Only Sometimes Offline
Tinder. Bumble. Hinge. Even a couple of matrimonial sites where strangers' bios included gems like "6’1, into stocks and spirituality."
At 34, she’d swiped, matched, unmatched, been ghosted, bread-crumbed, love-bombed, and once, unintentionally flirted with someone’s dad. So yeah—she was done. Her friends still sent her profile screenshots, memes about “the one,” and reels featuring oddly motivational astrology predictions. She responded with polite emojis and the occasional, “Haha, cute,” but her heart wasn’t in it anymore.
“Maybe love and marriage just… aren’t my thing,” she told herself one Saturday night, curled up on the couch with a glass of wine and her “Rainy Night Sad Bangers” playlist on loop.
That night, her phone pinged.
[You’ve been invited to a Spotify Jam session: “Chill Vibes for Tired Millennials”]
Tara, her best friend, was multitasking—rage-cleaning and passive-aggressively reminding Meera to have fun.
Meera sighed, clicked “Join,” and leaned back. The playlist started with Arctic Monkeys, eased into Lizzy McAlpine, then a detour into Lucky Ali (because desi existentialism hits different). Wow, Tara seemed to have upgraded, she thought, scrolling through the selection of songs and adding her’s to the queue, when she noticed a third listener.
Username: onlysometimesoffline.
Whoever this mystery human was, they were perfectly syncing songs with hers. She played Mitski, they dropped Phoebe Bridgers. She added a throwback Lucky Ali song, they followed with Silk Route. It wasn’t a playlist—it was foreplay.
The next day, a message popped up.
onlysometimesoffline: “Not to be dramatic, but that was the most emotionally fulfilling interaction I’ve had in months.”
Meera smirked.
meera.wav: “Same. Were we… low-key slow dancing through Spotify?”
And just like that, a conversation bloomed — not on a dating app, but in timestamps and lyrics and shared silences between verses. They started sharing songs, then voice notes, then playlists with names like “Songs to Cry To While Pretending to Be the Main Character in a Coffee Shop.” His voice was warm, a little gravelly, like late-night radio, and his humor? Impeccable. Equal parts sarcasm and sincerity.
A couple of weeks later, they met in person at a cozy record café. No big rom-com moment. Just coffee, laughter, and that warm weird feeling of familiarity you get when someone’s already heard your favorite songs.
He looked up from his drink and said, “So, is this when I tell you I made a playlist called ‘Meera-core’ or is that too much?”
She laughed. “Only if you let me judge it.”
Turns out, she didn’t need dating bios or algorithms—just a queue of the right songs and someone listening on the other side.
