You Broke Our Promise

Chapter 1 – The Pinkie Promise

It began under the old banyan tree behind their school, where secrets were traded like candy and promises carried the weight of forever.

Aarya sat on the lowest root, her diary balanced on her knees. Karan, her neighbor and classmate, was trying to steal a peek over her shoulder.

“Don’t look!” she yelped, snapping the diary shut.

“Then why write so much if not for me to read?” he teased, eyes sparkling.

“Because it’s mine,” she huffed, hugging the book like treasure. “And besides, you’d only laugh at my poetry.”

“Poetry?” He grinned. “Now I have to read it.”

They bickered until Aarya stuck out her pinky. “Promise me you’ll never read my diary without asking.”

Karan, dramatic as always, clasped her little finger with his. “Fine. But only if you promise you’ll always write about me in it. Otherwise, what’s the point?”

Her lips curved into a smile. “Deal. Always.”

That was the first time they said it—always. They laughed, sealing it with a pinky twist, neither knowing how heavy that word would one day become.

Chapter 2 – The First Goodbye

The day Karan’s family moved to another city felt unreal. Cardboard boxes swallowed his room, and Aarya sat on the floor hugging her knees.

“You’ll write to me, right?” she asked, voice trembling.

He rolled his eyes. “Obviously. You’ll get sick of my letters.”

“Never,” she whispered.

At the station, the whistle of the train pierced her chest. Karan squeezed her hand, then pulled her pinky into his. “Always, Diary Girl.”

“Always,” she echoed, blinking fast to hide her tears.

As the train pulled away, she stood waving until he was just a blur. That night, her diary bore a new entry: He promised. So I’ll wait.

Chapter 3 – Letters Across Miles

The letters arrived, sometimes crumpled, sometimes stained, always brimming with his voice.

Aarya, I joined the cricket team here. They’re terrible. I miss our samosa breaks.

Diary Girl, I drew a caricature of our teacher. Got detention. Totally worth it.

Her replies were neater, pages scented faintly with ink and flowers:

Karan, don’t forget to eat vegetables. Cricket isn’t food.

Monkey Boy, stop fighting with teachers. One day, your drama will land you in jail.

The postman became her favorite person. Every envelope felt like proof—distance hadn’t broken their “always.” Yet under her laughter, something softer bloomed: a love she didn’t dare name.

Chapter 4 – Missed Calls, Missed Chances

By the time they reached college, phone calls had replaced letters. Late nights filled with laughter, endless teasing, and secret confessions about classes, friends, and life.

But as time went on, calls grew fewer. Missed connections piled up like unsaid words. She stayed up staring at her phone, waiting for his name to light the screen.

One night, when he finally called, his voice was tired. “Sorry, Diary Girl. Life’s crazy here.”

She laughed it off, hiding the sting. “That’s okay. Just don’t forget me.”

“Never,” he promised.

But in the quiet after the call ended, her diary entry read, “But is ‘never’ weaker than ‘always’?”

Chapter 5 – The Almost Confession

A college festival brought him back to her city. They spent the evening wandering streets lit with fairy lights, laughter spilling like old times.

On the bridge, under a moonlit sky, Karan turned serious. “Aarya… there’s something I should tell you.”

Her heart pounded. This is it.

But before he could speak, his phone rang. His mother. He stepped aside to answer, the moment dissolving into traffic noise.

When he returned, he only smiled, masking whatever words had been on his lips.

That night, her diary read, “Some confessions don’t need words.” Or maybe they do, and we just keep losing them.

Chapter 6 – New Cities, Old Hearts

Years passed. Karan moved abroad for work. Aarya stayed back, building her own career. Life pulled them in different directions, yet invisible threads kept tugging them back.

Messages at odd hours. A shared meme. Birthday calls where laughter turned into silence heavy with what neither dared say.

Friends teased Aarya—“Still hung up on Monkey Boy?”—but she brushed it off. She dated others and tried to move on. Yet no one fit the shape Karan had carved in her heart.

Her diary whispered the truth she never voiced aloud: Some promises feel like anchors, even when the ship has sailed.

Chapter 7 – The Reunion That Changed Nothing

A school reunion brought them face-to-face after years. The room buzzed with old jokes, awkward hugs, and nostalgic laughter.

When Karan walked in, taller, sharper, but with the same mischievous grin—Aarya’s heart forgot how to beat.

They slipped into conversation like no time had passed. He teased her about still hoarding diaries; she mocked his thinning patience with people.

