Oxford, 2025

It was raining again.... the kind of soft English drizzle that didn't soak your clothes but crept in anyway, like a thought you couldn't shake.

Abhiram ducked into the second-hand bookstore just off Cowley Road, mostly to escape the weather. He wasn't planning to buy anything. He rarely did. His flat was already overflowing with books, most of which he hadn't finished. That didn't stop him from collecting more. Old books felt like people... flawed, forgotten, full of stories.

He drifted toward the South Asian literature shelf, fingers tracing the cracked spines until he found an old copy of Gitanjali, Tagore. A first English translation, softcover, corners curled in like tired petals.

He opened it.

And something fluttered out.

A piece of pale blue stationery, yellowed at the edges, folded in thirds like a secret. He blinked, surprised. There was handwriting on it... neat, flowing curves in black ink.

 Hyderabad, 17 March 1995

Dear Stranger,

I don't know who you are. Maybe you'll never find this letter. But if you do… I hope you're someone who still believes in letters. Real ones. Not emails or pagers or whatever's coming next.

Today I turned 20. I came to the library alone. My friends forgot. My parents were busy. So I wrote to you instead. Whoever you are.

Do you ever feel like you're living in the wrong time? I do, almost every day.

If you find this, write me back. I mean it. Leave your letter in the same book.

Until then,

Anuradha.

Abhiram stared at the page, heart oddly still.

It had been sitting inside this book for thirty years.

She was probably...

Realize and said to himself, Wait, What?......In her late forties now?, Married?, Living in the States?, Maybe she forgot she ever wrote this.

But something about the words felt... unfinished. Like a thread waiting to be pulled.

He glanced at the old bookshelf. Third shelf from the bottom.

He smiled, just a little. Maybe it was stupid. Maybe it was nothing.

Still, that night, he wrote back.

Ah, yes. Let's return to that quiet, rain-soaked night in Oxford... he said to himself.

Abhiram in his flat, sitting at his desk, staring at the blue paper with Anuradha's words from thirty years ago.

He doesn't know if she'll ever read his reply. But something about her letter won't let him stay silent.

∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆

It was past midnight.

Abhiram sat at his desk with a cup of masala chai that had long since gone cold, the rain ticking softly against the windowpane behind him. The library copy of Gitanjali lay open, Anuradha's letter resting beside it like a fragile piece of forgotten time.

He picked up a clean sheet of paper, took a breath, and began to write.

Oxford, 2025

Dear Anuradha,

I don't know if you'll ever read this.

If you do.... then somehow, impossible, you and I have managed to speak across time.

I found your letter inside Gitanjali this afternoon. I wasn't looking for anything. But something about your words made me pause.... like I knew the person behind them. Isn't that strange?. To feel something so familiar from someone who may no longer even exist in this time?.

You said you feel like you're living in the wrong era. I feel like I'm stuck in one I can't connect with.

The world moves too fast here. Everything's data, algorithms, and artificial meaning. But sometimes, I stop and think about all the things that don't fit into code..... like handwritten letters from 1995 tucked into old books halfway across the world.

You mentioned your birthday. I wonder.... are you still in Hyderabad?. Did you become the writer you sounded like?. Do you still visit the library, third shelf from the bottom?.

Maybe this is just a moment, and nothing more.

But if this letter somehow reaches you.... write back. Please.

Abhiram,

MSc, Literature & Memory Studies

*****College, Oxford.

ఇంకో విషయం(Inkō viṣayaṁ): Happy belated birthday, even if it's thirty years late.

{ఇంకో విషయం(Inkō viṣayaṁ): One more thing.}

Abhiram folded the letter carefully, slid it into the same Gitanjali copy, and returned to the bookstore the next morning. The clerk gave him a strange look when he insisted on putting it back on the shelf... but let him.

The book went back. The letter went with it.

And now, all he could do was wait.

Hyderabad, April 1995

Anuradha sat on the steps outside the library, the city warm and buzzing around her, but her thoughts floating somewhere far.... in grey clouds and cobblestone streets she'd never seen.

Oxford, she whispered under her breath. The word felt foreign and fragile on her tongue.

The letter she had just read sat in her lap. She had read it twice. Then a third time. The ink was real. The paper, newer than anything she owned. And the words?.

She thought it was prank... So started to write...

Hyderabad, April 1995

Listen...this is not funny. If you think I believe in this nonsense then you are wrong.

Stop This prank. Stop putting things in my books. Stop following me.

If you don't, I will tell my father. He is in the police. If you make trouble for me, he will find you. He will break your bones before you know what hit you.

Don't test me.

Anuradha.

Anuradha slammed the book shut after slipping her note inside. Her handwriting looked like it was carved, not written. She pushed the book back on the third shelf from the bottom and walked away without looking back.

She didn't believe in this nonsense. Whoever was doing this... some bored student, some clerk.. would stop after reading her warning.

...ΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩ...

Oxford, 2025

Late afternoon, a cozy little bookstore, near **** College.

Abhiram's fingers trembled slightly as he pulled the well-worn copy of Gitanjali off the shelf for the third time that week. The rain outside had softened to a drizzle, and the faint smell of old paper mixed with tea lingered in the air.

He opened the book, expecting silence. But instead…

There it was.

A sheet of paper, new yet somehow weathered, folded in thirds. His breath caught.

Carefully, almost reverently, he unfolded it and began to read...The ink of Anuradha's new letter bled a little at the edges, as if it had been written fast.

He read the first line and laughed out loud.

Listen...this is not funny. If you think I believe in this nonsense then you are wrong.

Stop this prank. Stop putting things in my books. Stop following me.

If you don't, I will tell my father. He is in the police. If you make trouble for me, he will find you. He will break your bones before you know what hit you.

Don't test me,

Anuradha.

He shook his head, still smiling. "Fierce," he muttered. "I never thought you'd be this fierce."

he thought in his mind, " But, How is this possible?." sometime later, He reached for his pen and began to write, careful but lighthearted...

Dear Anuradha,

I thought you wanted me to write back. That's why I did.

I never imagined you’d think I was following you... I'm thousands of miles and thirty years away. I'm not a prankster. I'm just a student who found your first letter in Gitanjali.

Your words felt real. I wanted to answer. That's all.

If my reply upset you, I'm sorry. You don't owe me anything. But I hope you don't stop writing just because of this.

You sounded lonely in your first letter.

Abhiram.

He hesitated, then added at the bottom...

ఇంకో విషయం(Inkō viṣayaṁ): Please don't set your father on me. I'm innocent.

And with that letter safely tucked inside Gitanjali once again...

...ΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩ...

Hyderabad, April 1995.

The next day, Anuradha pulled the book off the shelf with a mixture of irritation and curiosity. She had told herself she wouldn't look. But her fingers itched.

Inside was another letter.

She opened it.

...ΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩ...

To be continued....