Faceless Existence

She gazed back at me dryly with a piercing gaze that seemed to penetrate right through mine. Everything about her appearance was flawed; her weary eyes, dirty clothes that were badly creased, bits of nail varnish stuck to her nails, most of which had been chipped off. Her long tresses had once been in what looked like a braid, her cheeks were stained and swollen red. She stumbled on her tiny steps but her eyes were as piercing as before, unfaltering. The disturbing thing was that her eyes were as powerful as they were empty, there was nothing in them, no pain, no fear… no hope.

So I didn't knew why they had me smiling, we were like two strangely different people, connected in the crowd of unseen faces, through dots. No, I didn't know her, neither did she know me. We were strangers, unrelated yet somehow linked, something put us apart…together, but distant. As I smiled at her, a faint smile touched her dried lips, only for split second, after which it turned into a grimace; her eye brows knotted together in worry, her face distorted into anger. And within that very second she ducked her head and disappeared into the throngs of people.

She left me there, though, paused and alone while strangers blurred past. They were faceless, for me. I didn't search for her in that crowed space, but I stood there and wondered what I hadn't before, in the sole minute that I had felt a connection with her. I pondered about her unknown past and future as I stood there, alone, while she blurred past me. This time unknown. 

-Momina.

Eye to Eye

The air was humid and I could barely see in the smoke that occupied the room. I clenched my eyes shut and kicked down the door to the next room; my partner and I barged in, looking around for signs of life. I moved a cupboard and that’s when I saw her, covered in soot and clutching something close to her chest. She trembled all over and looked at me anxiously with her deep dark eyes and as I looked into them everything muted, I could sense the commotion behind me, my mates shoving me away and taking the bundle from her. She looked down that instance and fear struck her eyes; fear that wasn’t there before, she shook her head vigorously, muttering something.

I went close to her in order to hear her, ‘my baby, my baby’, she whispered as my friend tucked the blue baby under his arms and ran outside.

I looked at her shivering there in the hot room, with fire all around us, urgently draped a safety blanket around her and told her the baby was going to be fine. Maybe it was the confidence in my voice that I was trained to keep, or she really did believe me because her eyes sparkled for a moment and a faint smile touched her lips, ‘thank you’ she said. And then her eyes lolled back into her head.

I returned her out and we resumed extinguishing the fire, usually I was too occupied to think of anything, but today, I couldn’t let go the expression in her eyes. It was not fear, she had been sitting in the stuffy cupboard in a burning house for God knows how long, and yet there was no fear in her eyes. No fear for herself passing over to the other side. But it was something I knew too well; she had seen death, felt it, almost been swallowed up by it. And yet, escaped it. I knew it, been there and I had never met anyone who had seen death up close like myself. Never found someone I could relate to, talk to. My life was purposeless and I’d taken this job where one was faced with death risks every now or then.

I looked for her after work and got around to the hospital where she had ended up. On inquiring I was directed to a doctor who told me she was no more, the baby had survived, she was too weak though. Too close to death itself.

-Momina.