Is a spring thunderstorm a good omen or a bad one? As raindrops splashed through the window and onto her skin, Sneha watched the sky turn darkened and heavy. Just half an hour ago, there wasn’t a hint of a storm. She remembered the sky being bright and clear as she walked back from the pharmacy with the syringes. A sigh escaped her, a betrayal of her fatigue, but her memory remained sharp as ever.
Though Abir used to accuse Sneha, especially in those last days, that whenever she lost her temper she’d just forgetting what she said or how "insanely" she behaved. But as those moments replayed in her mind, Sneha didn’t feel defensive, Instead, a strange wave of pity came over her. It was always the same cycle- the fight, the replay, the regret. Sometimes Abir would ask, “Why do you act like that?” Sneha knew there was no single line in any language that could ever explain it.
Sliding the window shut, Sneha thought about how messy her triggers really were. She could never spell them out clearly for Abir. After every blow‑up, she’d try a new way to explain herself and Abir would said he can understand, either truly understanding or just pretending to. But she often wondered, if he actually got it, why did he keep pressing the exact same buttons that provoked her? Toward the end, Abir’s defense had turned into a stock line- "Nothing can say to you. You're too sensitive. You just can’t handle the truth. Human psychology is complicated thing. Sneha was well aware of her borderline personality disorder. She tried to stay conscious of her trigger points, but didn’t always win. Sometimes she just broke down. That was her limit and reality. But then again, do even the most "stable" people maintain perfect consistency?
The thing was, Sneha’s triggers were so tied to Abir that he eventually learned how to use them against her. Instead of looking at his own anxious, inconsistent behavior, he leaned on her breakdowns. Every meltdown became a chance to call her “insane” and insist she needed help, a perfect shield for his own flaws. And talk about Sneha’s luck, or maybe her fate, her worst reactions showed up almost only with him because she loved him intensely, she had no other world accept Abir. That gave him the ultimate weapon. As long as he could call her “mad,” or “insane”, he never had to face his own unstable, contradictory nature. He never had to look in the mirror, never had to change. Sneha believed that in this restless 21st century, everyone carried some kind of mental instability. She knew hers; many didn’t know theirs. But did Abir know his? He had spent his whole life assuming his behavior was normal, never stopping to question it.
Sneha thought back to February 23 of the last year. Just a week earlier she had returned from Rajshahi after meeting Abir, carrying a quiet anger from something careless he’d said before she left. from there. Even after coming back to Dhaka, that annoyance lingered. Then, one afternoon, out of nowhere, Abir texted, "Wanna meet?” It was the 19th or 20th, she couldn’t remember exactly. Like sudden rain, his text came without warning. She was surprised. Abir often texted her to meet suddenly, but that day felt different. They met at Kingfisher, spent hours talking, and afterward he dropped her at the Aftabnagar flat. He didn't tell why he was in Dhaka or how long he’d stay, and Sneha didn’t even ask. Back then, she had no interest in his personal matters.
Until his transfer to Rajshahi, Sneha had never initiated a meeting. She never asked to see him, never texted first, except on rare occasions. She only replied when he texted, talked when he called, met when he asked. A sudden thunderclap shook the sky, lightning ripping through the dark like a burning line. Watching it, Sneha tried to trace back, when had things actually started to get complicated? Was it really only Sneha’s fault? Didn’t Abir’s mixed behavior and his contradictory side trigger those things too?
Sneha remembered their second meeting on February 23. Abir had stayed in Dhaka for several days after the first one, Sneha noticed that but he didn't mention about it. That silence made her restless. On that day, after she posted a photo of her feet on Telegram from Kingfisher, Abir texted, “I’m coming from Savar Cantonment to Kingfisher.” She was already feeling low and even sent him a long text the day before. That afternoon, Abir showed up, pulled out her that text first and read it all, then asked her to sit closer. Sneha, still upset, kept her distance. He took her hand and said, “I admit, I'm a bad man, fine! But does that mean you can’t sit beside me?” Her ice melted fast. She was always dangerously weak when it came to Abir, helpless in ways she hated to admit. Yet Abir claimed he didn't even realized that.
