The days blurred into weeks. Weeks folded into months. Seasons turned their pages softly, without permission, and Anaya found herself standing at the edge of a year she hadn't noticed passing.
Summer's warmth faded. Autumn arrived with its golden leaves and soft winds, and then came winter with quiet, silver, and uninvited. Somewhere along the way, Anaya stopped counting the calendar days. She no longer marked them with excitement, or longing, or notes of hope. She simply lived them, folded between the pages of routine and silent dreams.
Yu Chen was no longer part of his boy group. Seems like the contract ends.
That news came like a breeze that didn't stir the curtain. No loud announcement. Just a subtle change in his bio, a quiet shift in the rhythm of updates. He had returned to his former company, choosing to focus on acting.
And suddenly, he was everywhere again. But not for her.
Magazine covers, interviews, drama stills. He stood beside elegant actresses, smiled at press events, laughed under stage lights that Anaya could only watch from a dim-lit phone screen.
Each time she saw him, her heart twisted in a strange, painful knot.
It wasn't just jealousy, it was the cruel echo of distance.
The helplessness of loving someone who belonged to a world where you did not exist.
She told herself, " it was admiration". She told herself "it was fandom".
She knows that, but it wasn't.
It was the way her chest felt hollow when he stood next to someone else.
It was the way her fingers trembled when she scrolled through gossip articles.
It was the way her thoughts spiraled at night, alone in her room, whispering,..
"He's so far. And I'm still here. Loving him like a secret that I can't bury."
Sometimes, she felt angry with herself. What was she doing?
"Loving someone who might never even know her name.
Waiting for replies she knew would never come."
There were nights she sat on the restaurant's rooftop, the air around her cold and still, her heart louder than the world. The stars looked the same as always, unreachable and burning. Just like him.
"This isn't love," she'd whisper. "This is madness. A beautiful, bleeding madness."
But each time she tried to let go, her heart reached for him again.
She wrote to him in her diary like he lived in her mirror. She never watched his dramas, but rewatched his interviews, memorized every flicker of emotion in his eyes. She celebrates every chinese festival herself but thinks like he was beside her, laughed at his jokes like he was speaking only to her, and cried when the scenes ended, because real life never gave her a role in his story.
And then came the actresses.
Lin Yue. Ten years older. Stunning. Graceful.
Another one, more than twenty years older, yet her beauty looked carved from time itself.
At first, Anaya was relieved. "They're so much older. There's no way..."
But the relief only lasted a breath.
"What if he doesn't care about age? What if he falls for maturity? For elegance?"
"What if he's tired of girls like me, small, invisible, afraid?"
"What if… he already loves someone?"
And then, the most painful thought of all..,
"What if he never once thought of me, even I'm infront of him? "
It wasn't just jealousy. It was fear.
Fear that she had poured her heart into something that would never even be acknowledged.
Fear that she was just a girl with too many dreams, a stranger in this vast world.
She began to doubt everything.
"Is this even love? Or am I just lonely?"
"Do I love him? Or do I love the feeling of loving him?"
"If he stood in front of me today… would he even see me?"
But no matter how hard the questions hit her, the answers always returned to the same soft ache.
She missed him.
Its not just a simple missing but alot lot lots of missings.
Not for what he did, not for how he looked, but for what he unknowingly gave her. A reason to keep her heart from going completely numb.
Every time she thought she had moved on, his smile in a new photo brought her back.
Every time she told herself, "That's enough,"
her dreams whispered, "Stay."
And so she stayed...
Trapped between hope and despair.
Caught between being his and being no one.
Writing stories by day, serving customers by evening, crying quietly at night.
And still loving him.
With no reply.
No promise.
No explanation.
Just loving him from afar, and hope someday both their world's will have a chance to meet.
And even in the silence, that love made her feel real.
As the snow began to fall and the world prepared for another new year, Anaya sat by her window pen in hand, diary open.
