All that Stays
Is love a verb, or a residue?
Is there any difference between love and romance for you? Or is it the same. Is “love” limited to romance or there are more sides to it?
They tell you that love is supposed to be this BIG THING. Bouquet of roses, long speeches and grand gestures, but love for me is much softer than that. I find love in the quieter moments spent together, so quiet that you won’t see it but it’s there, it’s there if you can feel it.
I’ve been told love is a big, beautiful thing—
fireworks, roses, and whispered promises in the dark.
But what if love is quieter?
What if it hides in small moments,
like sunlight slipping through half-closed curtains,
warming the room without asking to be noticed?
Love is in the way my mum packs my lunch, every morning, along with hers, even though i am not the only one in a hurry to catch my 8 am bus, but she also needs to get ready for her office. When I was in school, I never really saw it, or realised until one day I grabbed my dabba from the dining table and when I opened it in college, it was empty. In my 19 years of existence it’s the first time my mum had forgotten this, and it was also the first time I noticed it. This was the moment where I knew how blind I was to the love I was surrounded with. Or taking things granted was just something I was so used to. Or is it that mum’s efforts only get noticed when I want it to?
Is it in the tiffin my mother packed every morning,
her hands moving quickly between sips of chai,
sealing warmth into steel dabbas like bottled sunshine?
For years, I never thought about it—
until one afternoon, I opened my dabba and found it empty.
She had forgotten. For the first time.
And in that moment, I wondered—
do we feel love more when it’s there,
or when we realize we’ve been taking it for granted?
Love is in the way I used to wait for my baba to return from his work as a child, no matter how late it got, I wanted to tell him about my day and what riya did in school and how I aced in abacus class. Or love is in the way he waits for me today and everyday that i am late because of my unending college assignments. As soon as I get home I see him heating up the food for me, as warm as his love for me. A good meal after a long day and that same monologue about everything that happened since morning. He listens to me crib, cry and rant about the same things everyday still wanting to listen to me rant about my day. I never really ask baba about his day, maybe i should?!
Or is love in waiting?
Like how I sat at the dinner table as a child,
Waiting for my father,
watching the clock, keeping food warm,
like a candle flickering at an open door.
And now, isn’t he the one waiting—
rotis drying, curry turning cold,
staying up no matter how late I return?
Is love the patience of a meal, still waiting to be eaten?
Or, Is love, a sweet secret, like the two-rupee coins Amma slipped in my palm so my candy rituals continue. I remember the last time she slipped that coin in my palm, before she left the house, before she left me behind. I still have it in my wallet, as a memory. Everytime i think of her, I look at her picture where she looks rather beautiful. I never saw my grandpa, she never mentioned him, and I never asked. Love’s habit of slipping something empty hands, so they won’t be empty again.
Could love be in small, quiet acts?
Like the two-rupee coin Amma pressed into my palm every evening,
hiding it from my father,
so I could buy a Pepsi Cola—sticky, sweet, like stolen joy?
She was my best friend,
until one day, she wasn’t—because my mother said she couldn’t stay.
I never had a grandpa, but did she miss him too?
Is love just a habit—
slipping into empty hands, hoping to be held again?
Is it possible for love to just be, without needing a name? Where simply being together is enough? A place where we can be free, even when we’re fighting, because we always find our way back.
You and I, honey are like a paradox, can’t stay together and just can’t exist apart
Could it be in a simple drawing sent over coffee,
words left unsaid but still understood?
Is our story like Ross and Rachel’s—
on and off, back and forth, but never really over?
Do we need a name for it when, in our world, we are just us—
free, open, real?
Or is love sometimes the thing that doesn’t need rules,
but still feels like home—
a place you keep coming back to, even when you wander?
Or
Love is in letting go? Is it love when you know you can’t keep someone forever, but you give everything anyway? Or is it love just being there, knowing it won’t last? Or love is how my mum packs rava ladoos for my friend, the one I spent all my days with, the one I watched walk out with someone else. Maybe it’s in knowing when to let go.
Or is love what we give, even when it isn’t ours to keep?
Like the tiffin I once shared with my friend in college,
her hands reaching for the extra rava ladoos
that my mother packed just for her.
She held onto me on my scooty like a shadow that never left—
until one day, she did.
And as I watched her walk away with someone else,
I wondered—does love mean holding on,
or knowing when to let go?
Love is in those goodbyes? In that slam book we filled in at school, or the way he looked at me wearing a saree for the first time at the farewell. We knew it wasn’t going to work out. Things were changing. So we smiled, kept our feelings to ourselves, held our hearts a lil firmer and let each other go, so we could both move on.
Or is it in the quiet goodbyes?
Like the slam books we filled in school,
glitter pens and little secrets tucked into pages,
or the way he looked at me in my mother’s saree at the farewell,
eyes soft, unsure, unforgettable.
Did we let each other go with a smile
that said everything words couldn’t?
Is love sometimes about stepping back,
about knowing when to release a hand
so someone else can grow?
Or maybe, just maybe, love in solitude, instead of sitting in a room full of people and still feeling lonely. In a room where your laughter is “too loud” and ache is always unheard. Why should I shrink myself to be liked, when I can just choose cats over people and peace over self doubt?
Or is it in quietly choosing myself?
In the comfort of solitude, curled up with my cat, watching a show that feels like home,
instead of sitting in a room where my voice felt too much,
where my laughter was unwelcome,
where wanting to be heard was called seeking attention.
Maybe love is in knowing I don’t need their approval,
that my own presence is enough.
You see in the small things that always go unnoticed. It’s in the space in between us where you can breathe. In the moments that stay with us even after they are gone.
Maybe love is All That Stays.
Maybe love isn’t in grand gestures,
but in the quiet spaces it leaves behind.
Maybe it’s in waiting, in letting go, in remembering.
Maybe love is in the warmth that lingers,
long after the moment is gone.
Maybe love is all that stays—
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