Sneha still found his denial and defensive tone hard to swallow. How could someone defend himself by tearing another down? Even on the last day, he insisted he was a “good man.” And Sneha honestly believed it, she never thought of him as bad. From beginning to end, she had seen him as the most wonderful man she’d ever met. But then, how could a wonderful man, desperate to protect his so-called pride, dump all the blame on her so shamelessly? As if last two years, only Sneha did all things and he was only the victim! Can’t a good person make mistakes? Did faith ever say good men never slip? Why was it so hard for him to own his faults? The thought filled her with disgust. Yet even then, she wanted to carry her love for Abir until the end of her life.
On February 23, after pulling her close, Abir said: “You’re sitting with such a gloomy long face, while I came from Savar fantasizing all the way.” Sneha was really surprised! Perhaps that was the first time Abir had directly had gone straight to intimacy. He always claimed he never initiated and later used that as a shield. Not entirely false though, he rarely needed to. Sneha always wanted closeness and Abir knew it. Was there any reason for him not to realize that? She felt ashamed of those memories that had once been her entire heart and soul. Those were the most precious parts of her life, moments she used to treasure, praise, worship and love most.
But Abir’s ugly, disgraceful, shameless, low kind of narratives and denial poisoned those cherished memories and made Sneha's whole world hollow and cheap. She just felt like vomiting whenever she recalled Abir’s those statements. If he had simply said, "Usually, Sneha wanted intimacy or most of the time,” that would have been decent to hear from a man like him. And yes, it was true. Sneha always wanted intimacy, every time, again and again. Whenever he came to her, whenever he was with her, she needed those moments and that closeness. She was young, single and deeply-madly in love with him and Abir knew each and everything very well. It was natural; she loved him with everything she had.
Of course, She craved his touch, his nearness and those moments with him. Yet in his effort to prove himself a one‑woman man, Abir’s words made Sneha feel as if she had blackmailed him into bed for two years. Ya Allah! she thought. Can anyone create such intense moments of pleasure through blackmail every single time? Could something so mutual, so consuming, ever come from pressure alone? It didn’t make sense. Strange! Should she feel proud of her power or ashamed enough to disappear? Sometimes she lost herself in that thought. She didn’t know what to feel- pride in how deeply she had loved, or a quiet shame for how everything had been turned against her.
Sneha had placed Abir on a very high pedestal. She almost worshipped him. To her, he was different- polished, intelligent, a true gentleman, far beyond the typical Bangladeshi man. That belief was the reason she loved him madly, even at this stage of her life. But in the end, his accusations and stubborn denial stripped away all his politeness, tearing off the mask of the gentleman she thought he was. He pushed the weight of an entire two‑year relationship onto Sneha’s shoulders and just walked away. In that moment, he looked exactly like the men she had believed he was above. For Sneha, it was cruel and unbelievable. She had never imagined Abir would sink so low. It was truly heartbreaking for her. She couldn’t speak to any people for days after that last session with him.
Thinking back to that day again! February 23! Sneha remembered how intimacy between them usually happened either by chance or through her own approach. That day, even after Abir’s unusually direct move, she felt hesitant. Yet he pressed again. They left Kingfisher and went to Enchanted, where they spent several intensely charged hours from evening into night. Then back to Kingfisher for a few more drinks and when Abir left for Savar Cantonment, Sneha went part of the way with him, just to steal a little more time beside him. Somewhere on the road from Gulshan 2 to Gabtoli, she figured out that Abir’s family was moving to him, Rajshahi. Not from Abir directly, but she guessed, then asked.
Stuck in traffic in front of the Shyamoli cinema hall, Abir said quietly, “I don’t know when I’ll next be in Dhaka. Who knows when we’ll meet again. Maybe not for a year.” Sneha understood instantly. If his family was moving there, he’d have no reason to come to Dhaka for a year. She didn’t need a science background to figure that out. Even as a commerce student, she could see it clearly before he said any other word. She asked directly, Your family is moving there? Abir nodded, quietly, almost like a guilty man. But the way he avoided her eyes didn’t escape her. She asked again, when exactly they were moving. He just said, “Soon.”
