Hiya never dreamed of being a doctor.
She never sat by her window tracing constellations of career plans in the stars. Ambition was never her compass.
But now — she was chasing textbooks like they were lifelines. Skipping sleep for lectures. Staining her soft fingers with ink and formulas and fever charts.
Not for fame. Not for pride.
She did it for one man.
Dev.
Not to impress him.
But to stand beside him.
To be someone no one would ever dare call not enough for him again.
She remembered Mira's words. The way whispers once coiled around her like smoke. "She's just a village girl… clumsy, clueless… why would Dev ever want her?"
Now, every chapter she memorized was her rebellion.
Every paper she aced was her vow.
If I want to walk beside him, she thought, then I will become a path worth walking.
She didn't know what she wanted to be.
Until she knew she just wanted to be his. Not hidden. Not pitied. Not forgiven.
Chosen.
Proudly.
And so she rose early, slept late, ignored phone calls, skipped hairbrushes and lunch breaks — until the mirror no longer showed the soft, sleepy Hiya from Parole.
It showed someone with fire in her eyes and exhaustion under them. A girl who had turned heartbreak into hunger.
Miles away, in the quiet halls of a research lab covered in snow, Dev walked through days with a ghost on his shoulders.
Her laugh rang in his ears during lectures. Her half-pouty "hmmph" haunted his dreams. He could still feel the pull of her dupatta brushing his arm like wind. Still smell the vanilla from her scarf. Still taste the innocence of her lips on that reckless kiss behind the library wall.
The way she used to call out his name — breathy, soft, unsure — like a question waiting for love to answer.
Now she barely replied.
His inbox had more messages than hers.
Her voice — when it came — was distant. Gentle. But distracted. Like she was always somewhere else.
And God, he missed her.
He missed seeing her curled up on the terrace mat, eating mangoes with sticky fingers.
He missed how she tapped her pen against her chin while pretending to study.
He missed the way she'd hum while folding his sweaters, the way she'd look up at him when he entered a room, like her whole world paused to say you matter.
She was still his, wasn't she?
Or was she slipping away?
One night, he found an old video on his phone — her dancing, shy and silly, around the pole in the indoor sangha. Eyes shining. Bangles clinking.
He watched it on loop until his throat burned.
Until tears slid down quietly. No drama. Just the ache of loving someone so much you couldn't breathe without her.
He kissed the screen. "Come back," he whispered.
But she was still not picking up.
And it terrified him.
Meanwhile, Hiya sat by her study desk, flipping pages she didn't even see. Her head throbbed. Her fingers trembled.
She was too tired to text him back.
But not because she didn't care.
She cared so much, it hurt.
She just couldn't afford to slow down. Not now.
Not until I earn the right to walk beside him in his world — without him ever needing to defend me again.
Little did she know, her silence was slowly breaking the boy who once kissed her like she was air.