Time stands still. Rows and rows of tiny, garish metal boxes stand restlessly like students awaiting the school bell. A million pairs of anxious eyes flutter from the rusting traffic light to the bustling world around them. This was truly a traffic jam like no other. Silent screams fill the polluted air - nobody was going anywhere soon. 

I tap my feet in rapid haste, with my eyes scanning the congested roads. Here and there, dark viscous pools of mud and water settle comfortably on the Earth, almost like a constant reminder of the bygone sorrow of the sky. Every square inch is full. Patches of earthly dust splatter themselves across unending stretches of coal-black tyres. 6:15 screams the clock. I glance nervously at the ageing sky. Its luminescent hues have faded to creases of red and black strokes. The sky is dying. The sun is dead. And a horde of strangers are stuck in the same stretch of the bustling Earth. 

Somewhere, not too far away, a lively market booms. The persuading echoes of hawkers weave their way through the air to reach my ears. I catch a blurry glimpse of flamboyant tents set up on the distant horizon. The tent seems like it’s holding another world within. 

“HONK!”, blazes a gloomy truck, shattering my chain of thought. My eyes reluctantly flutter back to the scene at hand. Escape, was a distant thought when one could not even move an inch from their current spot. 

A gentle knock on the glass door rattles me. A girl, about seven, stands wearing rags and tatters of clothes. Her mud-brown hair is unkempt and in knotty twisted braids, her dark eyes are captivating and tear-stained and her hands fervently clutch a bunch of cheap stickers. 

‘Didi, please buy one’, her melodious voice begs with hints of desperation. 

I look at her face. I look at her hair. My eyes meet hers. I nod. She smiles. And then, a hint of joy spreads through the dark and murky lines of poverty scattered across her face. I do not bother to drive down the price she makes and give her extra. Her silent gazes of desperation seemed more persuasive to me than any cheap lie the hawkers are yelling in the markets. Meanwhile, the world remains unchanged. 

The girl hops away to her next customer, scanning with her beguiling eyes the restless faces behind the many wheels. Maybe she is looking for signs that someone else is a pushover like me. Or maybe, she is just looking. The perplexing depths of human nature and the psychology behind money is an ensnaring snake one can never quite fully grasp.

I try to focus on something else. 

I roll my window down completely. A barrage of blaring honks, incessant screams and cries of impatience replace the tunes of my calming playlist. The humid air envelops me in a warm embrace and an appalling sight of mud, Earth, and littered guck greets my tired eyes. The boy in the car nearby catches my attention. Oblivious to the chaotic world around him, the boy is drawing with his finger on the window, trying to make art through the condensed droplets of water. He is probably just the same age as the girl. And with that thought, an avalanche of inquisitive theories begin imploring my philosophical mind. I begin, unwanting and unwillingly, comparing every aspect of their lives. First their clothes; his - vivid, vibrant and hand-picked, hers - ragged, tattered and probably thrown at her face as a donation. Then their hair. 

His - newly cut, tamed and trimmed, hers- a wild forest of thriving creatures. I look away, hoping to stop. But the philosophies remain, pouring in. 

I think about their eyes. His - bored, inquisitive, focusing on pearls of water, studding the edges of his car. Hers - alluring, dark and filled with the murky waters of destitution. A million other negligible details flood my mind: her gait, his smile, her voice, his art…

And then finally, their place in this line. His - behind closed doors, protected. Hers - exposed and unguarded from whatever lies in the night. He was a tamed animal and she, a wild beast. How funny it would be if they ever met. 

I again, steer myself away from my philosophical abyss. 

Then, the sky thunders. A booming roar echoes from Zeus’s hearth. Like a monstrous beast, the sky growls, belts and snarls at the world below. And then, all hell breaks loose. Flashes of light dismember the corpse of the sky and the clouds burst with agony and grief. Showers and showers of rain leak out from within them like a stream of blood from a wounded creature. The pitter-patter of raindrops against my car’s metal hood sounds aggressive and almost devilish. Water begins seeping in from my window, and with haste, I quickly roll it back up. 

I fall back into my seat. My flurried eyes close with exhaustion. The alluring arm of sleep cradles me towards the land of dreams. I let my soothing playlist softly blare in my metal room. Escape was not an option. I was stuck in the heart of the city and the sky was now waging war. Realization dawns on me, as sleep gracefully does the impossible and transports me away. There was no way home.