When Autumn Came Back

The last time Maya saw Elias, it was a rainy September day, just like the one that greeted her now as she stepped off the train in the small town of Ashgrove. Twelve years had passed since she’d last been here. Twelve years of unanswered letters, missed birthdays, and memories tucked into the corners of songs and old notebooks.

She had told herself this was just a trip. A break from the constant noise of the city. A visit to see the maple trees in full flame. But as she walked through the familiar streets, her heart betrayed her — beating faster with each step toward the café they used to love.

Back then, they were just two reckless college kids who believed in forever. They would sit for hours by the window, her sketching on napkins, him writing poetry in the margins of newspapers. He used to say her eyes reminded him of autumn — “Not because they’re brown,” he’d said, “but because I feel like I’m falling every time I look in them.”

She hadn’t seen him since the night he left. His mother got sick. He had to move back home. The plan was simple — six months apart, then they’d reunite. But life had other plans.

And yet, here she was, twelve years later, with the same hope she thought she had buried long ago.

The café door jingled as she pushed it open. Nothing had changed. Same green walls, same wooden tables, even the same grumpy barista, though with a few more gray hairs. Maya took a deep breath and sat at the window seat, her old favorite.

She ordered a chai latte and pulled out her sketchbook, not really expecting anything. Maybe she was just here to say goodbye to the past properly.

Ten minutes passed.

Then fifteen.

She was just about to leave when the door chimed again. And just like that, he walked in.

Elias.

He looked older — of course he did — but it was unmistakably him. The messy hair, the soft eyes, the cautious smile. He was holding a book in one hand, rain dripping from the brim of his jacket. Their eyes met, and time folded in on itself.

He stopped. Then walked over.

“Maya,” he said softly.

She laughed. “Hi.”

“I— I thought you lived in New York now.”

“I do. Just… visiting.”

A beat of silence stretched between them, thick with everything they hadn’t said.

“I think about you all the time,” he finally said, pulling out the chair across from her. “I thought about writing. A thousand times. But I didn’t know if you’d want to hear from me.”

“I did write,” she said. “For a while. You never answered.”

He looked down, guilt flickering in his eyes. “Yeah. I was… lost for a while. After Mom passed, I didn’t know who I was anymore. I let everything go. Including you. And that’s something I’ve regretted every single day.”

Maya didn’t speak right away. Instead, she flipped to the last page of her sketchbook. A pencil drawing of the café window, with two empty chairs and a steaming cup between them. She pushed it toward him.

“I never stopped coming back here,” she said. “In my head. In my art.”

Elias stared at the sketch for a long moment, then smiled — that familiar, crooked smile that once made her feel like home. “I used to sit outside on that bench sometimes, wondering if I’d see you again.”

“So why didn’t you come in?”

“I was scared. That too much time had passed. That you had moved on. That we couldn’t go back.”

Maya looked at him, really looked at him. He had changed. They both had. But there was still something between them — something that had never left.

“We can’t go back,” she said. “But maybe we don’t need to. Maybe we just… start from here.”

Elias reached across the table, his hand brushing hers. “I’d like that. More than anything.”

Outside, the rain had lightened, the sun peeking through the clouds. Autumn had returned — and with it, so had something else. Something that had waited patiently beneath the fallen leaves and forgotten promises.

Love, it seemed, wasn’t gone.

Just waiting for the right season to bloom again.