When I first moved to Germany, one thing became clear almost immediately.
No matter which company you join, senior employees everywhere behave like they survived a war the freshers know nothing about.
“Bro this company is shit.”
“Give it two months.”
“You still have time to escape.”
And somehow they would say all this while casually eating free office snacks and discussing weekend plans.
At first I thought they were exaggerating.
Then slowly, I became one of them too.
Not because the company was bad.
Just because after a while, every job starts feeling like a game where deadlines reproduce faster than humans.
And somewhere in between work, meetings, documentation, learning curves, and pretending to understand German accents in calls… my relationship slowly started becoming difficult too.
Not bad.
Just… difficult.
Scene 1 – Accumulations
At first, none of it felt serious.
That’s the dangerous thing about accumulations.
Individually, every incident looked understandable.
Reasonable, even.
A postponed call.
A cancelled plan.
A delayed reply.
A tired “let’s talk tomorrow.”
Nothing dramatic enough to destroy a relationship.
But apparently, enough small things stacked together can slowly start becoming one big thing.
And back then, I didn’t really get that.
Initially, things were actually nice.
Daily calls.
Random photos.
“Look what I cooked.”
“Guess where I am.”
Sometimes we would stay on video call, doing absolutely nothing.
She would be doing her thing.
I would be half-listening while scrolling Instagram or pretending to work.
And somehow that still counted as spending time together.
Which honestly made no sense to me even then.
But apparently, girls are perfectly capable of sitting silently on a call for forty-five minutes and calling it quality time.
So I adapted.
Then work got heavier.
And slowly, the calls started shifting.
“Can we talk tomorrow?”
“Today was hectic.”
“I just reached home.”
“I’m really tired.”
And the thing is – none of those were excuses.
I actually WAS tired.
That’s what frustrated me later during fights.
Because in my head, I wasn’t doing anything wrong.
I was just exhausted.
Apparently those are two different things.
One night after work, I finally reached home completely dead.
The kind of tired where even changing clothes feels like effort.
My phone rang.
“I just reached.”
“Hm?”
“I’m outside your place.”
A pause.
“I came to see you.”
Another pause.
“I’m staying at a hotel nearby.”
And I still remember looking at the clock before replying.
“I’m really tired today.”
Silence.
“Can we just meet tomorrow?”
Another pause.
Then quietly:
“Okay.”
The call disconnected.
And back then, I genuinely didn’t think much of it.
To me it was simple.
I was tired.
Tomorrow existed.
Problem solved.
Another time, we had planned a proper date after weeks.
Actual planning.
Which itself had become rare by that point because every plan was slowly turning into:
“Let’s see tomorrow.”
“We’ll figure it out.”
“Depends on work.”
That evening, she called while I was still working from home.
“How much time?”
“Hm?”
“How much time before you come pick me up?”
And I remember freezing for a second because I had completely forgotten we made plans that day.
Not intentionally.
My brain had just become this endless cycle of work, deadlines, sleep, repeat.
And before I could answer properly, my roommate walked into the room looking visibly unwell.
Everything shifted after that.
“Babe… I don’t think I can make it today.”
Silence.
“What happened?”
“My roommate’s not well. I have to take him to Medicare.”
Another silence.
Then quietly:
“Oh.”
And the call disconnected.
And again, in my head, it made complete sense.
Someone was unwell.
What exactly was I supposed to do there?
Leave him and go on a date?
But somehow, these things never ended where they happened.
They always returned later.
“You had time to go out with your office friends.”
“It was literally one dinner.”
“You sounded happier there.”
“Because nobody was fighting there.”
A pause.
“That’s not funny.”
“It was a little funny.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
Back then, I genuinely thought humor could reduce tension.
Like if I made the conversation lighter somehow, the issue itself would also become lighter.
It never worked.
Another time:
“You don’t talk like before.”
“People change.”
“In six months?”
“I moved countries, not apartments.”
“That’s not the point.”
“Then what IS the point?”
We would discuss something on Tuesday.
And somehow it would return on Friday wearing different clothes.
And every conversation slowly started feeling like emotional accounting as if she was my manager and I was her employee.
