This story only has one main character
- Aug 28, 2025
- 7 min read
27th - 28th August 2025
If there’s anything I learnt from my 22 years of life, it’s that time passes. Very quickly. A year ago I was sitting across from the love of my life trying out sushi for the very first time and we had our lifetime ahead of us. It still feels like yesterday and yet, I underwent unimaginable horrors and even more unimaginable than that was that I survived.
And today, I went to the same restaurant, same staff, same sushi, but different Yutika. I watched a video of a physicist, a stand-up comic, and a neuroscientist debate about free will while sipping on lemon ice tea. I wonder what Manan thought about free will.
I walked around 5 kms and I listened to music the whole way and it felt beautiful. I felt beautiful and happy. But hey! I got stopped by cops??? Apparently the CM lives in Teynampet and they have blocked off the whole road, I’m just like, bruh. I laughed it off, but it’s kind of ridiculous. Do better, cops. Do I look like someone who would cause chaos? I was just a pretty girl wearing a pretty black dress.
But, I have since learnt, rejection is re-direction and I’m fine with that.
I took myself to Higginbothams, a place where me and Manan went on our first hang out session. I bought books after telling myself not to, but hey, some promises can be broken for the greater good.
I stepped on Marina’s sand and it started drizzling. I realized I have never gone to the beach alone. It’s sad, I should take myself to the beach often. And every time I look at the ocean, I want to cry. No reason. It’s just so big and I’m so tiny and it feels so relieving that I don’t matter. It feels like my heart gets a huge embrace. Mother. I call the ocean my mother. And she is.
I drenched my feet and sat down. It was crowded, I don’t like the crowd. But, I put on my earbuds and started listening to a few songs (Kun Faya Kun, obviously) and I had this weird/crazy thought, humans rush towards the shore to meet the waves with such joy and excitement, do you think maybe the waves are also equally happy to meet us? Are they rushing towards us, saying, ‘hey, look humans!’?
I have also realized that my 3pm thoughts are not very different from the 3am ones.
I came back home (I love it when the CMRL mini bus is empty. I absolutely do.) And I got to talk to Manan’s mother and I love her so much. I enjoy talking to her and it makes me feel connected to Manan and I think of his family as mine. I think I always will.
I had asked Manan to give me a present on his birthday (Ironic yes, but I wanted to feel his presence) and he gave me one of the greatest gifts anyone can ever give me and the best part? I didn’t even know I needed it and it happened disguised as a “bad” thing. (Nothing in this world is ever good or bad. Things just happen and it’s we who assign meaning to it)
Regardless, for every “good” thing that happens in my life, there’s an equivalent “bad” thing that also happens. And one such thing happened on this day as well. But, I followed what the philosophers say and I shifted my perspective.
Not, why did this happen?
But, what can I learn from this?
It helps. It really does.
Next time, you want to pull out your hair and scream. Pause. Take a breather. It’s going to be okay. You are not dead. It’s not the end of the world. Because the truth is that there’s very little in our hands. The universe doesn’t let people play dice with it. It rolls and gives you the number it wants and your job is to smile and accept it graciously. Suffering is random. Don’t take it personally. Free will is a hoax and everything is pre-designed. We are all actors and we shall follow our roles. If someone can see their future without you, then why try to force them into yours? Don't. There are no heroes or villains here, we are just guys who do “good”/”bad” things sometimes. But, there are main characters. And this is my story. And I will always be the main character here.
Then, of course I called up my best friends (my soulmates) and they immediately made everything better. I am always surrounded by love. Because I am love too. When something “bad” happens, you can either laugh or cry about it and I choose both. It was a sad but beautiful feeling.
“Aren’t you angry? This is something that is very unfair to you. Promises were made, ones that you didn’t even ask for. The carpet was pulled under your feet.”, my friend was angrier than me. “What the fuck, dude?”, was his primary reaction.
Oh. Oh yes. Yes. It was. I feel betrayed. I feel hurt. I feel sad. But, I don’t feel angry. Why don’t I feel angry? Should I be angry? Is the anger bubbling quietly bidding for time till appearance? I am very familiar with my anger, I do not feel her hiding. She does not hide. So why am I not angry? But, I caught myself before spiralling my way into anxiety.
