Success doesn't arrive loudly.
It arrives with schedules.
Ananya's days began to change.
Morning lectures.
Afternoon shoots.
Evening edits.
Late-night reading.
Her hostel bed became a charging station.
Her bag became an office.
Her mind became full.
One evening, she missed dinner.
Then another.
Then a movie plan.
Pihu joked about it.
Nandini adapted to it.
Meher noticed it.
"You're glowing," Meher said one night, watching Ananya type.
"And fading," she added softly.
Ananya looked up. "What?"
"You're becoming," Meher said. "And you're paying for it with yourself."
Ananya leaned back. "Isn't that how it works?"
Meher was quiet for a moment.
Then she said, "That's how it worked for my mother. That's why she doesn't know me."
The words landed.
Ananya closed her laptop.
"I don't want that ending," she said.
Meher met her eyes. "Then learn balance before power."
That same night, Meher stood in the hostel corridor on another call.
"Yes," she said calmly.
"No, I'm not coming full time yet."
"Yes, I understand the board's concerns."
"No, I'm not confused."
"I'm choosing."
She listened.
Then, clearly: "I won't be the face of a company that doesn't protect the people who work under it."
She ended the call.
And for the first time, her hands were not shaking.
Later, the four of them sat on the floor, eating from one packet of chips.
Pihu said, "Do you ever realize how different we're becoming?"
Nandini replied, "And how the same we're staying?"
Ananya looked at them.
Meher.
Pihu.
Nandini.
Mumbai hadn't separated them.
It was sharpening them.
"I think," Ananya said quietly, "this city doesn't build careers."
They waited.
"It reveals women."
No one joked.
No one disagreed.
Because somewhere between fest lights and first paychecks, between boardrooms and broken families, four girls were no longer just dreaming.
They were designing.