We are one person tonight. You and I.

My thoughts snake out of your mouth like lazy cigar smoke. Your ideas find their way into my writing.

Our dreams and fears paint themselves on the same canvas, in alternating shades of black and blue. You hold my hand to guide the brush in strokes of your choice, but you don't need to. My hands moves, possessed and determined.

We are one person tonight. You are a part of me. I lose myself in you. When we shut our eyes, we are on the same little island. When we open our eyes, there's nothing to see, it's all within us. It's who we are.

Such wistful weather. The evening is washed out by the traces of the night. The city sighs. The collective emotions of a few hundred people, a few hundred tired faces, resonate in the traffic. Heads at windows peek out. Heads waiting for lovers, or kids. Heads that can take the city no more. Sputtering heads with colds.

When I look out and see the city reflected in passing cars,I see one face. We're all the same, right now. Stuck between our worlds.

We'll solve a crossword together. 

You do the words that go down, and I'll do the ones across. When our paths meet, we'll look up and smile a little and exchange letters, swap suggestions. Do you think it's suchandsuch? Probably not, it's far too long.

When we're nearing the end, we'll realize we didn't really get all the words. Then you'll fill in the empty spaces with your emphatic Rs and your pretentious Js. The words that form will make no sense. But there will be no more empty spaces. Just words.

We'll look at the crossword and smile. Laugh, even. We put something together. We did. It wasn't perfect, but does it matter?

Inside my mug is a face that looks back at me. It's blurred around the edges - like rain clouds and the sun.

It's early in the morning and the curtains ripple in the soft, quiet breeze. My feet are up on the table and I am drinking tea by myself. Ugly feet, with worn out heels. No one else is awake. I thought I'd enjoy this time alone. But I don't. I realize that I am constantly looking for things that aren't with me in that moment. I want company when I am here and when I go out and meet people, I want to come and sit by myself for a while.

I stand at my window and watch the buildings and the rubble from the construction sites. I look at myself in the tea in the mug every time I take a sip and I see my sleep laced eyes.

It's a holiday and suddenly I feel like going to work. 

Forward.

That's where you have to move.
Cutting through all the things that get you blue, like flyaway emotions and frizz in your hair. Like the time when you don't think you have it in you to get out of bed. You do have it in you, you just need to tell yourself that.

It's all very self-help book like but it's true. Forward is where you have to be. Right now.

When it gets dark and the stars come out, you must be filled with the immense promise that beyond the night is another day. Another day, to make a mess and brave through it. 

I saw a boy in a wheelbarrow. His father pushed him around, along the rail tracks where the people live. He says something and the rather laughs. Then he moves faster and the child is beside himself with glee.

A few metres ahead, there is a pink goat. You can name her if you wish, it won't matter, because the first thing you notice is, is that she's pink. She's talking to a cat, and the cat looks deeply interested, which reflects well for the goat because our feline friends are not known to be generous with their attention.

Soon enough, the boy, the wheelbarrow and the father trundle towards the animals and the animals scamper to the side, both out of fear and for privacy.

I crane my neck to see what might unfold beyond this, but my train moves along and everyone is just silhouettes now, in the sinking Bombay sun.