But beneath the banter, a quiet ache lingered. Everyone else saw two old friends catching up. Only they knew it was a reunion of promises unkept, of love unspoken.

Chapter 8 – The Fight We Never Had

For the first time, they argued.

It started over something trivial—her teasing him about his job, his remark about her “still waiting.” The words sharpened, wounds years in the making spilling out.

“You don’t get to disappear for months and still call me yours!” she snapped.

“And you don’t get to act like nothing’s changed when it has!” he shot back.

They ended in silence, both trembling.

Later that night, Aarya wrote, "We finally fought." Maybe it was the fight we should’ve had years ago. Maybe that’s why it hurt so much.

Chapter 9 – Laughter in the Rain

A sudden monsoon shower caught them unprepared one evening. They ran for shelter, but halfway through, Karan slowed, grinning. “Why run? It’s just water.”

Aarya laughed, spinning in the rain, hair plastered to her face. He joined, their laughter echoing off the empty street. For a moment, the years, the fights, the distance—everything washed away.

Dripping wet, she gasped, “You’re ridiculous.”

He smirked. “And you love it.”

She didn’t answer. But her smile said enough.

Her diary that night: If love had a sound, it would be our laughter in the rain.

Chapter 10 – The What-If Game

At a reunion dinner, friends played a game:What if?

When someone asked, “What if Aarya and Karan had dated in school?” The table exploded in laughter.

Aarya joked, “We’d have broken up in a week—he’d eat my samosa.”

Karan added, “And she’d dump me for calling her poetry dramatic.”

Everyone laughed. But later, when they were alone, Karan asked softly, “What if we really had?”

She smiled faintly. “It would’ve been messy. But maybe… worth it.”

His gaze lingered. “Yeah. Maybe worth it.”

Her diary later: What if? Two words that hurt more than goodbye.

Chapter 11 – The Wedding Card

The cream-colored envelope arrived one morning. Karan Sharma weds Ananya Mehta.

Her heart cracked as she read it. But it was the note at the bottom that undid her:To Aarya, my forever Diary Girl—don’t you dare skip this. –Monkey Boy.

She laughed through her tears. Typical Karan.

Meera urged her not to go, but Aarya whispered, “I promised. Always.”

That night, she clutched an old letter of his: “Don’t worry, Aarya.” It’ll always be you first.

Her diary trembled under her pen:He broke our promise. But maybe I’m also breaking my own heart by letting him go.

Chapter 12 – Drunken Confessions

The night before his wedding, Karan called, drunk.

“Aarya… Do you ever wonder if it should’ve been us?”

Her heart clenched. “You’re drunk. Go to sleep.”

But he pressed on, voice breaking. “I love you, Aarya. Always have. Always will. Even if tomorrow I marry someone else.”

Tears streamed down her face. She forced humor. “Careful. If Ananya finds out, she’ll replace you with the fridge. At least it’s loyal.”

They both laughed, but beneath it lay shattered truths.

Her diary later: The cruelest confessions come too late.

Chapter 13 – The Promise Remembered

At the wedding, Karan looked radiant on the mandap. But his eyes kept finding hers.

When someone teased him about pinky promises, he laughed—but his gaze flickered toward Aarya. She smiled back, hiding her tears.

Later, she whispered as he passed, “Don’t forget to flush public toilets in Singapore.”

He nearly choked on laughter, drawing stares. For a moment, it was just them again.

But vows were spoken, the fire burned, and Aarya wrote in her diary: "He remembered." And maybe that’s enough.

Chapter 14 – Letting Go

Days later, under the banyan tree, Aarya finally said the words aloud.

On the phone with Karan, she whispered, “I think… it’s time I let you go.”

Silence. Then, his voice cracked: “I’ll always need you, Aarya.”

“But you already chose,” she replied.

They laughed through their tears, making jokes about his bad dancing and her shampoo-commercial sobbing.

Her diary that night: Sometimes, keeping a promise means setting someone free.

Chapter 15 – The Open Ending

Months later, at a café, fate placed them across from each other again.

“Diary Girl.”

“Monkey Boy.”

They laughed, mocked his pronunciation of “espresso,” and teased each other like old times. But when silence fell, he reached across the table. “Do you ever wonder—”

She stopped him gently. “No more what-ifs. We had our story. That’s enough.”

He nodded. Whispered, “Always.”

She echoed, “Always.”

Watching him leave, she wrote her final words:

Some loves don’t end. They just change shape. Ours lives quietly between the lines, unfinished, open. And maybe that’s the most beautiful kind of love.

The End… Or Maybe Not