The Station of Fireflies

In the underground station, the lights falter, and for a second the advertisements go dim— we stand in a velvet hush, holding our phones like jars, waiting for something small to begin.

Then a shimmer in the air, a startled constellation: fireflies, as if the park wandered down the stairs, as if summer forgot itself and slipped through turnstiles, bright stitches sewing the dark to itself.

A child laughs and the sound ricochets along the tiles, a soft bell that opens every locked feeling. Someone's face glows with the ancient yes of surprise, and strangers look up, briefly, at the same miracle.

When the train arrives, we carry the light with us, the way you carry a scent in your sleeve. Above ground, the streets are ordinary again, but our pockets hum, remembering.