The Love I Left Behind !
Recently, I watched a couple of romantic movies — Mein Vapas Aaunga and Idhyam Murali. It surprised me because I had stopped watching romantic movies a long time ago.
Maybe I stopped because, somewhere deep inside, I already knew what those stories would remind me of.
Both movies were different in so many ways, yet they carried the same painful truth: how difficult it is to forget someone you have loved with your whole heart.
And perhaps even more painful is knowing that sometimes, it is your own mistake that takes you away from that person.
You move on. Life moves on. Years pass.
But somewhere inside you, that one moment remains frozen.
For me, that moment happened almost fifteen years ago.
I still remember it.
I still regret the decision I made.
I have always believed that God has a plan for everyone. Eventually, perhaps, we get what is meant for us. But I have also learned that what is meant for us does not always look like what we once dreamed of.
And sometimes, the hardest thing in life is accepting the difference.
While watching those movies, I could feel the protagonist’s pain, not because I was imagining it, but because some part of me had already lived it.
That feeling of wanting to go back in time.
That desperate wish to find your younger self and say, “Don’t do it. Don’t make that decision. You don’t know what you’re about to lose.”
But life doesn’t give us that chance.
There is no rewind button.
There is no second version of that day.
And there are some people whom you lose only once but spend a lifetime remembering.
I still remember those days
I was in college then.
Young, foolish, and completely in love.
I remember travelling almost 300 kilometres in a general train coach just to see her. It didn’t matter how uncomfortable the journey was. It didn’t matter how tired I was.
I just wanted to see her.
Sometimes, love makes you do things that don’t make sense to anyone else.
I bunked classes just to talk to her through the night.
I remember how badly I performed in my exams.
I remember missing opportunities, including my inter-college hockey team selections.
At that age, I didn’t think about consequences.
I only knew one thing:
I loved her.
And I loved her enough to believe that I could stand against the world for her.
I was even ready to marry her without my parents’ consent.
Looking back now, I realize how young I was.
But I also realize something else.
I may have been young, but what I felt was real.
At least, it was real to me.
And as far as I understood at that time, she loved me too.
Fifteen years later
Fifteen years have passed.
A lot has changed.
People have changed. Life has changed. We have probably changed too.
But strangely, some memories don’t age.
I can still remember those days with a clarity that sometimes surprises me.
The conversations.
The waiting.
The excitement of seeing her.
The little things that probably meant nothing to anyone else but meant everything to me.
Sometimes, when I think about those days, I feel an inexplicable sense of peace.
For a few moments, I go back there.
And sometimes I create little stories in my mind where we are still together.
Maybe someone would call that an obsession.
But I don’t see it that way.
I don’t want anything from her.
I don’t want to disturb her life.
I don’t even know what she feels about me today.
Maybe she remembers me.
Maybe she doesn’t.
Maybe I am just a small chapter in a life that has moved far ahead.
And perhaps that’s okay.
Because some love stories don’t end with two people together.
Some simply remain alive inside one person’s heart.
Love doesn’t always need to be possessed
As I have grown older, my understanding of love has changed.
I no longer believe love is only about being together.
It isn’t always about holding someone’s hand, being physically close, or having someone beside you every day.
Sometimes, love exists without touch.
Without conversations.
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Without expectations.
Without even knowing whether the other person still feels the same.
You can be thousands of kilometres away from someone and still feel their presence somewhere inside your heart.
I believe love is intangible.
It is a connection that exists somewhere between the heart and the soul.
Perhaps that is why some people remain with us even after they have left our lives.
People sometimes confuse love with physical intimacy.
But for me, love has always been something deeper.
It is remembering someone and still wishing them happiness.
It is carrying their memories without demanding their presence.
It is being grateful that, once upon a time, they were yours, even if today they are not.
The waiting nobody sees
Sometimes I think about how many people spend years waiting for someone they truly love.
And perhaps the person they are waiting for never even realizes how much they were loved.
This happens especially in long-distance relationships.
There are journeys nobody sees.
There are sleepless nights nobody knows about.
There are sacrifices nobody counts.
There are classes skipped, trains travelled, exams neglected, opportunities missed, and countless hours spent simply waiting for a few minutes with someone.
And when the relationship ends, all of those things disappear from the outside world.
But they don’t disappear from the person who lived them.
They remain somewhere inside.
Quietly.
Forever.
If I could go back
Sometimes I wish I could go back fifteen years.
Not to change my entire life.
Just to change one decision.
I wish I could meet that younger version of myself and tell him:
“Don’t take her for granted.”
“Don’t let your ego, confusion, or circumstances decide your future.”
“If you love her, fight for her.”
“Because one day, you may have everything you thought you wanted, and still wish you could go back to that one moment.”
But I can’t.
None of us can.
Perhaps that’s the cruellest part of growing up.
We become wiser only after the moments that required wisdom have already passed.
And yet, I am grateful
I don’t want to call my love a tragedy.
Because despite the regret, it gave me something beautiful.
It taught me how deeply a human being can feel for another person.
It taught me that love can survive distance.
It can survive silence.
It can survive years.
And sometimes, it can even survive the absence of the person you loved.
I don’t know what she feels for me today.
I don’t know whether she ever thinks about those days.
I don’t know whether I still exist somewhere in her memories.
But I know what I feel.
And I don’t want to erase it.
Because even though that love is one-sided today, I still consider it one of the purest feelings I have ever experienced.
I can still wish the best for her.
I can still smile when I remember her.
I can still be thankful for the time when she was a part of my life.
Maybe that is what love becomes when you stop asking it to belong to you.
It becomes a quiet feeling.
A memory.
A prayer.
A part of who you are.
And sometimes, late at night, when everything is quiet, I still wonder what our life would have looked like if I had made a different decision fifteen years ago.
I know I will never get the answer.
But somewhere in my heart, there is still a version of us that never parted ways.
And perhaps I will carry that version of us for the rest of my life.
Not because I am waiting for her to come back.
But because once, I loved her with everything I had.
And some loves don’t need a second chance to remain true.
They simply remain.
Quietly.
Beautifully.
Forever.
