Dogs

In a forgotten alley behind a crumbling meat shop and a shuttered tea stall, two dogs lay curled together on a sackcloth that once carried wheat and now only carried cold. Rocky and Roby, brothers in fur and fate, had not eaten in more than a day. Their ribs showed like old fences. Flies whispered around their ears. The afternoon sun was cruel and indifferent.

Rocky lifted his head, ears twitching, eyes scanning the empty lane where even the shadows seemed to flee. “Roby,” he murmured, his voice cracked with thirst, “what did we do wrong?”

Roby didn’t answer right away. He blinked at the sky, pale and vast. Then he said, “I don’t know. We’ve never bitten anyone. We never barked at children. We chased crows, not cars.”

A silence settled between them again. Then Rocky sat up and, with a weariness older than his years, turned his face upward.

“God,” he called.

The wind shifted.

“Do You see us?” Rocky asked. “We were born beneath your sky, too. We run through your grass. We drink your rivers. Why then do Your human children treat us like dirt under their feet?”

Roby chimed in, softer but no less heavy. “They throw food into drains rather than into bowls. They swat us with sticks as if hunger is a sin. Not even water, God. Not even water.”

They sat there for some time, the wind listening, the sun inching.

Then came footsteps. A young man with a satchel slung over his shoulder. He paused. Looked at them. Not with pity—but with recognition.

He opened the bag and took out two roti, still warm. A bottle of water. A soft voice.

“Easy... here you go, my friends.”

Rocky blinked. Roby wagged his tail for the first time in days.

His name was Fazal.

From that day forward, Fazal came by the alley every evening. Sometimes with rice, sometimes with bones, always with kindness. He never kicked, never cursed. He spoke to them as though they had names—because now they did.

But Rocky, belly full, looked out toward the main road, where a pack of dogs stood around an overturned dustbin, chased by a boy with a stone.

“What about them?” he whispered.

Roby licked his brother’s muzzle and looked at the sky again.

“God,” he said softly. “Fazal found us. But who will find the others?”

The question rose like a howl only the stars could hear.

And somewhere, perhaps, a child paused before throwing a stone. Somewhere, perhaps, someone filled a bowl with water. Perhaps the world shifted—just a little.

But not enough.

Not yet ...