Money was thin that month and the fees were due. So I quietly stopped eating lunch. Just tea at the office canteen, day after day, telling myself it was temporary and telling her at home that I "wasn't really hungry these days."
She believed me for a while. Then a colleague mentioned to her, casually, that he'd noticed I hadn't eaten anything but tea for two weeks straight.
She never confronted me. Didn't make a scene, didn't cry, didn't demand to know why I hadn't told her. She just started packing an extra tiffin box every morning, sliding it into my bag with a quiet "in case you get hungry later."
We've never spoken about it. Not once. But I know that she knows. And every time I open that extra box at my desk, I understand exactly what it means.