"The Poisoned Rose"

Leena never expected to fall in love at seventeen. Not in the way she did—not the kind that makes your chest ache and your world spin with a single glance. But when she met Ayaan, everything else faded.

He was the quiet one in the back of her literature class, always scribbling poems on the edges of his notebook. He smelled like warm spice and old books. He wasn’t loud or flashy like the other boys. He didn’t need to be. His smile held secrets. His voice had gravity.

They met in the school library one afternoon, both reaching for the same copy of The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. Fingers touched. Eyes locked. It was cliché and beautiful and too perfect to be real.

For the first few months, it was a dream.

He walked her home. Wrote her poems. Whispered promises in the dark. She let him in, fully, completely. She believed love, when real, didn’t hurt.

But slowly, the petals began to wilt.

It started small. He’d question the boys who liked her photos. Tell her to wear something else. Say her friends weren’t “good for her.” At first, she mistook it for care. For love. The way a rose opens to sunlight, she turned toward him.

Then came the storm.

His voice got louder. His messages more frequent. Where are you? Who are you with? Why didn’t you answer? She felt her freedom shrink like cotton in hot water. And still, she stayed.

Because love is patient, right?

Because love takes work.

Because she believed the version of him from those first few months was still real—buried somewhere under the mood swings and manipulation.

But the boy with poetry in his hands had turned into someone who twisted words like daggers.

On her eighteenth birthday, he accused her of cheating. There was no proof, no reason, just suspicion. He shattered the ceramic rose she had crafted in art class—a delicate red bloom she'd sculpted with her hands. He called it symbolic. She called it the last straw.

She walked away.

Shaking. Numb. But she walked.

The next few weeks felt like detoxing from a drug. Her phone remained silent, but the phantom vibrations made her check it anyway. Every sunset made her cry. Every poem made her ache.

She didn’t recognize herself in the mirror. She had become smaller, quieter, afraid.

Her friends welcomed her back like a refugee. They never said I told you so. They just held her while she broke. Her mother, silent but watchful, began leaving small notes on her dresser: You are enough. You are not what he said you were.

Healing wasn’t a straight line. Some days, she missed him so much it felt like her lungs forgot how to work. On others, she burned his letters in the backyard and watched the smoke rise like a cleansing prayer.

One rainy afternoon, she returned to the same library where they’d met.

She wasn’t sure why. Maybe to reclaim the space. Maybe to find herself again.

The copy of The Prophet was still there, worn and soft at the edges. She sat cross-legged between the shelves and read:

"Let there be spaces in your togetherness..."

And for the first time, it didn't make her think of him. It made her think of herself.

Of the girl who loved words.

Of the girl who sculpted roses from clay.

Of the girl who had forgotten how strong she was.

So she started writing again—not love poems, but war cries. Letters to her future self. Journals filled with rage, joy, confusion, and hope. She took long walks. Grew succulents. Painted. Laughed.

Months passed. Scars faded.

One morning, she looked in the mirror and smiled—not because someone else loved her, but because she had begun to love herself again.

She wasn't the same girl who had fallen in love with Ayaan.

She was wiser. Wilder. Softer, but not weaker.

And when she passed a rose bush on the way to university, she paused—noticing a single bloom, perfect and vibrant, growing despite the thorns.

She whispered to it, smiling:

"Not all roses are poisoned. Some just need sunlight again."