Losing my glasses

The blobs of red and yellow lights bobbed up and down as I tread carefully in the darkness. The road beneath me glowed in the sea of fuzzy lights, looking like a picture one might have painted.

The blurry figures passing by didn’t have a face nor a shape. They were just moving figures, passing me one by one. Grains of brown sat where there should be features on a face, making me feel almost as if I was alone in the world of buzzing chatter and blaring horns.

Slender man was real. Not only was he real, but there were many because I was living in a world full of them.

Giant boards that hung from the huge towering creatures throughout the city, emitted light of different colours, illuminating the world, being the only thing to help me understand where the edges began and ended.

I climbed down what looked like the stairway leading into a pit of darkness, with a strong grip on the railing, making sure I don’t miss a step and tumble into oblivion.

I pulled out the card of the store I was headed to from inside my pocket and squinted at it in an attempt to read the letters printed on it. With insufficient lighting, and the very crucial part of me that was missing, I couldn’t make out what it said.

With a sigh, I ran the tips of my fingers over the bold letters. The man had said it would be right next to the foot over-bridge. I let my head fall back as I stared at the signs that hung above me, once again, attempting to read what they said. But all I could see were squiggly lines, some looking like ants that were crawling on the signs forming words from an unintelligible language.

This was going to be hard.

But I sucked it up, pushing every door and asking whether it was the store I was looking for. This was the only way I’d get there in time.

“Yes, this is it,” said someone, making me let out a breath of relief. I strolled in and awaited anxiously hoping this would make my day a little better.

After what seemed like hours, the man finally came out with my prized possession. He put it in my hands, and I pushed it onto my nose. And there sat my brand new glasses, making the world a less of a blurry mess.

I finally saw the man’s features and was able to tell apart the people around me and read the words that hung everywhere.

“I’m never losing my glasses again,” I promised myself.

Syeda Erum Noor is dangerously oblivious and has no sense of time. Send help at erum.noor1998@gmail.com