The days that followed were quiet, but they carried a new kind of weight.
Maddy didn't bring up that late-night conversation again. He didn't pretend it didn't happen either—there was just an unspoken awareness between them now. A tension that hung in the silences, in the glances exchanged across corridors, in the half-smiles that never quite reached their eyes.
Diya didn't mention it to Harsh. She didn't know how to.
What would she even say?
That Maddy asked her to wait… but still didn't make space for her?
That he wanted something more, maybe, but only when he was "better"?
And what did that make her in the meantime?
Harsh, perceptive as ever, noticed the shift. One afternoon after class, as they were walking back to the hostel path, he said, "You've been… distant."
Diya gave him a small smile. "Just tired."
He didn't press, just nodded, and changed the topic to a silly debate about whether hostel samosas were actually food or a prank. Diya laughed—and was grateful for it.
But inside, things were anything but light.
That weekend, the group planned a mini picnic —Maddy, Harsh, Diya, Nivi, and a few others. It was all casual and friendly. But Diya felt Maddy's presence the entire time. He wasn't saying much, but he watched her, especially when she joked around with Harsh or when Harsh casually offered her his jacket when the breeze picked up.
She saw it.
The flicker in Maddy's eyes. The way his jaw clenched when she laughed too long at Harsh's story.
And she hated how much she noticed.
Later that evening, as the group started packing up, Maddy asked Diya quietly, "Can we walk for a bit?"
She nodded.
They strolled away from the rest, down the stone path lit faintly by campus lights.
"I meant what I said," Maddy said suddenly, stopping.
Diya looked up at him.
"That I want to come back to you," he continued. "But… I don't want to hurt you more while I figure things out. That's why I've been keeping a distance."
She nodded slowly. "I get that, Maddy. But I also can't put my life on pause. I don't want to live in a 'maybe' forever."
He looked at her, eyes soft and searching. "I'm not asking you to."
"But you are," she said quietly. "Without saying it."
They stood there in silence, somewhere between where they'd been and where they didn't know how to go.
And the hardest part?
Neither of them knew whether to step forward or turn away.
Because love—when caught between timing and fear, starts to feel like a wound that doesn't quite close.