A Journey That Led to Clarity

 

One Evening…

It was just another evening in the bustling city.

Vehicles sped along the roads, busy as usual.

Among them, an auto-rickshaw made its way through traffic, carrying three passengers.

The auto driver, with headphones plugged in, was driving while listening to music on his cellphone.

One of the passengers was texting his girlfriend on WhatsApp, trying to apologize and make peace after an earlier argument.

The second was a young woman, scrolling through Instagram reels, trying to forget the heavy thoughts and worries clouding her mind.

Though her friends were of the same age, she often wondered whether she appeared older and more mature than them — a confusion that pushed her deeper into her phone.

The third was a little boy. He was returning home after running errands at the store, as instructed by his mother.

As time passed, the speed of the auto slowly decreased. The traffic signal had turned red.

The first passenger was still expressing his apologies, but there was no response from the other side.

Instead, harsher words came in.

The young woman’s phone ran low on charge, so she tucked it away in her bag and leaned back.

The little boy hadn’t won a single match on his game since getting into the auto.

Now, for the first time, he was on the verge of winning — when suddenly, a call came from his mother.

The game closed abruptly.

Frustrated, he answered:

"I’ll call you in a bit, Ma,"

and quickly re-entered the game.

But the network lagged.

Even before he could log in, he realized he had lost.

In anger, he called her back,

"Why, Ma? You always call me at this time. Why now?"

he snapped, and hung up.

Unwilling to face another defeat, he turned off his phone and started watching his surroundings instead.

It was then that he realized —

“We’re stuck… We can’t even hear the horns from the nearby vehicles anymore.”

The honking, now loud and relentless, began to irritate both the young woman and the little boy.

Meanwhile, the first passenger — still arguing — was hit with a final message from his girlfriend:

"There’s no point talking to you. I don’t want to speak anymore."

And with that, she ended the call and walked away.

He sat there, unable to handle the silence.

The pain was so heavy, it felt like it dulled even his sense of hearing.

"She never really understood me,"

he whispered to himself, sinking into sorrow.

Eventually, the long red signal turned green.

The vehicles moved, and the auto began to roll again.

All three passengers, now withdrawn from their phones, looked outside in silence.

A little farther down, the auto had to take a sharp turn —

but at this spot, vehicles could only move one way at a time.

The auto waited.

At that moment, all three passengers turned to look on their left.

There, beneath a makeshift tent by the pavement,

a mother was holding her child on her hip, feeding it.

To get the child to eat, she waved at the passing vehicles on the road, using them to distract and encourage the child to take each bite.

The little boy, watching her, remembered:

"My mother must’ve fed me the same way when I was little..."

and he smiled quietly.

Nearby, four little girls with tattered clothes played joyfully, laughing with each other.

Despite their appearance, they had no trace of shame —

only happiness.

Seeing them, the young woman thought:

“They have so little, yet they don’t forget how to smile.

But I… even with so much, spend my time grieving over what I lack, comparing myself to others.”

The first man’s gaze had fallen upon a couple working together on the sidewalk —

cooking food, completing their chores as a team.

In that moment, he remembered the argument from the previous day.

He admitted to himself:

“Yes, the way I spoke to her… that was wrong.”

He thought of how this couple lived in a tiny tent,

yet still held onto their love.

And he remembered…

“I have a big house now. I thought it was important — to live in comfort, to show off.

So I proudly told her about it.”

But she replied:

"Why? Isn’t our current home good enough?

It may be small, but is that such a big deal?

Right now, we don’t really need anything more."

That’s where the argument began.

And he realized, not telling her about the loan he took for the house — that too was a mistake.

He finally understood the reason behind the fight.

“It’s not about the house or comfort,” he thought.

“Heaven isn’t found in the place…

Heaven is spending a night in peace — with her.”

Just as that thought bloomed, the auto moved forward again.

Their journey continued…

 

“And when the journey ended,

there was something different in the air they breathed —

for the people who had boarded…

were not the same ones who stepped out.”

                                                                -by Nandagopal G