Then, as if trying to fill the silence, he started talking, almost too quickly. “My daughter isn’t a normal child…this time we both sat with her psychiatrist. Separately, her mother had sessions, I had sessions too . She told the psychiatrist things she never tells us. Her psychiatrist actually suggested she needs both her parents with her. A few days ago, she even left the flat alone…” He said it all in one stretch, as if it were nothing. But even then, Sneha couldn’t ignore, he was still avoiding his eyes. Sneha listened carefully and thought, something is definitely fishy. She couldn't name it, but she knew, this was half the truth. And after delivering it all in one breath, Abir made his face into sad and an expression meant to say he was not that much happy about this, that he felt terrible for Sneha, now and in the time to come. Sneha looked at him and smiled- Oh come on! Your family is going to live with you, it’s natural. Why couldn’t you tell me this earlier? Abir sat quietly with his that sad face.
On the way back from Gabtoli that night, Sneha started connecting some dots. The crying on the video call of February 6, that Blue Touch's song “Songgoto karone tomay ar ami bhalobashte parini”- some of it began to make sense. Her mind was flashing red flags, while her heart had already stepped into something deeper, that intense, almost obsessive stage of love where logic blurs. And the very next night, near 10 p.m., came those historical 46 hours and 42 minutes! From that moment onward, Abir stayed in Dhaka with Sneha. Completely by his own choice. No one forced him. No fear, no pressure. It was his decision. And maybe… that time became a turning point in both their lives.
The rain was easing. Black clouds drifted apart, letting blue and white break through. Watching the sky change, Sneha felt a desperate need to know, why had Abir erased those 46 hours and 42 minutes, pretending they didn’t exist at all, dragging up only the conversations from five months later? Why did he keep circling back to those selective moments, ignoring this entire crucial stretch of time? And yet, within that erased time lay the answers to so many questions. In fact, so many answers were hidden right there. Sneha never brought it up, not because she forgot, but because she didn’t want to disgrace Abir in front of anyone.
Maybe Sneha was impulsive. Maybe even insane or crazy, whatever Abir wants to call her now, she doesn't care anymore. But Abir had been something close to sacred to her. She had never needed to defend herself by dishonor him. She had never wanted to dump everything on him, the way petty people dig through filth and deny it all. Whatever her share of responsibility was, if Abir had only acknowledged even a fraction of his own, unprompted, it would at least protect his honor to her, even on his own eyes too. And the other hand, the two angels on his shoulders would have witnessed his honesty, something to carry into the day of judgement.
Instead, they witnessed this, at the final moment, he was brutally humiliating someone with whom he had so many private moments, no matter whether he acknowledged them good or bad anymore. And then he nakedly placing every burden on Sneha, leaving her unable to breathe in this world. Did Abir find peace in that, in winning by destroying her world? Good for him, if he did, Sneha thinks. But that last conversation before the end- Uffff! Sneha pressed her head in her hands again, the pain sharp. What a crushing weight, thinking of those 75 minutes. It poisoned her heart every time. And yet she put herself in his place and thought, an injured tiger lashes out. Abir wasn’t the only one who had done that. So had she. But still, did that make everything a lie? It was already ending. Why did he have to become so ruthless, soooo cruel in the process?
In trying to defend himself, Abir erased everything they had ever shared. He turned it all into nothing. As if it had never existed. Even now, Sneha struggles to believe his final words. A part of her still feels he didn’t tell the truth that day either. Just like always. His only goal was to end things while protecting himself. At first, she tried talk, but after listened Abir's nonsense things and way he was talking or how his tone sounded, she instantly stopped herself for not becoming a part of dirty thing. Because questioning him further would only make the goodbye uglier.
Still… which version of Abir was real? Which one told the truth? Which one hid it? Which one twisted it halfway? As the heat rose under the foil in front of her, flashes of his many versions played in her mind- from bars to riversides, from lows to highs, from red flags to beds. It was impossible to reach any clear conclusion from those layered, conflicting versions of him. Suddenly, a song Abir liked came to Sneha's mind-
Look me in the eyes
Tell me what you see
Perfect paradise
Tearing at the seams
I wish I could escape
I don't wanna fake it
Wish I could erase it
Make your heart believe
But I'm a bad liar, bad liar
Now you know
Now you know
I'm a bad liar, bad liar
Now you know, you're free to go...