All I could remember were flashing lights and deep siren sounds.
He took a deep breath.
“Is it still raining?” he asked the doctor.
“Raining?” The doctor looked puzzled. “It hardly rains here. It’s just the aftermath of the medicine and surgery. You’ll feel alright soon.”
Gary sat on his bed, eyes fixed on the hospital door. His face was tense, thoughts racing. There was a storm inside him—emotions he couldn’t name.
Who are they?
Are they friends… or just fragments of some strange emotional trauma?
I don’t know what I have to do with them, but I feel they’re close to me. And yet, by their faces, I know—they’re not from here. Maybe a place where it snows…
He rang the bell by his side. A nurse walked in.
“Hi, love!” she said.
“Can I have paper and a pencil?” Gary asked.
She frowned. “Sorry… what language are you speaking?”
Gary smiled. “Oh, that. I’m a multilingual guy—bare minimum of five languages.”
He brushed it off, but inside, his heart was pounding. Something was happening in his mind—and he could feel it.
He tried to recall their faces again.
Oblong face, neat beard, thick eyebrows. He’s probably from India… or the Middle East.
And the woman—big, bright eyes… long, wavy brown hair. A vague but captivating smile.
They belong together. Maybe I was meant to help them meet.
The first step was the sketches.
Gary knew a guy—an old friend, a sketch artist—so he decided to pay him a visit.
“Gary, my friend!” Junaid greeted him with surprise and warmth. “We usually work with witnesses, build sketches from memory. As artists, we’re basically reading minds. But if they get even one small detail wrong… the whole thing collapses.”
Gary nodded, eyes serious. “I know this sounds foolish, Junaid. These faces… they came to me in dreams. But if I don’t do this—if I don’t try—I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”
Junaid studied him for a long moment, then gave a slow nod. “Alright. Let’s give it a try.”
⸻
Hours passed.
Gary described. Junaid drew. They paused, argued, erased, and started again. Little by little, the faces came to life—drawn from memory that might not even be real, but felt truer than anything Gary had ever known.
Finally, Junaid leaned back and handed him the sketches.
“Gary, my friend… here is your couple.”
Gary’s hands trembled as he held the papers. His throat tightened. His eyes filled with tears.
“I will find them,” he whispered. “And show them the light of love.”
He had never traveled abroad before, but this time, there was a reason. In a black taxi, Gary arrived at the airport, and after a few hours, he landed in Mumbai.
A land where chaos carried an elegant diversity.
Gary had no idea where to start, but he felt certain the woman was there.
His first stop was a newspaper office. He introduced himself as Gary. After hearing the story, the guy at the advertisement desk laughed.
“Do you really want to do this? I mean… it’s a bit weird.”
Gary nodded. “I need to do this.”
After placing the advertisement, he approached the taxi drivers’ union. He pleaded with them, and with the help of Ankit Kamblae, the head of the union, he pasted the couple’s picture in every cab across Mumbai.
Months passed.
There was no news. No hope. Finally, Gary decided to go back—with a heavy heart.
He called Ankit to drop him at the airport.
Ankit said, “Sir, I’m on the way. Let me check if the customer with me can share the ride.”
Thirty minutes later, the taxi arrived.
“Hello sir, finally going back, huh? I told everyone… but most people refused rides with the couple’s photo behind the driver’s seat. Anyway, I hope you find them soon.”
Gary replied, “Ankit, let’s not talk about that.”
After reaching the airport, Gary took his bag. But before walking to the gates, he turned around and went back to Ankit, who was busy discussing the fare with the passenger.
“Ankit, here’s the last picture I have left. Keep it. Burn it on the way back, or it’ll haunt me forever.”
As he handed the picture over, the lady in the back seat suddenly exclaimed, “That’s my grandmother!”
Gary was speechless. After a pause, his eyes filled with hope. “Can I meet her?”
The girl replied, “Yeah, but I don’t think it’ll help. She’s had dementia since I was very young… maybe because of what she went through.”
Gary grabbed the sketch from Ankit and showed it to her. “Do you know this guy?”
She looked at it. “Hmm… no. I haven’t seen him.”
She shared her address and continued her journey. Ankit then took Gary there.
When Gary showed the grandmother the sketch, her face changed. She began pushing him away.
Her daughter came running, pulled Gary aside, and handed him a glass of water.
Gary was drenched in sweat, overwhelmed by it all.
He asked her, “What happened to your family?”
She told him a tragic story.
“They were the best couple in the city—love in the air, always. But every story has a villain. In ours, it was their best friend. He killed my dad. My mom was eight months pregnant with me. Then he disappeared. No one ever found him. Maybe it was his greed or obsession with my mother. He even met her after the murder… left a letter that said:
‘I wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you.
We were supposed to be just friends.’”
Gary felt a surge of emotions—anger, sorrow, confusion.
“I think I should leave,” he said quietly, “Take care of your mother.”
The woman stood, wiped her tears, and walked him to the doorstep.
As Gary was about to leave, she smiled faintly and said, “My daughter used to say, ‘Aayi, I’ll sign that guy’s death certificate.’ That’s why she became a doctor.”
Gary smiled and got back into the taxi.
⸻
Emergency alarms blared.
Chaos erupted in the hospital. Nurses ran around, calling the doctor on duty.
She rushed to the care unit. A man in his early fifties was breathing heavily. His blood pressure was dropping fast. Eyes rolling back. Veins bulging.
Before anything could be done—it stopped.
Tears rolled down his cheeks. With a faint smile, the man looked at the doctor one last time.
Back in her cabin, the nurse brought in the death certificate for signing.
The doctor asked, “Did you notice? He smiled at me before his last breath. That’s… haunting. Especially on my first day.”
The nurse replied, “Doctor, do you believe in the seven minutes of life?”
“Yes,” she said, “but I’ve never really seen it.”
The nurse took back the signed certificate. “Maybe… someone like you, in this life—or maybe a memory—his mind had saved a few minutes… to carry the baggage of regret from his previous one.”
The doctor nodded. “Finish the procedure. Check if the details are correct.”
The nurse reviewed the form:
Gary Hector. Time of Death: 10:40 PM.
While packing up his belongings, she found a sketch of a couple—along with some vague, incomplete poetry:
I wish I could go back in time, before I crossed the line.
When silence between us was comfortable, not heavy.
I wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you.
I ruined everything.
The nurse looked at the pale Gary one last time…
Then fed the sketch into the shredder
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