She had this habit of stealing my pens. Not in a careless way—no, she’d always take them with this playful smirk, twirling them between her fingers as if claiming them as her own.

"You have too many," she’d say, slipping one into her bag.

"And you never have one," I’d counter, watching her tuck it away like a prize.

It became our thing. Every time we met—at coffee shops, libraries, or even just in my car—she’d end up with one of my pens. And every time I pretended not to mind, but secretly, I started carrying extras. Just for her.

One evening, as she sat across from me, doodling absentmindedly on a napkin with yet another stolen pen, I asked, "Do you even use them, or do they just pile up somewhere?"

She grinned, biting her lip. "Maybe I just like taking something of yours with me."

I didn’t respond, just watched her trace circles on the napkin, my stolen pen spinning between her fingers.

Months later, we drift apart. Not suddenly—just a slow, quiet unraveling. The messages become shorter, the calls less frequent. And then, one day, there’s only silence.

One afternoon, I’m looking for something in my desk drawer when I see it—a pen. Not mine. Hers. The only one she ever left behind.

I pick it up, twirling it between my fingers the way she used to. I don’t even try to use it. I just hold it there, wondering if, somewhere in her bag, my pens still exist. If, in some quiet moment, she finds one and remembers me too.

Some people don’t take things to keep them. They take them to hold onto a feeling.

And maybe, just maybe, she held onto me too.

We are at a café we often visit, sitting across from each other, the same way we always do. She loves their cinnamon biscuits, the kind that crumbles at the touch but melts in your mouth with warmth. She always saves the last one for later, wrapping it in a tissue and slipping it into her bag.

Today, she does the same. But as she reaches for her bag, it tips slightly, and the biscuit drops. A tiny crack runs through it. She sighs, about to leave it, but I pick it up, carefully brushing off invisible crumbs, and hand it back.

"Still good," I say.

She looks at me, amused, and shakes her head before tucking it away again.

I don’t know why I remember that moment so much. Maybe because it was just like us—delicate but still holding together.

Months later, I’m searching for something in the backseat of my car when I find it. A tiny, forgotten bundle of tissue paper tucked between the seats. The biscuit. The one she saved that day.

She isn’t here anymore. Not in this car, not in my life. But the biscuit is. A fragile piece of something that once was.

I hold it in my palm for a moment, then unwrap it gently. It's crumbled now, beyond saving. But I don’t throw it away. Not yet. Instead, I close my fist around it, just for a second, before letting it slip between my fingers.

Some things aren’t meant to last forever. But that doesn’t mean they weren’t once whole.