By Saranya Perumal
The streetlight flickers like it’s debating
whether or not it wants to keep trying.
The city moves, unbothered.
No one stops. No one looks up.
People like me were never meant to stay.
We come undone quietly,
thread by thread, thought by thought,
until we are nothing more than an afterthought
in a place that never really made room for us.
No one calls to ask where I’ve been.
No one wonders if I made it home last night.
I have lived in this city for years,
but if I were gone tomorrow,
my absence would be just another forgotten thing—
like a misplaced hair tie, a missed train,
a name that lingers on the tip of the tongue before dissolving.
We walk with our shoulders tucked in,
heads lowered,
as if we owe the world an apology
for daring to exist at all.
People like me don’t make it home.
Not because we don’t know where it is—
but because no one is waiting at the door.
I don’t know how long I’ve been walking,
but I know that no one is looking for me.
The train arrives empty.
The phone stays silent.
I stand at the edge of the tracks,
watching the lights blur into something almost alive.
For a moment, I think—if I step forward,
will the city pause? Will someone scream my name?
But the wind swallows the question,
and I turn back to the nothing I know.
Some people disappear all at once.
People like me fade so slowly,
it almost looks like we are still here.
I should call someone.
Tell them I still exist.
Tell them I haven’t disappeared yet.
Tell them I am on my way.
But my voice is a murmur,
and no one is listening.
So instead, I keep walking.
Not toward anything.
Just into the nothing that’s left.