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Chapter 1 — The First Email
I always thought the hardest thing about being a musician was the silence.
Not the quiet between songs, but the kind that follows you home — the silence after applause fades, after promises disappear, after you start wondering whether you ever had talent at all.
That was my night, every night.
My laptop's blue glow reflected off the half-empty mug of coffee beside it, the steam long gone. My guitar leaned against the wall, one string missing — kind of like me, really. I was twenty-nine, chasing half-melodies and broken dreams through the crowded veins of Delhi, teaching kids the chords I could never make pay my rent.
It was past one a.m. when the ping came.
A new email.
I groaned. Probably another spam message — a "grow your YouTube channel" pitch or a halfhearted job rejection from a studio I'd forgotten applying to. Still, my hand moved to the mouse, more from habit than hope.
The subject line blinked:
> Don't skip the audition tomorrow.
I frowned.
The sender was stranger still.
No name. No address. Just a cryptic placeholder:
> From: You (2035)
At first, I laughed out loud. Maybe one of my friends — probably Sameer — thought he was clever enough to pull a prank. But curiosity won, as it always does with me. I clicked open.
The message was short, clean, and written like someone who knew me too well:
> "Arjun,
I know you won't believe this, but I need you to listen.
Go to the audition at Blue Note tomorrow. Don't let fear talk you out of it.
And when Mira shows you the photo — say yes. You'll understand later.
Trust me.
— You (2035)."
My smile faded halfway through reading.
The Blue Note. That was real — an open-mic bar downtown. I'd been planning to go tomorrow, but I'd already decided against it. I didn't want to embarrass myself again, playing to half-drunk strangers who only cared about beer offers.
And Mira?
That name wasn't random either. She was a friend from college — more like a spark I'd never quite managed to turn into a flame. We'd bumped into each other just a week ago at Connaught Place. She'd said something about "a new photo series" she wanted me in, and I'd brushed it off.
Now here it was, both things, tangled together in an email that shouldn't exist.
I checked the timestamp — 1:47 a.m., current time. No delay. No odd headers. The message looked… normal. Except for the part where it claimed to be from me ten years in the future.
I typed a quick reply.
> "Who is this? Nice prank, by the way."
I hit send, smirking.
A few seconds later, the notification pinged again.
New message.
Same sender.
> "It's not a prank. Just don't be late. Some things only happen once."
For a moment, the air felt heavy — not scary, exactly, but dense, like a room before a storm.
I closed the laptop, shook my head, and muttered to myself,
"Whoever you are, you've got my attention."
---
The next morning, Delhi looked washed clean — overnight rain had left the streets slick and silver. I was halfway through my second cup of coffee before I admitted to myself that I was actually considering going.
Maybe it was ego. Maybe curiosity. Maybe both.
But something about that email lingered.
By evening, I was standing outside the Blue Note Café, guitar case in hand, wondering if time travel counted as stage fright.
Inside, the small venue buzzed with soundcheck chaos — mics squealing, waiters shouting orders, a dozen aspiring singers nervously tuning guitars.
I found a seat at the bar, ordered a soda, and told myself I'd just watch. Then I'd leave.
That's when I heard a voice behind me.
Soft, amused, familiar.
"Didn't expect to see you here, Arjun."
I turned.
Mira.
She looked almost exactly as I remembered — messy hair tied up, camera strap slung around her neck, eyes that seemed to always be laughing at something only she could see.
"Mira Joshi," I said, smiling despite myself. "Still turning people into art projects?"
"Only the ones who look like they need saving," she said.
Her grin widened. "Actually, that's why I'm here. I was hoping you'd show up. I'm doing this photo thing — 'Artists in Transit.' I want you in it. Just a few shots. You playing live."
I blinked.
> When Mira shows you the photo — say yes.
The words from the email pulsed through my mind.
She noticed me hesitate and raised an eyebrow.
"What? You busy being mysterious again?"
I laughed weakly. "No, no, I just… yeah. Sure. Why not."
She smiled, a little surprised by how easily I agreed. "Wow. That was quick."
"Trying new things," I said. "Apparently that's my thing now."
I played third that night.
My hands shook for the first minute, but somewhere in the middle of the second song, something clicked. Maybe it was Mira's camera flash from the corner — or the tiny applause that followed a chord change I'd just made up — but for the first time in a long while, I didn't feel invisible.
After my set, Mira came up, breathless.
"See? I told you. You're good when you stop thinking so much."
I shrugged, trying to hide how much those words meant.
She held up her camera screen. "Look. You should see this."
It was a photo of me mid-performance — eyes closed, guitar in motion, framed in soft blue light.
For a second, I didn't recognize myself.
"I love it," I whispered. "Feels like a version of me I haven't met yet."
Mira smiled. "That's kind of the point."
That night, when I got home, the city was quiet again.
My inbox had one new message.
> "Good. You went. You changed something small — and that's where it starts."
I stared at it for a long time.
No explanation. No signature. Just those words, pulsing quietly against the screen.
A part of me wanted to delete everything, pretend it was just a glitch, a prank, a coincidence.
But another part — the part that had seen my own reflection in Mira's photo and felt something shift — whispered that maybe, just maybe, this was the beginning of something I wasn't supposed to understand yet.
I closed the laptop, turned off the light, and sat in the dark for a while, listening to the faint hum of the city.
And somewhere deep inside me, for the first time in years, silence didn't feel like emptiness.
It felt like waiting.