When Absence Became Madness - The News That Buried Her Alive - Part 7

 Disaster rarely announces itself with thunder.

Sometimes it arrives in laughter.

That morning she reached the gate late and found a small crowd near the tea stall. Familiar faces from the neighborhood stood smiling, speaking excitedly.

At the center stood Arjun.

He wore a pale blue shirt.

And he was smiling more than she had ever seen.

The sight alone hurt strangely.

Then she heard the words.

“Congratulations, Arjun!”

“When is the wedding?”

“She is very lucky.”

The world tilted.

She looked from face to face, waiting for someone to laugh and reveal it as a joke.

No one did.

Someone held up a box of sweets.

Another man said, “At last you agreed! Your mother must be so happy.”

Arjun accepted the teasing with quiet embarrassment.

Engaged.

The word entered her like a blade.

She stepped backward, unable to feel her feet.

The crowd blurred.

Traffic sounds vanished.

Even sunlight seemed to dim.

A classmate touched her shoulder. “Are you alright?”

She pushed the hand away violently.

No.

Nothing was alright.

All day she moved like a ghost through corridors, hearing only fragments.

Wedding.

Bride.

Lucky girl.

Date soon.

By evening she locked herself in her room and tore every page where she had written his name.

Paper flew across the floor like white wounds.

Then she gathered the torn pieces and cried over them.

At dinner she said nothing.

At midnight she laughed suddenly.

At one in the morning she screamed into a pillow.

At two she stood before the broken mirror and whispered:

“He cannot.”

The next day she waited at the gate again.

Arjun came as usual.

Same walk.

Same calm face.

How dare he?

How dare the world continue normally after destroying hers?

She wanted to run before him.

Ask why.

Ask since when.

Ask if he had ever noticed the girl who lived and died by his footsteps.

Instead she stood trembling while he passed.

He glanced at her briefly, perhaps noticing swollen eyes.

Then moved on.

That single indifferent glance broke the last thread holding her together.

She laughed loudly in the middle of the road.

People stared.

Then she cried just as loudly.

By afternoon, her mother was called to college.

“She needs help,” a teacher said carefully.

“She is unstable.”

At home her mother begged her to speak.

“What happened?”

“Tell me.”

“Did someone hurt you?”

Yes.

A man who never touched me.

But such wounds sound foolish when spoken aloud.

So she remained silent.

Days later, engagement cards began circulating in the neighborhood.

She stole one from a shop counter and hid it in her dress.

That night she read Arjun’s name beside another woman’s name until dawn.

Two names printed together.

One name erased inside her.

And something dark began whispering:

If happiness cannot be yours—

Why should it belong to anyone?