The City that never sleeps...

The coffee was getting cold, steam rising from it in large swarms. A table lamp shaded its warmth alongside its plight to light its space. The silence of the room was suddenly disturbed as she crumpled a piece of paper and hurled it to where a herd of them lay. Something seemed to annoy her as she tried to work…

She stood up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes and stretching her hands. The numbness was getting to her. Walking over to the window she looked at the street below her. From four floors up, everything seemed miniaturized. There was a storm raging outside the window, cold and merciless. Yet, it did not seem to disturb the preoccupied people, except the inch of desperation to reach home. She looked lazily at the table, bringing work home was the last thing she wanted to do. But deadlines stared at her from the small yellow papers stuck on the wall next to her table. And the coffee she had made to keep her warm, oh, she never had time for it. Every morning she would have to pour it down the sink, making a mental note not to repeat it again…

It was the city that never slept, she knew…  Busses and trains literally groaned under the weight of the people crammed into them, taking them to their diverse destinations.  Every eye reflected the struggle and passion to succeed.  Just like hers, when she had vouched for journalism. Being a reporter, she loved the spotlight, the risk, the travelling and sometimes, putting her life on the line. The thrill was enchanting. But as they say, everything in life came with a price tag. From tall towers touching the sky that glimmered with lights like as though a million candles were lit in mid air, or the dark eternal stretch of roads, or cars speeding away with blaring flawless engines; to the selfish, heartless people masked in pleasantness, they had all imbibed the spirit of soullessness.

She was amongst them, the crowd of hollow men. Though every time she would find herself wanting to do what she had almost forgotten to do, trust. But pain was always a consequence, searching her soul in the past, among lost relations, among sleepless nights, bewitched work timings, strangling deadlines, a bit of jokes and happiness under the hood, thoughtless adventures, a list of things on the purchasing list, countless acquaintances and camera flashes, mindless dancing, alcohol and smokes, heartbreaks and scars…

Sometimes, some choices in life always caught up to you. It was a matter of time if you’d see yourself regretting the choice or you fight with it along the years and look back a day and find nothing but the struggle. It was just a question of which day came first. But somewhere in that struggle lay all her life. There was no changing it. There was no looking back. That was all a couple of years, triumphs, sorrows, and failures ago…

 

 The storm raged on, inside her. Yet, tired with work and fighting off emotions, she fell asleep with her head on the table. The cold coffee lay forgotten…