From Unpublished Novel!

It was a soft pain, a pain that lingers through the several thousand miles that separated them now. A pain that lived across the distance, that survived the vagaries of time. He kept it cuddled close to him, like a soft toy hugged it through the endless , lonely nights. That was a part of him that none of his new friends knew. They treated him as someone who could enjoy life to the fullest, except that he had no girlfriend, and he never showed the inclination to have any!

He walked through the streets at night. The empty streets consoled him, understood him. The rustle of fallen leaves created the melodies that could soothe him. He must forget the past, he knew that, and yet past followed him like a shadow. It accompanied in every bright moment of his life. He was so used to thinking about her, that his momentary lapses into joy made him feel guilty, so much so, that these mistakenly enjoyed moments of joy were compensated by an elaborate ceremony of sadness.

Things changed when this sparkling stream of laughter splashed his face with her radiance. Her wit bewitched him, released him and eventually restrained him. The stream was a welcome breeze of promise of the future. A future that by being so, was going to grab him from the clasp of past and release him into promise of hope and possibility.