The first time I noticed him looking at me was in computer class. I was a commerce student, and he was a science student. He wore glasses, and if I’m honest, he looked pretty average, nothing extraordinary. Then again, I wasn’t much different—just another average-looking Indian girl, blending into the crowd like so many others.
We had only one common class, and it was in that small overlap where our lives briefly brushed against each other. Every time I crossed his classroom, I’d hear his friends calling him to look at me. I never understood why. What was so special about me that caught his attention? I wasn’t the kind of girl boys noticed, but for some reason, he always did.
It was our farewell day, the last day of school. I had thought about talking to him so many times, but the opportunity never seemed to come. He was always surrounded by his friends, or maybe it was just me who hesitated. Fear or pride—something always held me back.
When his class gathered for a group photograph, I took a picture of them with my brother’s phone. I didn’t have my own phone back then, but that blurry image felt like my only connection to him, my quiet secret. I remember standing there, pretending to be interested in their group, but really, my eyes were only on him.
That was the last time I saw him.
Five years have passed since then, and I still can’t forget him. His face, the way he looked at me with those glasses—every small detail is etched into my memory. I’ve searched for him on every social media platform, hoping to stumble upon a profile, a picture, anything that could reconnect me to him. But no matter how hard I tried, I never found him. Not once.
The photo I had of him is long lost, and I don’t know if I’ll ever find him again. Yet here I am, five years later, wearing the same pair of glasses I saw him in the first time he looked at me.
It’s strange, isn’t it? How a fleeting moment, a few glances across a classroom, can linger in your mind for years. Maybe it’s because he saw something in me when I couldn’t even see it myself. Or maybe it’s just the mystery of it all, the unknown of what could’ve been.
Whatever it is, he’s a ghost I can’t let go of. And maybe I never will.
