtL0KhTNR
And the hope that in some parallel version of now,111Please respect copyright.PENANA3d3oFPInAq
you say the thing you never said —
and someone stays.
But in this world, in this moment?
Nova slept.
A little sad.111Please respect copyright.PENANAfnHf7ct6gU
A little wiser.
And somewhere between the real and the not-quite-real,111Please respect copyright.PENANAURgTMGqNqq
he whispered one last thing to the darkness:
“If love is a question no one knows how to answer...111Please respect copyright.PENANAPSo4ujMN9A
maybe I’ll spend my life learning how to ask it better.”
Then darkness.
And for once...111Please respect copyright.PENANAZot8NEBZKQ
peace.