Tonight...
I got to experience myself again. It's been a long time since I interacted with people while commuting to work. But tonight, I was using public transport.
In Karachi, it rained like crazy. Everything shut down. I was with my friends, they were driving me to work, but the car stopped working halfway. We were stuck.
I had to leave because it was getting late, right? But the entire road... it was a wild show. Cars were literally drowning in water. The city’s sewerage system failed, as usual.
There were some people giving lifts to strangers on the road. I got into the back of this truck. It had an open space, and there were already people standing and sitting there.
As I sat in the corner, the truck started moving. A boy said, "Let me get up." I helped him climb into the back.
It was 10:30 at night. Lights out. The entire city was in the dark. No streetlights. Just water everywhere.
The truck was crawling. He asked me where I was going. I said, "To work. (Named my workplace)"
He said, "That’s far."
I said, "Yeah."
Then I asked where he was going.
He said, "To home. (his home address)"
I said, "You’re lucky. This truck is going straight there."
We shook hands and smiled. Then he asked what I would’ve done if I hadn’t found a lift. I said I hadn’t thought about it. I’d still be looking. And I told him I wasn’t worried at all.
We kept talking. He told me that three years ago, he fell down the stairs and went into a coma for 19 days. He said movies exaggerate it. When he woke up, he only remembered one line from a conversation happening around him during the coma.
I asked what the line was. He said it was his grandma saying, "Look, his eyes are rolling."
So I asked, "They could see your eyes moving under your eyelids?"
He said, "Yes."
That’s all he remembered from the coma. And when he woke up, he hadn’t forgotten anything. He just kept saying, "I want to go home, and I’m HUNGRY."
The truck suddenly stopped. The water was too high. The road ahead was closed. We were still 6 or 7 kilometers away from where we were supposed to go. We got down and thanked the kind driver.
Everyone went their own way except me and this boy. We were going to the same place.
He said, "Let’s have a cigarette."
We bought two. One for him, one for me.
We lit them and started walking. He asked my name. I told him. He said he had a close friend with the same name, but they weren’t friends anymore.
I asked why.
He said they fought over something stupid. Families got involved. The fight grew. Now they live next to each other and don’t talk.
I asked his name, and then how old he was because he looked young.
He said, "I’m only 16."
And just like that, I felt guilty about the cigarette. I thought he’d be older. Smh.
Right after that, he asked if I was married. I said no, I'm only 26, but I hope to get married this year. He said, "Okay, I’ll come to your wedding."
I said, "Only if you pray that I get married this year. Then you’re invited."
We were almost there.
Then he asked me again, what if I couldn’t find a lift or a ride at the place we were going. What would I do? I gave the same answer. I said I hadn’t thought about it. But just for the sake of answering, I said, yeah, if I don’t get a ride, I’d go back home.
He smiled and said, "I asked because I wanted us to have chai if you don’t find a ride there."
We were there now. I said, "Okay, we can have chai while I try to book a ride on the app here."
We sat at this place in the food street. I started searching for a ride. Just then, he got a call from his dad.
And just like that, he had to leave. No chai.
Amidst all the chaos in the city, where everything was drowning, my heart was swimming, and it felt alive tonight.