The road to her grandmother's village was silent, the kind of silence that didn't comfort, it pressed against her ribs like weight. Anaya sat stiffly on the crowded bus, her bag clutched tight in her lap, her mind spiraling with every possible thought. Her heart beat faster with every turn the wheels made toward home.
Home.
Or whatever was left of it.
As she got down from the bus, the familiar paths to her grandmother's house looked blurred under her anxious gaze. Dust blew across the narrow road, and a strange chill ran down her spine despite the afternoon sun.
And then she saw them.
People. Neighbors. Villagers gathered outside the house. Some were sitting on the veranda, others wiping tears, murmuring, whispering. Her footsteps slowed.
Her heart... stopped.
And then she saw her.
There, in the center of the room, surrounded by jasmine garlands and the low hum of prayers, lay her grandmother.
Still.
Peaceful.
Gone.
Anaya froze at the entrance. Someone, maybe a neighbor rushed toward her and hugged her tightly, their sobs echoing around her like a cruel lullaby.
"She was calling your name last night," they whispered. "Kept saying she wanted to see you."
Anaya couldn't breathe.
Her knees buckled beneath her, and she collapsed on the stone floor, a sound escaping her chest that she didn't recognize as her own. Her cries came without pause, as if every sob had waited too long to be released. She crawled toward her grandmother, touched her still hands, and clutched her close.
"No," she whispered. "No, no, no…"
This couldn't be it. Not her. Not the only person in the world who held her without questions, who waited for her letters, who remembered her favorite sweets, who whispered her name like it was precious.
Her world dimmed.
By evening, the rituals were done.
The villagers slowly disappeared into their homes, one by one, like candles blown out after a prayer. The sky turned orange, then purple, then black.
Inside, the house felt hollow. The air held the smell of incense and grief.
Anaya sat alone on the old cot in the corner room, her grandmother's shawl still wrapped tightly in her arms. Her eyes were swollen, dry, and vacant.
Anaya murmured herself, "She was gone".
"Truly gone."
"And now I.. was alone. There is no one for me in this world."
"No parents. No siblings. No one who I call as my own."
"Now, I am just an orphan in a world that was too large, too loud, and too cruel."
And then she heard it.
Voices. Low. Sharp. Creeping through the cracked wooden doors.
She got up quietly and walked barefoot across the room, the cold floor grounding her just enough to move.
Behind the half-closed kitchen door, she heard her aunt's voice.
"She's alone now. Who's going to take care of her? Let's just get her married off. That old man from the next village. he's been asking again. He's rich. He'll pay well."
Anaya's breath caught in her throat.
"Are you mad?" her uncle hissed. "She's still young. She won't agree."
"She doesn't need to agree," her aunt snapped. "No one's left to protect her now."
Silence.
Then a low chuckle.
"We'll wait a few days. Say it's tradition. Then we'll make arrangements. Don't let her out of sight."
Anaya backed away, her fingers trembling.
Her chest tightened.
Not only had she lost the only love she knew, now she was being treated like she was something to be sold. Like she wasn't even human.
She crouched behind a broken shelf, her arms wrapped around her knees, her body shaking as tears fell silently down her cheeks.
A moment later, footsteps echoed in the hallway. Her aunt looked around suspiciously. "Did you hear something?"
Anaya held her breath.
The silence answered for her.
Eventually, the footsteps faded. The house grew still again.
Later, the lights dimmed. The night crept in. The voices ceased.
They slept.
But Anaya didn't.
At midnight, she rose.
Barefoot and quiet, she walked to the wooden shelf where her grandmother's framed photo rested. Her fingers touched the glass softly, like a goodbye kiss.
"I'll come back one day," she whispered, tears rolling down her cheeks. "And I'll make you proud."
She wrapped the photo in a soft scarf and tucked it inside her bag.
Then, like a ghost in the dark, she stepped out into the night.
No sound. No shadow.
Just a girl with a bag, a broken heart, and the strength only grief can give.
The station was nearly empty when she arrived. The early morning fog clung to the rails like smoke, and the benches were cold against her legs. She waited in silence, the photo clutched in her arms like a heartbeat.
When the train finally arrived, she climbed aboard and found a window seat. As the train pulled away from the station, the village disappeared behind her, swallowed by shadows.
She didn't look back.
She couldn't.
Hours later, the train reached Hyderabad.
The same city, the same chaos but everything felt different.
She walked out of the station with a hollow ache in her chest. No one waited for her. No one knew what she had just lost. She was just another face in the crowd.
But she was also something more now.
She had survived the deepest kind of goodbye.
She had run from being caged.
She had kept the last piece of love she had left in a single photo frame wrapped inside her bag.
She reached to her room and locked herself in for days without any food or sleep.
And for the first time in days, her phone buzzed softly.
A new Weibo notification.
It wasn't a message.
Just a post.
But somehow... she smiled.
Because even the faintest thread of light could still reach her. here, now, even in the dark.
Even now, she can't hold back and cried hardly and hardly holding the phone and shouted " I don't have any family... What should I do."
From down the restaurant, her boss heard thise sounds and thought, " isn't Anaya gone home, why there are sounds from her room."
He went and checked and found that there is some one in the room. As he knocked on the door, there is no response.
Anaya frightened and shut her mouth. The boss, knocked down the door and the door is opened. As he saw Anaya he scared and as Anaya saw him, she fainted.
Later, The boss taken her to the hospital.