06-03-2026, 01:24 PM
The vibration of his phone pulled him out of his thoughts.
A message from his mother lit up the screen.
“Beta, when are you coming home? Your father asks about you.”
Arjun stared at the message but did not reply.
It had been eight months since he had attended a family gathering. He could already hear the questions waiting for him there, the aunties asking about marriage, the uncles offering career advice, the cousins carrying their newborn children.
So much life.
So many expectations.
All pressing in on him, reminding him of everything he felt he had failed to become.
The phone buzzed again, but Arjun ignored it and returned to the glowing monitors.
Another folder opened.
“Engagements – 2025.”
The couples in these photos looked impossibly happy.
Radiant.
Hopeful.
Alive.
Fake happy? Real happy?
He no longer knew the difference.
At first he used to analyze the expressions carefully, wondering which smiles were genuine and which were staged.
Now he simply watched.
Because watching was easier than living.
Then Rhea’s voice surfaced in his memory, sharper than any photograph.
“You’re always behind the camera, Arjun,” she had said. “You watch life. You document it. You archive it. But you never actually live it.”
He had tried to explain himself back then. He had told her that artists needed distance, that observation was essential for understanding life.
But she had only looked at him quietly.
“You’re hiding,” she said.
“And I can’t love a ghost.”
Standing alone in his dark apartment at two in the morning, surrounded by thousands of glowing images of strangers’ happiness, Arjun finally understood something painful.
She had been right.
He had spent years hiding, behind the lens, behind professionalism, behind the safety of observation.
The photographs seemed to mock him now. Their laughter and intimacy reminded him of a life he had never quite learned how to live.
His finger hovered over the mouse, trembling slightly.
But he could not click.
A message from his mother lit up the screen.
“Beta, when are you coming home? Your father asks about you.”
Arjun stared at the message but did not reply.
It had been eight months since he had attended a family gathering. He could already hear the questions waiting for him there, the aunties asking about marriage, the uncles offering career advice, the cousins carrying their newborn children.
So much life.
So many expectations.
All pressing in on him, reminding him of everything he felt he had failed to become.
The phone buzzed again, but Arjun ignored it and returned to the glowing monitors.
Another folder opened.
“Engagements – 2025.”
The couples in these photos looked impossibly happy.
Radiant.
Hopeful.
Alive.
Fake happy? Real happy?
He no longer knew the difference.
At first he used to analyze the expressions carefully, wondering which smiles were genuine and which were staged.
Now he simply watched.
Because watching was easier than living.
Then Rhea’s voice surfaced in his memory, sharper than any photograph.
“You’re always behind the camera, Arjun,” she had said. “You watch life. You document it. You archive it. But you never actually live it.”
He had tried to explain himself back then. He had told her that artists needed distance, that observation was essential for understanding life.
But she had only looked at him quietly.
“You’re hiding,” she said.
“And I can’t love a ghost.”
Standing alone in his dark apartment at two in the morning, surrounded by thousands of glowing images of strangers’ happiness, Arjun finally understood something painful.
She had been right.
He had spent years hiding, behind the lens, behind professionalism, behind the safety of observation.
The photographs seemed to mock him now. Their laughter and intimacy reminded him of a life he had never quite learned how to live.
His finger hovered over the mouse, trembling slightly.
But he could not click.
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