Not too long ago, Maya—a complete introvert—found herself in Bangalore, battling waves of depression, panic episodes, and a sense of overwhelming weirdness. She had hoped that moving back to Mumbai, back home with her people, would heal her. But the mind, as she soon realized, doesn’t always sync with a change in location.
Sitting cross-legged in her grey shorts and black t-shirt, her hair a tangled mess, she mindlessly swiped through Bumble. A question nagged at her: “How are you able to swipe so casually? Is this really the kind of relationship you want?” And yet, she continued. She carefully selected filtered photos for Instagram, even as her mind played back the words of her once-upon-a-time lover—now a long-distance great friend.
“If you can’t be happy with yourself, how can you make someone else happy?”
She sighed. I need a companion. I need someone to love me like in the movies. I don’t care about looks, height, or conventional attraction. I just need… love.
Two conflicting thoughts played tug-of-war in her head when her phone buzzed. A message from someone she had just matched with. She reread his profile, wondering how to craft the perfect conversation.
Maya was an introvert in real life, but on chat, she transformed into an extrovert. She had two versions of herself, and she often questioned both.
Just as she was about to reply, another notification popped up. Rudra.
“What’s up, babe?”
She rolled her eyes. Dating app, chatting, and now this?
Before she could reply, his next text made her heart skip a beat.
“I’m coming to India for a week. We have to meet.”
And just like that, the dating app guy didn’t matter anymore.
Her mind drifted into a flashback—the first time she met Rudra. They had connected online, and in their very first conversation, they had become lovers. He was everything she wasn’t looking for, yet she had fallen for him, hard and helplessly.
Maya stared at her screen for a moment before typing back.
“Sure.”
A single word, but it carried the weight of a thousand emotions.
