<p><br/></p><p>It wasn’t the internet, no.</p><p>This wasn’t about missed calls or poor connections.</p><p>It was something deeper </p><p>a rhythm of almosts and retreats,</p><p>like a dance where one partner always paused mid-step.</p><p><br/></p><p>His silence was never empty.</p><p>It was alive.</p><p>Each glance felt like a secret debate,</p><p>a board meeting held behind his eyes,</p><p>motions raised, arguments whispered,</p><p>but the minutes never shared with me.</p><p><br/></p><p>And still, he noticed me.</p><p>He noticed everything.</p><p><br/></p><p>The day I missed work, his message arrived before noon:</p><p>“You didn’t show up today. You good?”</p><p>The day I changed my hair, he tilted his head,</p><p>studied me carefully,</p><p>and said softly,</p><p>“This one suits your eyes.”</p><p><br/></p><p>How do you ignore a man</p><p>whose attention lingers like sunlight,</p><p>warming everything it touches?</p><p><br/></p><p>But that attention unsettled me.</p><p>Because attention is not casual</p><p><br/></p><p>attention is intention, even when unspoken.</p><p><br/></p><p>So I thought of him, too much.</p><p>Should I just ask him? I’d wonder.</p><p>Then pride would rise:</p><p>No. Don’t sound desperate. He should be bold enough.</p><p>And doubt would whisper back:</p><p>Or maybe he doesn’t even have the words to talk the love talk.</p><p><br/></p><p>Every laugh we shared was a breadcrumb,</p><p>every pause, a locked drawer.</p><p>And I, restless,</p><p>became an archaeologist of his silences,</p><p>digging for meaning in half-smiles,</p><p>studying the way his voice grew tender</p><p>whenever he said my name.</p><p><br/></p><p>But just when I thought he would step forward,</p><p>he pulled back again.</p><p>Shuffle.</p><p>Pause.</p><p>Retreat.</p><p><br/></p><p>That was where his eyes kept me waiting,</p><p>in the fragile space between what was said</p><p>and what was almost said.</p><p><br/></p><p>Until one evening, over suya and soft laughter,</p><p>my patience broke.</p><p>My voice trembled,</p><p>but carried the weight of two</p><p> years of unspoken hope.</p><p><br/></p><p>“Tell me,” I whispered,</p><p>“what exactly are we doing?”</p><p><br/></p><p>The world froze.</p><p>The night air held its breath.</p><p>For a moment, I thought I had leapt too far,</p><p>sounded too desperate, ruined the balance.</p><p><br/></p><p>But then he smiled.</p><p>That kind of smile that spills light into dark rooms.</p><p><br/></p><p>“I was waiting,” he said slowly,</p><p>“to see if you would ever ask me that.</p><p>I wasn’t sure if you’d reject me.</p><p>I’ve been in my building phase</p><p>laying bricks of who I want to become,</p><p>trying to be enough for you, for us.”</p><p><br/></p><p>And suddenly, the pauses made sense.</p><p>He hadn’t been running from me.</p><p>He had been running toward the man he longed to be,</p><p>dragging time with him,</p><p>hoping I would still be there when he arrived.</p><p><br/></p><p>Something inside me softened.</p><p>The doubts, the battles, the long nights of overthinking—</p><p>they dissolved in the light of his honesty.</p><p><br/></p><p>Because here he was,</p><p>not perfect, not polished,</p><p>but real.</p><p>And real, I realized,</p><p>is the most poetic kind of love.</p><p><br/></p><p>So I reached across the table,</p><p>smiled through the storm in my chest,</p><p>and whispered,</p><p>“Then let’s build together.”</p><p><br/></p><p>And just like that,</p><p>the waiting ended.</p><p>The board meeting in his eyes finally adjourned</p><p>not with silence,</p><p>but with a promise spoken out loud.</p>
At the end of the month, we give out prizes in 3 categories: Best Content, Top Engagers and
Most Engaged Content.
Best Content
We give out cash prizes to 7 people with the best insights in the past month. The 7 winners are picked
by an in-house selection process.
The winners are NOT picked from the leaderboards/rankings, we choose winners based on the quality, originality
and insightfulness of their content.
Top Engagers
For the Top Engagers Track, we award the top 3 people who engage the most with other user's content via
comments.
The winners are picked using the "Monthly Engagers" tab on the rankings page.
Most Engaged Content
The Most Engaged Content recognizes users whose content received the most engagement during the month.
We pick the top 3.
The winners are picked using the "Monthly Contributors" tab on the rankings page.
Here are a few other things to know for the Best Content track
1
Quality over Quantity — You stand a higher chance of winning by publishing a few really good insights across the entire month,
rather than a lot of low-quality, spammy posts.
2
Share original, authentic, and engaging content that clearly reflects your voice, thoughts, and opinions.
3
Avoid using AI to generate content—use it instead to correct grammar, improve flow, enhance structure, and boost clarity.
4
Explore audio content—high-quality audio insights can significantly boost your chances of standing out.
5
Use eye-catching cover images—if your content doesn't attract attention, it's less likely to be read or engaged with.
6
Share your content in your social circles to build engagement around it.
Contributor Rankings
The Contributor Rankings shows the Top 20 Contributors on TwoCents a monthly and all-time basis.
The all-time ranking is based on the Contributor Score, which is a measure of all the engagement and exposure a contributor's content receives.
The monthly score sums the score on all your insights in the past 30 days. The monthly and all-time scores are calcuated DIFFERENTLY.
This page also shows the top engagers on TwoCents — these are community members that have engaged the most with other user's content.
Contributor Score
Here is a list of metrics that are used to calcuate your contributor score, arranged from
the metric with the highest weighting, to the one with the lowest weighting.
4
Comments (excluding replies)
5
Upvotes
6
Views
1
Number of insights published
2
Subscriptions received
3
Tips received
Below is a list of badges on TwoCents and their designations.
Comments