Every missed call.
Every delayed reply.
Every cancelled plan.
Every tired tone somehow returning during the next argument.
And after a point, I genuinely stopped understanding what counted as enough anymore.
Scene 2 – Conflicts
The weird thing about fights is that eventually the topic stops mattering.
The pattern becomes the real issue.
And ours became painfully predictable.
“You’re always tired.”
“Because I AM tired.”
“You never ask how I’m doing anymore.”
“You’re saying that like I don’t care.”
“You feel sleepy every time I want to talk properly.”
“Because these conversations happen at 1 AM after work.”
“You always have explanations.”
“Because there ARE explanations.”
And maybe that was my biggest mistake.
I thought explanations automatically fixed things.
If my reasons made sense, then the issue should logically disappear too.
Apparently, relationships don’t work like SAP tickets.
Who knew.
The dengue fight was probably the point where things properly broke.
She was unwell.
Actually unwell.
And yes, I checked in.
Called.
Texted.
Asked if she took medicines.
But somewhere later during another argument, she suddenly said:
“You didn’t even ask properly how I was doing during dengue.”
“I literally called you.”
“You sent two texts and disappeared.”
“What was I supposed to do from another country?”
“I don’t know… care?”
That irritated me back then.
Because in my head, I DID care.
But apparently, caring silently and caring visibly are also two different things.
And another thing I never understood back then was why old issues kept returning.
To me, once a conversation ended, the issue should have ended with it.
I thought bringing up the same thing again and again was unnecessary.
Dragging, even.
“We already discussed this.”
“No. You explained your side.”
“What else was I supposed to do?”
“I don’t know… maybe understand mine too.”
And even then, I still remember feeling frustrated instead of thoughtful.
Because from my side, it genuinely felt like no matter what I did, we somehow kept returning to the same fight wearing different outfits.
And after a while, even hearing:
“We need to talk.”
started feeling exhausted.
Not scary.
Just tiring.
At some point after another stupid fight that sounded exactly like the previous ten fights, I finally got tired.
Not angry.
Just tired.
“We should probably end this.”
Silence.
Then:
“It was just a fight.”
“No… it stopped being just fights a long time ago.”
Another silence.
“We still love each other.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you talking like this?”
And I still remember staring at the wall before answering.
Because even while saying it, it felt true.
“Because sometimes… love is not enough.”
And after that, the silence somehow felt different.
Heavier.
Like both of us knew something had quietly ended before either of us officially admitted it.
Scene 3 – Realisation
Almost a year later, we weren’t really talking anymore.
Not because of one final dramatic fight.
Just… distance.
Work had slowed down for the first time in months.
And silence is dangerous when you suddenly have time again.
Because distractions stop protecting you from yourself.
For months, I had convinced myself I was just busy.
Just stressed.
Just tired.
And maybe I was.
But somewhere during that phase, I came across an article online – The Untranslated.
I don’t know why I clicked it.
Maybe because the title sounded interesting.
Maybe because boredom makes people read things they usually ignore.
But somewhere in the middle of that article, I remembered her.
Not the fights.
Not the dramatic moments.
The smaller ones.
The pauses.
The “oh” before disconnected calls.
The silences after sarcasm.
The way she kept returning to the same things while I kept wondering:
“Why are we discussing this again?”
And for the first time, I think I understood what she had actually been trying to say all along.
Not perfectly.
Not magically.
Just enough.
Maybe that’s why her last words stayed with me.
Not the angry ones.
Not the emotional ones.
The quiet ones.
“I wish you had cheated.”
At first, I thought that statement was unfair.
But after reading that article, I think I finally understood what she meant.
It would have been easier if there was someone else.
A reason.
A betrayal.
Something obvious to blame.
Because how do you compete with someone who still says they love you… while slowly giving less and less of themselves to you every day?
And maybe that’s the worst part.
Nobody cheated.
Nobody became evil.
Nobody stopped caring completely.
We just slowly became people who no longer knew how to reach each other properly.
And by the time I understood that… it was already over.
A few months later, I saw her profile picture change.
And for some reason, that bothered me more than the breakup itself.