My loveee,
Seven months, Jaanmoni. 5,040 hours. Every month I sit down to write this thinking the count is the story, and every month you prove me wrong. The count is only the frame. This month the story is simple: on the 2nd I made you a promise on my knees, and by the end of the month you were the one keeping it for me.
It started, like it always does in these letters, with a stranger. One "Hi" at 23:46 on a January night, a girl with her walls all the way up, and a boy who did not know yet that waiting outside those walls would be the best thing he ever did. I have told you that story every month, so I won't retell it. I'll only say that the boy had no idea what was behind the walls, and seven months in he is still finding new rooms.
Then 2 September. I had the words ready, but when I actually went down on one knee in front of you I meant every one of them more than when I wrote them, because you were looking at me. I told you the ring was not me asking for anything. I told you that you don't have to earn it and you can't lose it. I told you I'm here, quietly, steadily, today, tomorrow and every day after. Then I asked if I could keep you too, and you said yes. For the four hours home I sat on that bus with your "Yeaaaahhhhhhhhhh" open on my phone and the missing already starting in my chest. By the 18th the ring had left a small mark on your finger, and you showed it to me like it was something to be proud of. Shona, it is.
Your exams sat in the middle of this month, and I could not sit beside you for them, so I did the only thing I know how to do: I made the distance useful. A planner I made for you, with you. ICT tutoring at nights, Somas explanation nights, and many more upcoming nights being your best tutor. ShakibOS Partner, an app, and you saying "AMAR husband banaise" like it was the most obvious thing in the world. And on the night your head would not stop, I put Quran on for you and you fell asleep to it. I never want to be the person who pulls you away from your life, shona. I want to be the reason it feels lighter.
Then the 19th. I want to write this plainly, because you were there for all of it and you deserve to see it written down. That afternoon I lost my job. The first company of my career to let me go, and the reason they gave was my performance, when nobody had ever once complained about my work. I wrote to you that it felt like my pride, my skills, shattered into pieces. And before I had even finished explaining the project, before I got to the worst part, you had already written: "no need to put pressure on yourself. I'm here by your side." When I finally typed the two words I had been avoiding all afternoon, "I failed", you answered in the same minute, "na shona, it's not like that, it's okay bby", and then you just called. You didn't fix anything. You couldn't. You held it. That evening, when you asked if I felt even a little better, I told you the truth: time did nothing, you did. Shakib says Shakib failed, Samlina fixes. And then you were saying that I am enough, that I am a good son, a good friend, a good partner, a good person. And then the line I will carry for the rest of my life: "we don't have to be at the peak. downs are the ones that proves that ups can be beautiful." On the 2nd I promised you I'm here, quietly, steadily. On the 19th you showed me what that actually looks like.
I see all of it, baby. I see the difference between your "wyd" and your "ki korteso shonaa?", and I know which one means something is sitting in your head. I know your "emnei" is almost never emnei; you told me so yourself this month, "it was for you", and I already knew, I only ever ask because I know. I see the girl who writes "be all messy you need, ami achi na" at 03:26 and in the next breath calls me the piece of her heart. You said this month that I see your highs and especially your lows. I do, shona. I will never stop looking.
And we have both grown, not just me. You taught me the rule and I wrote it down: solution chaile solution, or else proper listener. Lesson learnt, ma'am. I used to come at every problem with a fix already in my hands; now I ask which one you need, and more and more the answer is just "stay". And you, baby, grew too. The night you were drained, you did not go quiet and disappear. You came and told me. You said it, I heard it, I adjusted, and nobody had to guess. That is the whole thing we built in seven months: we talk, we solve, we stay, and we love more.
We have had four days in the same place, shona: 2 April, 21 July, 2 August and 2 September, and three of our anniversaries we spent side by side. This is the first one since the ring that we spend apart, and I won't pretend I don't feel it. But that is exactly what the ring on your hand is for: whenever we're apart, you look at it, and I'm right there. And on the nights I miss you most, I let myself see the days that are coming. Your head on my shoulder while I hold your hand, with no bus waiting for me at the end of the day. Me running so that the moment you open the door, you can jump straight into my arms. The same song playing in the same room, no app needed to keep us together. And one night, finally, putting you to sleep with no phone between us, just me, right there, the way I promised.
I'm not going anywhere, shona. You asked me once, "Can I keep you?" Yes then, yes now. And if you asked me every day for the next 870,960 hours, I'd choose you over and over: every "ami achi na", the exams, the worst afternoon, every emnei that was never emnei, all of it.
You called me the answer to all your prayers. At 04:01 on the 29th I told you the truth back. You are my every answered prayer, shona.
Happy 7 months, meri jaan. Seven down, forever to go.