A quiet night. I was lying on my bed, staring at the vast spread darkness around, though not completely dark it was, for the night-light my roommate insisted on having switched on was killing the emptiness from a corner.

But I didn’t mind it. For someone whose thoughts are louder than the noise around, I learnt early on to not pin hope on a ray of light.

The clock struck 12 midnight; the mighty earth had registered yet another successful rotation on its axis.

The date showed May 7th on my phone. Normally, I would not have been up at this time to see my phone change the date and time. But today was special. It was my birthday.

I saw the date. I saw the time. I closed my eyes, maybe a bit too hard, for an innocent teardrop I didn’t know was there found its way to the edge of my eyes and decided to bid me goodbye.

Yup, today was special. For today was the day I saw the date and time on my smartphone change to a date I hold dear. And there I was, acknowledging it all alone.

This was not the case till a couple of years back.

I used to stay in a hostel in Gujarat. Us boys at a public engineering college might not exactly know how to be great engineers, but we sure as hell knew how to be a family when ours was not around.

Planning for one’s birthday didn’t just begin a day before; it was built around effort and hard work for over a week. Believe me when I say this—the level of excitement in me on my birthday was way less than the rest of them celebrating it, because this was the day they got to be wild and kick me hard on my butt.

Cutting a cake was a ceremony; smearing it on faces was the celebration.

But the best part was a walk to the nearest eatery post celebration, open at 1 or 2 AM in the night, with your bunch and just having a cup of tea or coffee with a light meal. That was what made me realise you don’t need fine dining when you have your people around.

And yet, this was just the 50%. The other 50% was your best friends taking initiative—from planning the celebrations to kicking you the hardest—but making sure to look you in the eye and let you know that no matter what, you would not be celebrating this day alone.

You look at them, knowing they are one of the reasons you smile. They fix you when needed, but all the more, they are the ones with you when no one is around.

This was 2016. Today was 2018.

I had moved to the Middle East to earn a livelihood. Life takes such turns when one has to step up to support family financially.

You don’t have your people around. The new roommate doesn’t know you well enough to be one of them. Everyone has turned a page in their lives and is busy in theirs. Your best friends move to the States for a better life. You wish them well.

But you do ask yourself about the look you once shared, questioning whether the knowledge of being there for one another was true indeed.

If it was, where were they today? For it was 15 past 12 and they still hadn’t called.

And if it was not, how could I ever be happy knowing the last time I met them was one of the last times I truly smiled?

The teardrop that left my eye a while back may have opened a drain, for before I realized, the drop had translated into a sob. I wiped it off, staring again at my phone.

I realized I had to be strong here. For the more I got affected by this, the weaker I would become. I collected myself, prepared to keep the phone aside, and turned my head the other way to sleep.

It’s just a birthday. It’s just another day. Maybe the time zones are different, and the date got lost. Thoughts and assurances in my head.

I went back to the realization that the room was dark—and it was getting darker, for my eyes decided not to look at the night-light anymore. Thoughts indeed were louder than the noises around.

You know how I know it?

For exactly at that time, my smartphone vibrated. Once. Twice. Then into a long vibration.

That was my best friends calling.

But my thoughts… were too loud for me to pay attention to the voice.