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.