"Maybe we'll never meet," she wrote. "Maybe you'll never know me. Maybe one day, you'll get married, and I'll see your wedding photos and smile through the pain. But even if that happens… thank you.
Thank you for making me believe in something beautiful, even if it was just a dream."
" I'll never think like that, if you are the groom I can only be the bride. I'll never leave a single chance."
Outside, the stars shimmered faintly.
And inside her, a small, fragile hope still breathed.
Then slowly days passed, the end of the year didn't just bring cold winds and soft snowfall but not in Hyderabad but in Beijing. It brought something unexpected, an ending. Not of her love, but of something she had poured her entire heart into.
Anaya had finished writing her first novel.
It didn't happen like the stories she read in books, no fireworks, no cheering crowds. Just a soft click of the keyboard in the quiet room above the restaurant. Just a moment of stillness as she stared at the final words.
"The end," she whispered to herself. And then, the silence clapped in her ears.
She didn't cry. She didn't smile either. She just sat there for a long time, hands in her lap, not knowing whether to be proud or afraid.
Because the truth was she didn't know what to do next.
She had written scripts too. Small scenes. Dialogues. Little slices of emotion pulled from her heart and stitched into characters.
But the world outside her diary was wide and unknowable.
.. Where do even begin?
She searched online for competitions, publishers, agencies. The more she searched, the more lost she felt. The literary world looked like a sea she didn't know how to swim in.
Every website was a blur of rules and formats, every forum filled with advice that sounded more like riddles.
"Query letter."
"Literary agent."
"Industry standard."
"Pitch deck."
She didn't even know what half those words meant.
She had the heart of a writer.
But not the map.
And so, her novel just sat quietly on her desk-printed, bound by a simple clip, waiting for someone to notice it. Waiting for her to be brave enough.
Each night, she told herself:
"Tomorrow, I'll send it out."
"Tomorrow, I'll submit it somewhere."
"Tomorrow, I'll try."
But "tomorrow" always came with a new fear.
Anaya murmured herself,
"What if they laugh at me?"
"What if they say it's not good enough?"
"What if it really isn't good enough?"
Then, the " tomorrow " had lost in days of Tommorows.
So, she kept writing but not sharing.
Kept dreaming but not stepping forward.
It was a strange ache.
To carry something so beautiful inside, and yet fear the world might not see it the same way.
She found herself watching Yu Chen's interviews again. This time not as a fan lost in love but as someone trying to understand what courage looks like.
He always seemed so composed. So sure.
Even when speaking about failure, his eyes held a quiet strength.
"I want to try acting seriously now," he had said in one interview, looking calm but firm.
"Even if it's slow, I'll grow. Even if I fail, I'll learn."
Anaya paused the video. Rewound that part. Played it again.
"Even if it's slow, I'll grow."
She whispered the words to herself like a prayer. Then scribbled it down in her notebook.
She didn't have a manager.
Or a publisher.
Or a mentor.
But she had her words.
And maybe… that was enough to begin.
Still, at night, her mind wandered back to him. Not just as an idol now, but as a symbol of dreams pursued without hesitation. Of courage that didn't wait for perfect timing.
"You're so far," she thought as she looked out at the cold sky.
'But somehow… you still keep me going."
She opened her diary again that night and wrote:
"Dear Yu Chen,
It's been a strange year. I finished my novel, but I don't know what to do with it. I wrote some scripts too, like the ones you act in. But everything feels like a locked door.
Still, I haven't given up.
Not on my story. Not on myself. Not on you.
I think I'm learning slowly.
I think I'll get there someday.
Even if no one sees me right now, I'll keep writing.
Maybe… someday, I'll write something you'll act in. Maybe someday, you'll read my words and think of me.
I know this sounds foolish. But for now, it's enough to believe.
With love,
Your silent love,
Ann."
She closed the diary, her eyes misty but hopeful.
The night didn't give her answers.
But it gave her the courage to begin again.