Mountains Between Us

Mist clung to the stone corridors of St. Joseph College, blurring the edges of everything - arches, steps, the narrow strip of quad beyond the windows. It turned the world into a muted painting, all soft grays and slow drifting shadows. Khendrup stood with his shoulder pressed to a damp wall, letting the cold seep into his shirt like a quiet reminder that he didn’t have to move to exist. He watched Astha through the fog.

She came into view as if someone had opened a door to sunlight. Not bright in a loud way - more like the moment the clouds thin and the air changes temperature, the way your skin knows before your mind does. Her footsteps didn’t hurry; they didn’t hesitate either. She walked the quad like she belonged to it, like the mist couldn’t claim her, like the stone paths had been waiting for her all along.

Khendrup told himself it was only observation. Only noticing. Only the way you notice a new stain on a shirt or the smell of hot tea drifting from a corridor. But his attention tightened around her anyway, snagging on the movement of her hands as she adjusted her bag strap, on the turn of her head when she laughed at something a girl beside her said. The sound reached him muffled by fog, yet it still landed - warm and close - inside his chest.

He let his gaze drop when she passed beneath the window, pretending to study the cracked paint at the corner of the frame. His throat felt too small for the air. He hadn’t spoken to her. Not really. Not since he’d become aware of her, which was unfair, because awareness wasn’t harmless when it kept returning. He could feel it, the way the damp wall held him steady while his mind tried to drift toward her like a leaf pulled by current.

The corridor smelled of wet stone and yesterday’s soap. Somewhere down the hall, a ceiling fan clicked, clicking like a nervous metronome. Khendrup listened to it until it blended with the scrape of shoes from passing students and the distant thud of a door shutting. He stayed where he was until the flow of people thinned and the quad looked emptier again.

Then, as if the mist had decided to stop hiding things, Astha turned and looked up - directly toward the window Khendrup leaned beside.

His body went rigid before his mind could decide what to do. Her eyes found him with unnerving precision, clear even through the haze. For a heartbeat, neither of them moved. Khendrup felt the damp wall against his back and the cold air on his lips, felt the way his pulse knocked against his ribs like it wanted out.

Astha smiled, small but definite, the kind of smile that didn’t ask permission. She lifted her hand - not a wave exactly, more like a casual acknowledgment - and then she walked on.

Khendrup remained where he was until his legs remembered they could carry him. He pushed away from the wall and started toward the cafeteria, moving slowly, as though speed might draw attention to the fact that his thoughts had already followed her.

At lunch, the cafeteria was a pocket of heat inside the fogged campus - steam rising from steel trays, the scent of steamed momos and fried onions threading through everything. Noise pressed from every direction: laughter, clinking spoons, the shuffling of chairs against tiled floors. Khendrup slipped into the stream of students like he always did, keeping his shoulders narrow, his face neutral, his eyes down.

He found a seat near the window where the quad could still be glimpsed through glass that had been wiped too quickly. Rain had threatened earlier; now the air carried dampness and the faint mineral smell of wet earth. Khendrup set his tray down and stared at it as if the food might offer answers.

He tried to choose his expression the way he chose his meals - carefully, without drawing too much attention. He ate a momo, chewed, swallowed, and realized he hadn’t tasted anything beyond the spice that warmed his tongue and faded too quickly.

A shadow fell across his table.

Khendrup looked up.

Astha stood there with her tray balanced in one hand and her umbrella - closed, dripping slightly - held against her side with the other. Water beaded on the umbrella spokes like tiny reflections of the cafeteria lights. Her hair looked darker where the mist had touched it earlier, and when she moved, the smell of rain seemed to follow.

“Is this seat taken?” she asked.

Her voice was steady, not teasing. Yet the question carried a gentle insistence, like she already knew the answer and was giving him a chance to choose otherwise.

Khendrup opened his mouth and found his voice waiting behind a locked door. “No,” he managed, and even to his own ears it sounded too flat. He shifted to make space.

Astha sat without rushing, her movements precise and unforced. She angled her tray slightly toward him as though they were sharing something by proximity alone. The cafeteria noise continued, but it rearranged itself around them - less like sound and more like a wall he could lean against.

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