I had been living in that colony for almost two years with a little boy who had just turned two.

At least, that was what everyone believed.

To the people in the colony, I was a young widow who had been left alone to raise her son. I worked a small job for a modest salary, lived in a tiny rented portion, and somehow managed to keep our little life running.

And strangely enough, nobody ever treated me like an outsider.

The aunties checked on me whenever I came home late. The neighbors sent food whenever they cooked something special. The children ran into my room without knocking, and somehow, my little boy had become everyone's favorite.

They pitied me sometimes.

They admired me sometimes.

But most of all, they loved us.

Only I knew the truth.

I had never been married.

And that little boy wasn't my son.

He belonged to a family connected to mine through a terrible misunderstanding—one that had led my father to make a decision that destroyed another family.

I couldn't accept what had happened.

I couldn't forgive my father.

So I had chosen my own punishment.

I would raise that child as my own. I would live as a widow. And I would never marry.

Nobody in the colony knew the real reason behind my life.

Not even him.

There was a young man in our colony who had been openly telling me for months that he loved me.

And every time he said it, I gave him the same answer.

"I'm a widow. I have a child. You should find someone else."

His response never changed.

"I know."

"Then why don't you understand?"

"Because I don't have a problem with either of those things."

I would glare at him.

He would grin.

That was him.

Always smiling. Always joking. Always helping someone.

If someone's fan stopped working, he would somehow appear with a screwdriver.

If an aunty needed groceries, he'd carry them upstairs.

If the children wanted someone to play with, he became a bigger child than all of them.

The entire colony adored him.

Unfortunately, he seemed to have decided that I was the only woman in the world worth annoying.

What I didn't know was that he knew the truth.

He knew I wasn't a widow.

He knew I had never been married.

And most importantly...

He knew the little boy wasn't mine.

Because that child was his elder brother's son.

I had no idea he knew.

And he had no intention of telling me yet.

Instead, he simply waited.

For me.

---

That evening, the entire colony was glowing with Diwali lights.

Music blasted from the speakers. Children ran around with sparklers. Someone had put up a makeshift dance floor in the middle of the street, and within minutes, half the colony had gathered around it.

I stayed inside my room.

I couldn't join them.

As far as everyone knew, I was a widow.

And a widow celebrating Diwali with everyone else didn't exactly fit the image I'd carefully created for myself.

So I sat near the window, watching the lights flicker outside.

Then I heard laughter.

His laughter.