It’s okay that I don’t feel what people maybe should feel normally. I’m one of the furthest people away from normality, since my birth. All my life I have chased after a “normal state” of being. But, fuck normality. This is who I am. I am someone who becomes kind during the hardest of times. And you know what? I’m fucking proud of it. I’m proud of the person I have sculptured myself into. I’m proud of this Yutika who managed to keep her head calm and composed and didn’t lose her shit, because she knows– she knows nothing is and was never in her control.
Anger is a time and energy consuming emotion, and it is usually directed at someone who you give the power to hurt you. And it was a subconscious process I believe, maybe I didn’t have the energy left or the fight left in me to become really angry.
So the anger slipped through my mind like water on a lily pad. I realized within 2 months, I had started to anchor myself. I learnt to ground myself and I embraced myself. Losing Manan to death had changed me. Immensely. Fundamentally. In words I can’t explain. But, this isn’t the first time the carpet was pulled from under my feet. The last thing the entire floor had burned to ashes and I pulled through that. I walked through that storm alone. Only a fool would believe that I can’t put myself back together again. And I am not a fool.
It’s also obviously very freeing to know that you gave it your 100% and this time, even though the initial emotions hit me like a truck, I know that it was never my fault. I stayed true to my heart and I fought until the point I realized I was the only soldier on the battlefield. Embarrassing. But, I did not run. I did not run from the war. Love requires bravery and I stayed brave till the very last minute. And I’m proud of myself.
Screaming along to Taylor Swift is the best catharsis for all pain and that’s what I did. I danced, I cried, I impulse ordered a keyboard that makes good clickyyy sound (it was 580, absolutely worth the money and it literally came within 12 hours and using it to type is also cathartic) and I had egg maggi and went to bed.
There’s only one quote that came to my mind the next morning when I awoke.
“If you get on the wrong train, get off at the next stop. Because the further you go, the more expensive your return ticket will be.”
(In my case, I'm glad I didn't book a flight ticket. but, here are some lyrics of a song I can't seem to stop thinking about.)
And during this journey, I had somehow found myself too. I found the little girl inside the train. She was sitting by the window and she didn’t know where to go. I found her. I hugged her. She had run away from a very unstable household drowning in abuse and debts. And a house that was indeed safe for her burned down. Trust issues. Big trust issues.
“Hey Yuti. I fixed it. I fixed it all. I fixed our house. It is now very peaceful. You can come back and no matter what happens I will protect you.”
I think she trusts me now. I held her hand and I brought her back home. Back where she belongs and I think she will stay now. I think she won’t run away again. And that’s all I could ever ask from her.
Meanwhile, for the mature Yutika, she literally doesn’t give a fuck anymore? Is that a “good” or a “bad” thing? Her reaction to it was me failing my physics internal test in 12th grade and all I did was shrug my shoulders and said, meh, I will try again. (I think I have gotten ridiculously good at goodbyes)
She already had the agenda/prescription ready the minute it happened: Cry, Friends, Taylor Swift, Cry, Food, Poetry, Guitar, Cry, Read, Sleep. Repeat until hurt subsides and you wake up and your first thought is, “Hey, what’s for breakfast?”
She has learnt her lessons too. Every time she walks away from something she doesn’t think she deserves, she finds something ever better or more like the next better thing finds her. And every time, she will continue to learn something new and that’s all that matters.
And Yutika survives one more day. To roll the stone up the mountain. To see beyond the shadows of the cave and hold up a candle to it. To fall in love again. With herself. And others. To continue being the kind person; she has no other choice because she doesn’t have free will, so she is absolutely fucking glad she turned out to be someone she is proud to be. The universe might have fumbled with her life settings but it rolled double sixes for her personality. Crazy luck stats, bro. Crazy luck stats.
To sign out, I quote Taylor again:
“Everything you lose is a step you take”
(You’re on your own kid. You always have been. But, that's nothing to be afraid of.)
Comments