Title Shadows of the Silent Blade

"Life is a journey that we experience to reach our destination of self-growth."

"Life is the stage we have to ourselves where we perform our actions to receive an applause."

I hear a groan. Where did it come from?

Right. It came from my mind. Why you ask?

Because everything I just wrote is absolute trash.

Why does this happen? Everytime I have a thought that appears beautiful in my brain, I write it down, and the moment I read what I have written, I don't like it anymore. I hate it when this happens. It makes me feel that I am just not cut out for doing this.

I have a goal in my life. To write something that reflects such an emotion that every person reading it feels it with the same power I intended them to feel. Say, I write a character who feels a sudden rise in adrenaline. The reader, too, should feel the same, which can only happen if I write about something that hits home to every heart and leaves them engrossed in my book.

Am I making sense? Well, I am in my head so guess what, you just have to deal with it.

I jump as I hear my door open. Great, first I had to deal with my crazy self, and now I have to deal with Kelly's crazy self, all by myself. Yay life!

"Mel, come on! I have so much exciting stuff to tell you! Get out of your chair, close your notebook, straighten yourself and meet me in the sandwich bar in 5 minutes. Hurry up!" she screams, as she rushes to our usual hangout to grab a table.

Grudging as I didn't do anything productive in the past half hour, I do as she said, grab some money and head out of my student apartment.

The sandwich bar is the place where you will find all the students who live in the university campus trying to spend some leisure quality time with their friends and significant others. It is run by an old Indian couple, Mr and Mrs Singh, whom I now consider to be my other family. And just for that, I receive a free plate of french fries with my sandwich. Good exists, y'all.

"A pathetic attempt at a southern accent Mel." says Kelly, when I try to greet her in that manner.

"Whatever. Did you order ?"

"Duh, the usual combo. But you have to show Mrs Singh your face for the fries."

"Of course. It has been a while since she came down. Since the past few weeks I have only seen her nephew at the counter, who is so engrossed in doing his mental maths he forgets there is a customer waiting to pay." I laugh with Kelly at the memory, as I go to the counter.

"Good morning Mrs Singh. It's been a while since I saw you." I say, as I lean towards her on the counter for her to kiss me on the forehead.

"Good morning dear. I missed you too. I had gone to attend my daughter's convocation in Australia. She graduated!" she replies with excitement, while bringing out my fries from the kitchen.

"Wow! That's great. My heartiest congratulations to her. Thank you for the fries!" I say, as I take the plate and head for my table.

As I walk past other tables, I see that every table seats friends, who are talking to each other, cracking jokes together, and stressing over assignments, together. That is why I love this place. All of us here are going through the same struggles, and luckily, have found friends who can relate to us as much as we can to them.

I reach my table and sit down when Kelly looks up from her phone screen.

"Ok first of all, the dance is this weekend. Who are you going with?"

"Who are you going with?" I ask, in an attempt to make her forget her question, even though I already know her answer.

"I'm going with Sam, obviously. He asked me this morning. He is the best." She says, with a dreamy look in her eyes. God, this girl.

"So, where is lover boy anyway? Apart from your daydreams, I mean."

"Huh? Oh yeah, he has gone for a ride with his friends."

"I didn't know he had a car."