Stalingrad of my solitude : preface / foreward :

Introduction to the Content

Page 1

Let’s not speak of eras, not yet. Let’s not tie memories to timelines or years or the ticking of clocks. Some stories are better told without the burden of when - they belong instead to how they felt. So, let’s just begin from that - from a feeling, from a season that still hums quietly inside me, though the world around it has long shifted.

We were young then. Carefree, unbothered by the noise of what others thought or what they might one day say. There was no need to define or explain the way we moved through that space together. It was enough to simply be. To sit side by side in the warmth of each other’s presence -that gentle closeness that made time slow down and made silence feel like music.

Perhaps it was the innocence of not knowing what anything meant, or maybe it was my way of believing that something unspoken could still be sacred. I didn’t understand then that not every bond exists in equal weight for both hearts involved. Sometimes a touch, a glance, a quiet leaning against someone feels pure, holy even — but for another, it might just be comfort, a passing warmth before they move back into their own orbit.

Page 2

From the beginning, we were different - not in ways that anyone could see, but in the ways we broke each other softly, unknowingly. There was something like a fever between us, something that isolated rather than joined. Slowly, we began turning inward, away from the world, building a quiet cocoon that felt safe but also lonely.

We were just children, really - young, clueless, and stumbling through a feeling we had no language for. I can’t speak for him - maybe he knew, maybe he didn’t -but for me, everything about it was new. My life had always been small and structured: I loved my books, my bicycle rides, the sound of old songs drifting through the evening air, and the clatter of table tennis balls bouncing across the wood.

And yet, amid all of that, I would still find moments - stolen ones -to sneak a glance at him. It wasn’t easy; in fact, it often felt impossible. But for reasons I can’t quite explain, that single glance would anchor my day. Without it, the night felt long, restless. Maybe that was my first mistake — believing that love could be sustained by sight alone, that a fleeting look could promise peace.

Page 3

Maybe the gods were jealous. Maybe what I asked for wasn’t written in the pages of my karma. Or maybe he never asked for me in return. I still don’t know. Sometimes I think love only becomes real when both people name it, claim it - when it’s bound in some ritual, sealed in the eyes of a world that approves. But what we had never fit into those frames.

Perhaps that’s why it faded before it could even begin. It was fragile, held together only by what I gave - never by what I received. It wasn’t anyone’s fault; it just wasn’t built to last. You can’t pour endlessly from a cup that’s never refilled. And yet, back then, I didn’t understand that. I thought giving was the purest form of love.

Maybe that’s why I fell so hard - because I never learned how to love gently. Because I wore my heart outside my body, believing that sincerity alone could make me enough. But life doesn’t always reward the honest. Sometimes, it takes your tenderness and teaches you what the word loss truly means.

Page 4

Looking back, I don’t think either of us knew what we were doing. He was sure of himself in ways I wasn’t. I mistook that confidence for depth, mistook his ease for intention. Maybe he just existed in the moment - and I, foolishly, tried to turn moments into meaning.

But in some ways, I can’t blame him. We were both learning, both searching. It’s just that my search led inward, and his led away. I built altars of memory; he built doors of escape. We were mirrors once - now we are echoes.

And yet, even after all these years, when I close my eyes and think of that golden hour light on the highway, or the sound of laughter from those afternoons, something still stirs. Not love - not anymore - but a kind of ache that reminds me I was alive then, truly alive.

Page 5

Maybe all love stories are flawed from the start - not because they fail, but because they end. Maybe that’s their only purpose: to begin, to burn, and to teach. And though ours left behind no promises, no photographs, no shared paths, it left me with something quieter - an understanding of myself.

I used to think love was about becoming one with someone. Now I know it’s about seeing yourself clearly in the reflection they leave behind. He taught me that. Without meaning to, without even staying long enough to know.

So no, I won’t tie this memory to a year, or a city, or a season. It belongs to that space between -where youth and silence and longing meet. A time when the world was simple, when a single glance could light up a night, and when I still believed that being seen, even once, was enough.