Months slipped by like sand through fingers—each grain a moment, a memory, a quiet promise.
Between the chaos of assignments, the weight of family, and the relentless tug of mismatched time zones, Maddy and Diya found their rhythm. Not the seamless harmony of before, but something new—something theirs. Distance was no longer the villain of their story. Instead, it became the silent sky beneath which their love stretched, vast and patient, learning to breathe again.
The Ritual
Every evening, without fail, Diya propped her phone against a pillow and called him.
No matter how exhausted, how tangled in deadlines, how frayed at the edges—those calls were their anchor. Sometimes, they studied together, cameras off, mics on, the soft hum of keyboards between them.
"Focus, Diya."
"You first, Maddy."
Weekends were sacred. Movie nights with synced screens, reactions lagging half a second, but laughter arriving right on time. It didn't matter if the connection stuttered. What mattered was the way his voice wrapped around her in the dark, the way her name sounded in his mouth—like home.
The Little Things
Because love, they were learning, wasn't just in the grand gestures.
It was in the way Maddy changed his Discord background to an old college photo of them, slapping a ridiculous virtual top hat on his pixelated head just to make her laugh after a brutal day.
It was in the shared whiteboard where Diya doodled a tiny cartoon version of herself holding a water bottle—"Hydrated because Maddy said so." (He never let her forget it.)
It was in the way Harsh, ever perceptive, ever kind, stepped back without a word—no drama, no bitterness. Just the quiet understanding that some stories weren't his to hold.
The Hard Days
But it wasn't perfect.
There were nights when the distance felt like a blade. When Maddy was sick, and Diya couldn't smooth the fever from his brow. When Diya failed an exam and sobbed into her pillow, waiting for his call—his voice, thick with sleep, whispering, "It'll be okay," hours too late.
Yet they held on.
Because love, when tended with intention, could grow anywhere—even across oceans, even through screens.
And for now?
It was enough.