The Day I Found Myself in a Stranger’s Eyes

The Day I Found Myself in a Stranger’s Eyes
By Rehan Khan
I was sitting on a park bench on a slow Thursday evening, the kind where the sky is unsure whether to shine or sleep. The clouds hung low, casting a soft grey over everything, making even the flowers look as though they were holding their breath. It was my routine now—come to this park after work, sip weak coffee from the paper cup, and pretend I wasn’t lonely.

That’s when I saw her.

She couldn’t have been more than seventeen. Hair messy like she didn’t care, eyes distant like she cared too much. She walked with a notebook in hand, mumbling to herself under her breath. Something about her made the world quiet for a second.

She sat down a few feet away from me on the next bench and opened her notebook with the kind of urgency only a young writer knows—the one that says “If I don’t write this now, I might forget who I am.”

And suddenly, I was seventeen again.

I remembered the nights I used to write in notebooks while the rest of the world slept. I remembered the dream of becoming something—anything—more than what I was. I remembered the desperation to be heard, to be understood.

I stared, not meaning to, but I couldn’t help it. She looked up, noticing me.

We held eye contact for just a moment.

That was it.

One single second—but in it, I saw everything I used to be. The ambition. The anger. The curiosity. The chaos.

She blinked. I smiled.

“Writer?” I asked, cautiously, pointing at the notebook.

She hesitated, then nodded. “Trying to be.”

“I used to be one too.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Used to?”

I looked down at my coffee, swirling the bitter liquid.

“I stopped,” I said. “Life got loud. I got quiet.”

She tilted her head, curious but cautious. “That’s sad.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, “it is.”

There was a pause between us. The kind where words want to be said but aren’t brave enough yet.

“What did you write about?” she asked, softly.

“Everything,” I said. “The world. People. Love. Pain. Things I didn’t understand.”

She smiled, and it lit something in her eyes. “I write about that too.”

We sat in silence again, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. It felt like being near a mirror you weren’t ready to look into but grateful for its existence anyway.

“I’m scared,” she whispered.

“Of what?”

“That I’ll never be good enough. That I’ll waste my time. That no one will ever read my words.”

I swallowed. It was the same fear that had wrapped around my spine all those years ago. The same fear that had eventually silenced me.

I didn’t want that for her.

I reached into my bag and pulled out a worn-out leather journal. I hadn’t written in it in years. But I still carried it, maybe out of guilt, maybe out of hope. I handed it to her.

“What’s this?” she asked, flipping through the yellowed pages.

“My old thoughts. My younger self. Maybe you’ll find something in there that makes sense.”

She looked at me with wide eyes, like I had just handed her a key to something important.

“I don’t even know your name,” she said.

“Doesn’t matter,” I smiled. “You already know who I used to be.”

She held the journal close. “Thank you.”

Before I could say more, she stood up, gave me one last glance, and walked away.

And just like that, I was alone again.

But not empty.

Because for the first time in years, I felt a flicker of something I thought I had lost—purpose. Maybe I couldn’t go back and be the writer I once dreamed of being, but I could help someone else stay brave when I wasn’t.

I picked up my phone and opened the notes app.

“The day I found myself in a stranger’s eyes,” I typed.
“She reminded me who I used to be, and who I still might become.”
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