Friendship in the Dark
Darkness and Light
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The Grand Pearl Hotel, with its antique elements, stood against a backdrop of most crowded streets in Karachi, where the city breathed with urban chaos of booming modern everyday life.
Among the fading walls, the past refused to leave and between Hassan and Ahmed - childhood friends – the lives of two man who once had separate paths came to be connected once again.
Instinctively, Ahmed, looking restrained and well-mannered in his tweed suits and calm mannerisms, had returned to Karachi after a long time spent abroad, where his once optimistic eyes were now dwindling under the weariness of his tasks. Therefore, while Saying struggled to find his place in the foreign country, Hassan stayed rooted to the city: he drove his old taxi, to earn money for his family.
Their re-meeting at the Grand Pearl Hotel was not endowed with fiery nostalgia, as the sounds of their laughter strode the space of sadness and mourning, tapping in the melodies of their strange recollections. They were the two characters, sitting in the opulent hotel foyer, moistening their lips with scorching tea and fine porcelain cups, forgetting about how old they were and in turn, going back in time, where there wasn’t any care or problems.
Yet, their outward appearance of happiness hid the depth of their sighs and reality of the wounds. Ahmed, loaded with the burden of his crumbling marriage and stifling debts, just continued presenting in front of his friend. "I supposed Karachi being no more my place of residence would have changed the entire situation," he said, although there was a tinge of regret in his voice. "Yet, even when I ran miles on my feet, my past still caught up with me."
Hassan was concentrating to the utmost, expressing a deep understanding and warmth "Life is in weird some kind of a mode pulling us back regardless of how hard we try to avoid it" - he remarked, such pain and struggles of his written on his face. "So we face them, that is friendship.
A fact placed in ignorance of Hassan, Ahmed possessed a devastating debt, the evil loan sharks he must borrow money from to sustain the former enviable reputation of his. With each day that might pass, the burden of debts was continuously amassing, and thus, risked to bury him right beneath their nightmare-like hugging arms of the enemy.
When Ahmed was at a crossroads, he had no other option but to come up with an agreement with the dangerous underground individuals, and they had no intention of refunding him, no matter how much he agreed to. "I'll Do Whatever It Takes to Guarantee My Family the Safety", he told himself in a soft voice while he was feeling slightly overwhelmed with fear.
As night closed Karachi's heartbeat became more and louder and the shadows fell deeper casting a dark shadow on the city itself. A full penitence through acceptance of guilt and good deeds will come back and bite you in the butt in this dimly lit lobby of the Grand Pearl Hotel.
The floodlights vanished, and dark shadows of unknown men with their faces covered swarmed the hotel with all the pain of a coming storm. Hassan, the one true friend, stood directly behind Ahmed, ready to confront whatever fate was coming next. "I won't let them have you," he affirmed, his voice as strong as a rock with just enough gentleness that the disruption couldn't overcome.
Yet, fate, remorseless and merciless, appeared to have something else in store. With Ahmed and Hassan sucked into the deafening Amok in the once peaceful lobby, the consequences of their actions started to show. It wasn’t until seconds before both of them were taken by night that their eyes accidentally exchanged a look of regret and completion.
On the following day, the once elegant and radiant Grand Pearl Hotel becomes just a solitary eyewitness to the tragedy, which none could realize or prevent. Blood soaked these constructions from the floor to ceiling which colorfully showed the results of the human follies and the weakness of life.
On the other hand, the streets of Karachi had peaceful people swarming everywhere as the city had stopped pondering the disaster that took place behind the doors of the hotel. Yet, for those who had seen all of the problems of that day just minutes before, remembering would be like a permanent guest, wandering next to their steps, and casting a shadow over the pain in their hearts.
In the next few days, shadows of Ahmed and Hassan being imprisoned or in harm’s way traveled from one street to another like flames in a desert fire whose story was subjected to a metamorphosis the moment it was retold. Some gave an account of their courage in the presence of adversity, others felt sad about the preventable loss of two young lives, aged only sixteen and three, both taken by the cruel hand of fate.
However, amid the gloom and the turbulence, there was still a ray of hope as a lighthouse piercing through the dimness, ready to show the way to all of them. In the very heart of Karachi where the shadows were dancing and the noise of past times coming from every avenue, the world of friendship was living on, which also showed how strong the spirits of human beings can be which can encourage them to have a love for each other even after such destruction of peace and stability of society.
But as their journey came to a tragic ending, their legacy would not be in vain, it would be as part of the dynamic multicolored Karachi as one of the golden strands which is woven in its rich tapestry. To underscore it all, it is not the darkness of the past that matters the most, but the clarity of their inner light that they carried to the future. A light that would be passed down to their descendants.
While the sun disappeared behind the city's top rows and the warm colors spread onto the streets were coming alive, Ahmed and Hassan continued to exist in the minds of those who loved them as if the prayer had never left their lips. And so, even though they were gone, their soul with them, they still are there with me, able to bind me in this inescapable web of our hearts that still goes on in the shade of Karachi.
