Time Period: All decades interwoven
Lie : Love is always linear
Delhi, 2020.
The city hummed with its usual rhythm of traffic, construction, and the scattered cries of street vendors. In a quiet corner of a library, a woman in her sixties flipped through an old book she had stumbled upon in the stacks.
The book was slim, its cover faded with age. The title read Echoes of the Heart. On the inside cover was a name she hadn’t seen in decades: Ananya Chatterjee.
The Poetry That Endures
The woman was Dr. Asha Mehta, an acclaimed professor of literature. She had been a student in Kolkata during the turbulent 1970s, attending protests alongside her more daring peers. One of them, a poet named Ananya, had left a lasting impression on her with her fierce words and quiet grace.
Asha hadn’t thought about her in years. But as she read the familiar verses, memories of those protests and Ananya’s calm voice returned.
One poem caught her attention:
Fires consume, but ashes remain.
A love once burned can never be reclaimed.
Asha sighed, wondering what had become of Ananya. She had heard whispers of a love affair with a Naxalite leader, a man who had used her poetry for his own agenda. The idea seemed both tragic and inevitable.
The Photograph That Speaks
The same day, a young photographer named Kavya Sharma stood in a bustling gallery in Delhi, her eyes fixed on a black-and-white photograph. The image was of a young woman standing under a flickering streetlight, her expression both determined and heartbroken.
The photograph was part of an exhibit titled Dreams of the City. The placard beneath the frame read: Rohini Mehta, self-portrait, 1986.
Kavya had never heard of Rohini Mehta before, but something about the photograph drew her in. It was as if the woman in the frame had captured a fleeting moment of truth—an instant when ambition, love, and despair collided.
Kavya’s phone buzzed. It was a message from her brother, a software engineer:
“Found this weird quote in a program at work today. Looks like poetry:
‘I loved the idea of love more than its truth. The lie felt safer.’”
Kavya frowned, intrigued.
The Encoded Love Story
Ravi’s encrypted program, now a widely used piece of software, had become infamous for its hidden messages. Decades after its creation, his story continued to slip through the cracks, reaching strangers who would never know the man behind the code.
Kavya texted her brother back:
“Sounds like someone got their heart broken.”
The response came quickly.
“Don’t we all?”
She put her phone away and turned back to the photograph. The light hit it differently now, illuminating the faint tear glistening in the corner of Rohini’s eye.