Chapter 1 - A Familiar Name

There are moments in life when we have to accept that not everything will go the way we once planned.

My name is Laya.

Once, I imagined my life would be simple. I would graduate from high school, go to college, find a good job, and eventually build a life with someone I loved. But life had other plans for me.

I never went to college. Instead of sitting in a university classroom, I started working at one of the banks in my hometown. Every morning, I went to work in formal clothes, met countless people, and followed a routine that slowly taught me what it meant to become an adult.

At first, I felt like I was falling behind. My friends began leaving town for college. Some were accepted into public universities, others chose private ones, and some were already starting to build the lives they had always dreamed of. And me? I was simply trying to make the best of what I had.

But as I grew older, I began to understand something. Life isn’t only about what we want. Sometimes, it’s about what we’re willing to fight for. I wanted to change my financial situation. I wanted a better life. I wanted to be able to help my family someday without constantly worrying about money. And because of that, I began to look at relationships differently.

I no longer wanted to simply be loved. I wanted to build a life. I wanted something serious. Something with direction. A relationship with someone emotionally mature, someone with clear goals, someone who could walk beside me toward a better future. Maybe that sounded too materialistic to some people. But to me, it wasn’t. I had simply become too aware that love couldn’t pay the bills. Love couldn’t always solve problems. And love alone wasn’t enough to build a future. That realization was what eventually led me to make the hardest decision I had ever made about my relationship with Mike.

Mike was someone I had once loved deeply. After graduating from high school, he moved to another city to attend college. He studied Architecture at one of the country’s public universities. I knew how much he had wanted to study there. He dreamed of becoming an architect, and I had once been one of the people who supported that dream the most. We tried to maintain a long-distance relationship. At first, everything seemed fine. We still talked about our days, called each other, and shared little things about our lives. But slowly, I began to feel something changing. Mike was busy with college. I had started working. We were living separate lives in two different cities, and little by little, I began asking myself a question.

Could I really see my future with Mike? The question kept coming back. Not because Mike was a bad person. Not because he didn’t love me. In fact, that was what made everything so much harder. I knew Mike loved me. And I had once loved him deeply too. But whenever I tried to imagine our future, I couldn’t see a clear picture. I didn’t know what we would become. I didn’t know when we would truly be ready for marriage. I didn’t know if we wanted the same things in life. And what scared me the most, I wasn’t sure if being with Mike could give me the kind of life I wanted. I wanted to improve my financial situation. I wanted a financially stable partner. Someday, I wanted to build a family without constantly worrying about how we would afford the things we needed. I wanted a partner who could stand beside me, not someone who would make me feel like I had to carry everything alone. Maybe I was selfish. Maybe I thought too much about the future. But I didn’t want to spend years staying in a relationship simply because I was afraid of hurting someone.

I once asked myself: If I stayed with Mike simply because I loved him, was I choosing happiness-or was I just holding on to a habit?

I never found the answer. So eventually, I chose to leave. The problem was, Mike never really believed we had broken up. Every time we argued, he assumed I was simply angry.

“You’re just in a bad mood.”

“I’m serious, Mike.”

“You’ll feel better tomorrow.”

“I don’t want to continue this.”

“You’ll come back eventually.”

Those words always made me go quiet. Because maybe, all this time, he had been right. I had always come back. But it wasn’t because I was convinced he was my future. I came back because I was afraid of losing someone who had been such a big part of my life for so long. Until eventually, I realized something. Being afraid of losing someone isn’t a good enough reason to stay. I wanted more than a relationship that survived simply because it had lasted for so long. I wanted a relationship with a purpose. I wanted someone I could picture myself beside whenever we talked about the future. And whenever I tried to imagine that future with Mike, all I saw was fog.

Unclear.

Uncertain.

I didn’t want to live like that, so I chose to stop, not because I hated Mike. I simply began choosing myself, Some time after everything ended, I came across a name on social media.

Tiar.

I stared at the screen for a few seconds. The name felt familiar. I opened his profile, and slowly, memories began to return. Elementary school. Our classroom. Old friends. And a boy who had once been in the same class as me.

Tiar.

We hadn’t been close back then, but I remembered him. Especially because Lisa, my best friend, used to have a crush on him. I couldn’t help but smile at the memory.

Funny.

After all these years, I had somehow found Tiar on social media. I looked through some of his posts. Apparently, he was studying in another city too. He was majoring in International Relations at a private university-one that was known for being quite expensive.

I paused for a moment.

Wow.

His life had really changed.

We used to be nothing more than elementary school kids. Now he was living in another city, attending a good university, and building a life of his own. I was about to close his profile, but for some reason, my hand stopped.

Why not say hi?

We had been classmates once. There was nothing wrong with that, so I sent him a simple message.

“Tiar?”

I didn’t expect anything. I wasn’t even sure he would reply. A few minutes later, a notification appeared. Tiar replied to your message.

I opened it.

“Laya?”

I smiled.

He remembered me.

“Yeah. You still remember me?”

A moment later, he replied.

“I think so. We were in the same elementary school class, right?”

I laughed softly.

“Yeah. I thought you’d forgotten.”

“Of course not.”

Our conversation was simple. We asked each other how we were doing. We talked about work, college, and old friends. I told him I was working at a bank. He told me about college in another city, about studying International Relations, and about how busy he was.

There was no talk about relationships. No talk about the future. Nothing romantic.

Just two people who happened to have shared the same classroom as children, meeting again as adults.

But there was something different.

Talking to Tiar felt easy.

I didn’t have to explain my past. He didn’t know about my relationship with Mike. He didn’t know why I had chosen to leave. He didn’t know that behind my job at the bank was a woman desperately trying to build a better life. He didn’t know that I was looking for something more serious in life.

And perhaps because he knew nothing about me, I felt free to simply be myself. I didn’t realize that night was the beginning of something.

I thought I was simply saying hello to an old classmate. I didn’t know that the boy I had once known only as a childhood classmate would slowly become someone who would make me question what the future really meant.

Because by then, I had already made one important decision. I didn’t want to be in a relationship based on love alone.

I wanted something with direction. I wanted someone who could grow with me. Someone who had a life and clear goals of his own. Someone who could make me believe that the future didn’t always have to feel frightening.

And I had absolutely no idea…

that just a few days after that small encounter on social media, I would begin seeing Tiar differently.

I didn’t know whether he would become someone who stayed. Or simply someone who came into my life to teach me something. But that night, as I put my phone down and closed my eyes, I smiled softly.

I wasn’t looking for love, I was simply trying to start my life over. And sometimes, when we stop looking, someone appears without ever being asked. Someone from the past, someone we never imagined would come back.

Tiar.