I was very worried about leaving my family and moving to a new place. Back then, I was a naive 23-year-old girl, belonging to an upper-middle class family in Pune, and I was going to stay away from home for the first time in my life. Besides, I did not know anyone in this new place. However, I made up my mind to go, because after all, I had been preparing all the while to do my masters and now when I had the opportunity to study Physics in the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology at Kharagpur, I could not back off just because I couldn’t find a nice hostel or didn’t know anyone there.

I thought my life would become better if I went there and did well. I finally joined IIT-KGP, and on the first day, I asked a senior in college to help me commute from the railway station to the college campus, as my parents or friends could not accompany me. I didn’t know him but I needed help with my luggage, and I did not have a hostel room allotted yet. I thought I would have to make some alternate arrangements in case the allocation was delayed.

Nevertheless, it was a pleasant surprise when, after hearing me talk over the phone in Marathi, he told me that he also spoke Marathi. We connected instantly.

His hostel was close to mine and we would go to the department together every day (he was a 2nd year M.Tech student in the Physics department, too!). Although we were taking different courses, we would meet during the break between classes. Our meetups happened more often as he would call me when he had to go to the local bookstore, or a juice point. He was very different from me in every way but he was one of the nicest people knew there.

The more I started to talk to him, the more I liked him. We became more than just friends. He said he liked me and I knew that I liked him too. So why not give it a shot, I thought.

We started watching movies together in his room and eventually had movie nights, and this became routine. Though I did not know anything about his past, I was very comfortable in his company and never cared about anything else when I was with him.

Like I said, he was a nice guy and I trusted him more than anyone else and I felt like I had found the love of my life. We talked about our future together but the talking always happened only when I started the topic. Was he not serious? NO, he was just a shy guy. How could I even question his intentions about me? He was a decent guy, a sincere student, who got placed in an amazing company. He respected people and was ideal in every way. In fact, he never called me to come over to his hostel room. He never made any plan that I was uncomfortable with. He never said anything wrong, or fought or argued with me.

And in fact, he never promised me anything or tried to ignite feelings in me. He was one of those perfect guys you would see and simply fall in love with.

By then, we were seriously talking about our future together. I thought he was really shy and wasn't able to talk things out. He knew it would be difficult to convince his family, but he loved me. However, in the back of my head, I felt like he never cared. Unlike the other guys in my class who accompanied me when I was going somewhere alone, he never offered to come with me. He was okay with me being close to other guys. He was never jealous of anything. I thought he gave me my space. But all this felt like he never cared about me. 'Is he not serious about me? I shouldn’t be talking to him anymore, he probably doesn’t mean anything by all that he has been doing,' I would think.

But the very next day he said “Hey, I really like you and I want to be with you. It’s just that I became like this after my grandma passed away, and I was very close to her. In fact, I was closer to her than my parents. I never felt that anyone was close to me in my life and after her demise, I always kept people at a distance. After a really long time, I felt like I connected with you and I don’t want to lose you. I don’t know if I can ever show you the love you deserve, just know that I have always been this way and it’s hard for me to be the way you expect me to be. Please give me some time, I will work on it.”

And from then on, any confusions I had about him were gone, and I was so sure about him. I believed in his words. His words were promises made, and I was happy with it.

Little did I realize that it could be the only time he would say something like that. Anyway, I was very blindly in love and I ignored my other friends as well. As his graduation date approached, I spent most of my time with him since it was his last few days in college. After his graduation, we both went to our hometowns for holidays. I still remember the day I was leaving for my hometown- I was sitting in the train by myself and I was crying my heart out. Because the thought of not having him when I came back to college the next year was devastating. That day I cried so much that I threw up, LITERALLY! I didn’t tell him all this because I wanted him to be happy and I did not want all this to affect him in any way. I knew I would make myself more sick if I knew he was not okay.

And after the holidays, when I went back to college, things were very different.

I was so used to spending time with him that I was really bored most of the times. I was interviewing for a lot of companies, and I got placed in the first month, that too in the same company as his. This seemed like a miracle for me, but I called it DESTINY! I didn’t make too many friends in my first year of college so I barely had any friends to hang out with. But now, I started to spend most of my time talking to him over the phone. I thought that since I would be working in the same company as his, it would work out perfectly. I missed him a lot and I knew he was probably missing me too, all the way in Bangalore.

Anyway, we would be at the same place after a year and everything was going to be perfect, I imagined.

I started getting busy being the Placement Coordinator in my college. I reduced talking to him over the phone as I was busy with my own work. The placements used to happen all day and sometimes I had to spend all night making arrangements for the employers arriving the next day. This became my routine. I was sitting alone one night at the college auditorium and was thinking about him. I realized that I was missing him again, like everyday. And suddenly it struck me that we had not spoken for 8 days. I was busy with a lot of things happening in college but he had a 8-5 job. Why hadn’t he call me?

I was angry about it for a while and I thought I should never call him, but as usual, my anger did not last too long. I kept calling once in a while despite my busy schedule. My heart couldn't admit that he did not love me. Like he told me before, he had always been like that after his grandma passed away and it was hard for him to be a more sensitive person than before, and he was probably working on it. And also, he was probably still very shy because he never had friends who were girls. I believed this was going to change eventually.

I graduated with a lot of confusions about him. But I thought since I was going to join the same company as him and I would probably find answers to all my questions. I was sad whenever I thought about the whole situation, but I wanted to stay positive. I was excited and scared at the same time to start my new career. This time, I did not find any accommodation in Bangalore, and he did not care. He did not offer to pick me up from the station, but I convinced myself by saying that Bangalore traffic is so much that it would be difficult for him to come from Marathahalli during rush hour.

We worked in the same building. I thought he would ask to meet me because we hadn’t met for one full year. But nope, he didn’t bother. I took the courage to talk to him and asked if we could meet, and he did. We were talking about various things and in the middle of our conversation when I asked him why he hadn’t been talking, he told me that when he went home during the holidays, he asked his dad about our marriage. And his father said that he would commit suicide in case he chose to love a girl outside their community and bring her home. This was what kept him away from me the whole year. I hadn’t realized this. I asked him what he thought about it and he said that he had to oblige to his dad. My heart broke.

Little did I know that all this had happened. I asked him if he at least tried to convince his parents and he said he didn’t. I decided to let it go if he didn’t want it as much as I did.

As cliché as it may sound, love forced isn’t love at all right?

If he did not even try a little to convince his parents, then that’s definitely not the kind of guy I should be with. And he had clearly moved on by the time he was telling me about this. I was shattered that day. I am still stuck thinking about him most of the time, no matter what I do. My tiara keeps falling every time I cry for him. And I had to forgive this person who wasn’t even sorry for what he did.

Although I decided to move on, I haven’t. I am shameful to acknowledge that I clung on to him even after it clearly ended. I was actually self-serving the relationship because I had become mentally dependent on him and was fearful to lose him, afraid that I might never experience true love again. But like I said, love forced isn’t love at all, right?

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