Chapter One

I sat motionless on the cold metal bench, my eyes fixed on the empty tracks before me. Raipur Station's Platform 1A, usually bustling with activity, felt hollow—a ghost of its former self.

A crackling announcement echoed through the space: "कोविड-19 प्रतिबंधों के कारण, सीमित सेवाएं चल रही हैं। कृपया सामाजिक दूरी बनाए रखें।" (Due to COVID-19 restrictions, limited services are running. Please maintain social distancing.) The words barely registered. My mind was elsewhere, untethered from the present.

The direct entry point from outside the station loomed to my right, a steady trickle of people bypassing the main counters. Opposite, the parcel office buzzed with activity. Loaders grunted as they hefted heavy packages, their voices mixing with the persistent honking of auto-rickshaws and the occasional shout of a rickshaw-puller.

A pack of stray dogs trotted past, their nails clicking against the concrete platform. In the distance, a child wailed, quickly shushed by an anxious mother. These fleeting intrusions into my consciousness only served to deepen my isolation.

Flash: Marigold garlands hung heavy, their vibrant orange a stark contrast to the palpable tension in the wedding hall. I stood there in my sherwani, surrounded by guests whose eyes brimmed with sympathy. Hushed whispers snaked through the crowd like poison. "The bride... she's left...?" "What exactly happened...?" Their pitying glances bore into me, as if asking me, what have you done?

The screech of metal on metal pierced the air as a goods train lumbered by on a far track. I watched it pass, each car a blur of rust and faded paint. How easy it would be to step in front of such a behemoth, I thought. To let its unstoppable mass erase my failures, my pain, my very existence.

Flash: I jolted awake, disoriented, my head pounding. "Guys?" I called out, my voice hoarse. The hall spun as I stumbled to my feet. "Rahul? Samyak?" Silence answered me. I fumbled for my phone, dialing number after number. No answer. No messages. Nothing. The clink of glasses from last night's celebration echoed in my memory, a cruel reminder of a camaraderie that had vanished like morning mist.

A beggar shuffled past, his outstretched hand ignored by the few travelers scurrying by. I couldn't help but see myself in his desperate eyes. I wondered, who between us was more in pain? I had everything he might have wanted. And yet, I had nothing of what he had - a will to live.

Flash: Red ink bleeding across spreadsheets. The startup that was supposed to be my legacy, my contribution to the world, reduced to a series of negative numbers. Dreams quantified and found wanting.

Why go on? What was the point of this relentless struggle, this parade of disappointments? Death whispered promises of peace, of an end to the gnawing emptiness that consumed me. Surely oblivion was preferable to this half-life of regret and failure.

The distant rumble grew louder. My train approached. I didn't know which train it was. And it didn't matter.

I stood, my legs leaden but my mind curiously calm. I had made my decision. Life had proven itself a cruel joke, a cosmic prank played at my expense. But I would have the last laugh.

As I moved toward the platform's edge, a strange sense of lightness came over me. One step, then another.

Just as I prepared to take that final, irrevocable step, a hand grasped my shoulder. Firm. Insistent.

"Wait," a voice said, cutting through the fog of my despair. "Just wait."