Prarthana's POV

I didn’t believe in coincidences.

Not anymore.

The café was Tanya’s idea. It always was. Her solution to everything involved caffeine and confrontation, preferably served warm. I arrived a few minutes late, scanning the room out of habit, not expectation.

That was when the air shifted.

It wasn’t dramatic. No sudden silence, no slow-motion recognition. Just a quiet awareness settling into my bones, like my body had recognized something my mind was still denying.

Someone familiar was close.

“You’re staring,” Tanya said, sliding a cup toward me.

“I’m not.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You do that thing when you lie. Your shoulders tense.”

I looked down, fingers tightening around the ceramic. “You’re imagining things.”

She didn’t push. That worried me more than if she had.

The café was busy in a muted way. Low voices. Clinking cups. Soft music I didn’t recognize. I told myself to breathe normally, to stop searching for ghosts in crowded rooms.

Then I saw him.

Not fully. Not clearly. Just the back of a man standing near the counter. Broad shoulders. Still posture. Familiar in a way that made my chest tighten before my thoughts could catch up.

Kabir.

The name formed uninvited, instinctive.

I looked away immediately, heart racing, every nerve suddenly alert. Years had passed. Years of convincing myself I was fine. Years of silence carefully folded and stored away.

And yet my body reacted as if no time had passed at all.

“Prarthana,” Tanya said softly now. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” I said too quickly.

I stood. “I need air.”

Outside, the evening had settled into a cool calm. I leaned against the railing, eyes closed, grounding myself in the present. Traffic moved. People laughed. Life continued, indifferent to my internal chaos.

I didn’t turn around when footsteps approached.

I didn’t need to.

He stopped a few feet away. Close enough for recognition. Far enough to maintain distance. The space between us felt deliberate, controlled, heavy with everything unsaid.

For a moment, neither of us moved.

I wondered if he could feel it too. The weight. The pull. The history pressing against the present.

Then the footsteps retreated.

No name spoken.

No glance exchanged.

No past resurrected.

When I finally opened my eyes, the street looked the same as before. But something had shifted permanently. The balance I’d built so carefully felt unstable now, like a crack spreading quietly beneath the surface.

Inside the café, Tanya watched me with questions she didn’t ask.

“I think,” I said slowly, “some things don’t end when you walk away.”

She didn’t disagree.

That night, as I lay awake once more, one truth settled with uncomfortable clarity.

Avoidance wasn’t distance.

And silence wasn’t safety.

Somewhere nearby, Kabir Rathore existed in the same city, breathing the same air, carrying his own version of the past.

And we were officially no longer strangers.