Anamika: The Girl Who Found Herself

By Saloni Duggal

When Anamika was little, she believed that kindness was enough to make friends.

She shared her lunch, helped with homework, laughed at others’ jokes — even when they

weren’t funny — just to belong. But as she grew older, she realized that not everyone valued

goodness the same way.

Her innocence was mistaken for weakness. Her loyalty, taken for granted.

One by one, the people she called friends drifted away, leaving her alone in corridors filled

with laughter that never seemed to reach her.

At home, things weren’t much different. She had an elder brother named Aayush —

everything she wasn’t, at least in her parents’ eyes.

He was intelligent, charming, and effortlessly talented. His report cards were trophies, his

smile the family’s pride, and his achievements, the rhythm of the household.

Whenever he walked into a room, their parents’ faces lit up. And when Anamika followed,

the light dimmed a little.

“You should learn something from your brother,” they’d say, not out of cruelty, but

comparison. Yet those words hurt more than they realized. They chipped away at her self-

worth, leaving behind silent resentment and unspoken pain.

Anamika admired Aayush deeply, but she also lived in his shadow.

No matter what she did, she was always “Aayush’s sister.” Never just Anamika.

The only person who saw her differently was her grandfather.

He was her world — her friend, her protector, her only safe place in a house full of noise

and misunderstanding.

When the arguments at home grew too loud, she would escape to his room. He’d be sitting

by the window, newspaper in hand, glasses sliding down his nose, ready to listen to her

endless stories.

“Tu bas apni tarah rehna, Anamika,” he’d say. “You don’t need to be like anyone else. You’re

special the way you are.”

He believed in her when no one else did. He laughed with her, celebrated her smallest

achievements, and reminded her that love didn’t have to be earned — it could just be.

But in the first year of college, he passed away. Quietly. Suddenly. Leaving behind a silence

that felt heavier than any noise she had ever known.

When the news came, she froze. Everyone cried around her — her mother, her brother, her

relatives — but Anamika didn’t shed a tear.

Not because she didn’t want to.

But because she didn’t know how.

All her life, she had been told to be strong. That crying made her weak. That emotions were

messy. So, she swallowed her grief and stood still at his cremation, whispering to herself,

“Dadu, wake up. Please. You can’t leave me. I need you. You’re the only one who ever

understood me.”

But the flames didn’t listen. And that day, a part of her burned too.

After that, she spoke to him in her head — before exams, before events, before sleep. She’d

imagine his voice telling her, “You can do this, beta. I’m proud of you.” It became her quiet

ritual — her invisible anchor.

But something changed after his death — Aayush, her elder brother, became her pillar.

He was never good with words, but he was there when she needed him. When her eyes

swelled up from silent tears, he sat beside her without asking questions. When she broke

down in small ways, he became her silent comfort.

For the first time, she felt her brother’s warmth — not as competition, but as connection. He

never replaced her grandfather, but he carried forward his love in quiet gestures.

Then came the day she wrote her first poem about her grandfather — the only person she

had truly lost. It was raw, emotional, and filled with unspoken love. When she recited it on

stage, her voice trembled, her heart raced, but the words came out strong. By the end, the

audience sat in silence, moved beyond applause.

For a brief moment, she felt her grandfather’s presence — as if he was smiling through her

words.

But a few days later, she realized the notebook in which she had written that poem was

gone. She searched everywhere — in her bag, under her bed, in her drawers — but it was

nowhere to be found.

At first, she was heartbroken. That poem was her last emotional conversation with him. But

later, as she sat alone by the window one night, she smiled through tears.

Maybe it was a sign — a message from him.

A sign that it was time to let go.

That she had said what she needed to say, and now she could finally be at peace.

That she didn’t have to hold on to the pain anymore — she could live freely, laugh loudly,

and enjoy the childhood she had once lost in the noise of expectations.

For the first time, Anamika didn’t feel the burden of grief. She felt her grandfather within

her — not as loss, but as light.

Home without him was still not perfect, but she had changed.

She had Aayush’s quiet support, her inner strength, and a new understanding of life.

She learned to hide her hurt behind humour. It became her strongest shield.

Whenever she was scolded, she cracked a joke. When she was ignored, she laughed it off.

People thought she was fearless, bold, even rebellious. They didn’t know that behind every

joke was a wound she was trying to heal.

In school, she had a reputation — the short-tempered tomboy.

Loose shirts, sneakers, messy curls, and an attitude that said she didn’t care — even when

she did. The boys were afraid of her, the girls kept their distance, and the teachers treated

her like a storm to avoid.

But she wasn’t cruel; she was hurt.

And anger was just her way of keeping people from getting close enough to hurt her again.

Still, deep down, she longed for friendship — genuine connection.

She didn’t need dozens of people; she just wanted one who’d sit beside her without

judgment. But that never came.

When school finally ended, she decided to rewrite her story.

She joined an all-girls college, where no one knew her past — no one knew the angry, lonely

version of her.

Standing at the college gate on the first day, she took a deep breath and thought,

“No one here knows who I was. Maybe this time, I can decide who I’ll be.”

And she did.

She began to care for herself — her curly hair, once mocked, became her identity. Her smile,

once a mask, began to feel real. Her walk, her energy, her presence — all started to carry a

new kind of confidence.

But transformation wasn’t magic. It came with fear.

Every time she joined a college event or stood on stage for a poetry recital, her heart raced.

She felt her hands tremble, her throat tighten. Anxiety whispered, “You’ll mess this up.”

But she smiled anyway.

She had learned to act confident until she became confident.

She didn’t always know what she was doing — but she did it anyway. Because she knew

that no one was coming to save her. If she wanted to change her life, she had to do it herself.

Her first poem — the one for her grandfather — might have been lost, but its message

stayed alive within her. It became her silent promise: to live fully, to love deeply, to never

hide her heart again.

Soon, she was no longer the invisible girl.

She was that girl with the curls — whose laughter filled corridors, whose energy brightened

dull classrooms. Teachers knew her by name; juniors admired her confidence; and seniors

sought her help.

But fame came with friction.

Some feared her fire. Some envied her rise. Some whispered lies behind her back, hoping to

dull her shine. But Anamika had faced worse — she had faced silence, rejection, and loss.

Gossip was nothing compared to that.

She smiled, stood tall, and kept going.

She organized events, led cultural fests, and represented her department. Her face became

so well-known that her entire department was identified through her. Even those who

didn’t know her name, knew her presence.

And through it all, she remained a tomboy — raw, real, and unapologetic.

She wore what she liked, spoke what she felt, and never softened herself to make others

comfortable.

She wasn’t the prettiest or the most intelligent.

But she was authentic.

She had turned her pain into poetry, her fear into confidence, her loneliness into art.

When people called her “too much,” she smiled — because she knew how much she had

been told she was “not enough.”

She had built herself, piece by piece, from everything that tried to break her — and that was

her greatest victory.

By Saloni Duggal