On the Brink of “What If?”

Lavanya Addepalli
3 min readMay 11, 2021

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The life as we call is interdependent on one another. Some are blessed blood relations, and then there are a few more blessed who are not blood relations but are equally important. Some stay connected for life, but then many leave in the middle. A very few grow far with prolonged silence. The silence that both want to break, but are unable. Maybe they are growing comfortable with silent space and just thinking of one another where words are falling short. They say it’s the love and affection that holds each other stronger together. There are so many kinds of love that we can list out and tag them. But then there is a kind of love you cannot label them nor tag them. The kind of love you don’t want to express to be not mistaken to “What if?”. The love which is to utmost respect and affection beyond a just friend place. And then, there is this lump in the throat, making it hard to speak. The memories flash, and the past conversations are reminded of.

The spoken words, may carry the message, but it is always the silence followed by that carries the emotions and intentions. As the quietness grows, the silent rhythms take over the soul. It is the torrential chaos deep inside with an unfamiliar struggle of thoughts of illusion and reality. The struggle to balance reality and live in the illusion of the head is like trying to hold two extremes without falling apart. In the walk of life, we come alone, and in no time, we start making relations; by the prime, we collect a handful of people we want to hold on to, but that isn’t always what fate is all about. It is the one or the other who is at the wrong place, and the pureness of love & affection is left there un-understood. All that rushes of good times, and the lump in the throat fight firmly to keep it hidden again with a “what if?”.

At times the silence is daunting and feels chilled like a fallen leaf under the frost. It has no other go but to suffer through the cold winters. With the coldness of blood and numb thoughts, we keep struggling to sleep night after night, toiling between the bitter reality and honeyed illusion. All the “what-if?” & “If-Buts” maybe could be answered as long as the two people are alive and are willing to break the silence. Having one life and ample choice for having people in life, why do we still hold on to the “ifs-buts”?

When one is alive and the other dead, all the “what-ifs” turn into “I-wish”. The dead are far long gone, leaving behind millions of questions for the alive to struggle to sleep every night. But when the two with an un-named affection of relation, one is alive, and the other is at the brink of life simply thanking ….? It is unknown even to imagine how the “what-if” to express.

The uncertainties that hit us hard leave us with a million unspoken silent words, robbing the part of us along with it. Waking up to a message in the inbox from the same silent friend thanking me for being part of life, followed by a long silence …. only for me to learn that was the last message that friend sent for a lifetime ….!!!! And I am at a loss of words to speak now ….

“It is cruel to summarize a friendship with pure love and affection as one last sentence on the last page….”

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Lavanya Addepalli

“Wandering Researcher” .. Student by profession... Human by heart with clusters in brain.. Travel & Music Lover, Foodie, Ghost Writer