🌸 Title: Tell Me a Story I Can Stay In
📘 Genre: Contemporary fiction · Romance · Realistic Drama · Slice of Life · Storytelling-Within-Story · Dual POV
📝 Story Summary:
She first saw him at a literary award function — not on stage, but just off it, telling a story.
While everyone praised bestselling authors, he stood quietly by the side, reading aloud a fictional love story called Rain Between Us, about two imperfect souls who fall for each other in the messiest, most human way and she couldn't stop listening.
There was something about the way he spoke… like he wasn't performing. Like he was living it.
So she searched for him. Fought her way through crowded inboxes, unreachable DMs, and half-broken links — until she finally found a way into his life as his editor.
Now, each week, she sits across from him. And he tells her a new story — one from his real past, raw and unfinished.
A classroom crush.
A childhood lost to grief.
A betrayal in the name of love.
A slipper that reappeared after eight months.
Stories you wouldn't think matter.
But as she listens, she starts to fall — not for the boy in the story, but for the boy telling it and maybe, by the time he finishes… She'll be part of the final chapter.
🎭 Character Introductions: 🧑🎤 Ayan (Main Male Protagonist)
A quiet, emotionally layered young man with a complicated past.
Wears humor like armor, but his stories reveal a lifetime of hidden grief, resilience, and surprising depth. Not the romantic hero you'd expect — more grounded, sometimes blunt, but always real.
Works in a publishing office, where he tells weekly chapters of his life to the girl who once tracked him down.
👩💼 "Her" / The Female Narrator (Main POV Character):
The story begins in her voice. We never learn her name immediately — the focus is on how she experiences Ayan's stories.
A budding editor who once fell in love with a stranger's storytelling at a book award function.
Curious, sensitive, observant — and slowly falling in love with Ayan, chapter by chapter.
Her chapters frame the entire novel, giving emotional insight and romantic connection to Ayan's past.
🔄 Narrative Format:
The story alternates between her present-day perspective (frame narrative) and Ayan's storytelling (past).
Each core chapter is a standalone memory — from childhood, school, or early adulthood.
Over time, the storytelling sessions evolve into deeper connection, soft romance, and subtle shifts in their relationship.
🧩 Structure Overview:
Chapter Type Description Framing Chapters (Present) Girl's POV — meeting Ayan, reacting to his stories, bonding after each chapter Storytelling Chapters (Past) Ayan's POV — deeply personal, standalone memories with emotional depth Epilogue Their final moment — when fiction becomes their truth
❤️ Theme Highlights:
Storytelling as a form of healing
Romance born not from flirtation, but understanding
The ordinary turned poetic
Closure and clarity over dramatic twists
How someone's past can bring two people closer in the present