Title: The Last Cup of Chai
(A Short Story by Faraz Parvez, Pen Name of Dr. Arshad Afzal, Former Faculty Member, Umm Al-Qura University, Makkah, KSA)
The chai shop at the corner of Bansanwala Bazaar had seen better days. Its wooden benches had grown weak, wobbling like old men. The kettle, blackened with years of service, hissed and fumed like an aging revolutionary. But the chai—it was still the same. Strong, sweet, thick with cardamom, capable of mending a broken heart or fueling a heated argument.
Shahid sat at his usual spot by the rusted fan, stirring his tea absentmindedly. He was thirty-five, a middle-class schoolteacher, caught between his father’s ideals and his own unfulfilled dreams. His glasses kept slipping down his nose as he read the crumpled newspaper.
At the counter, Bashir, the chaiwala, wiped a glass with a rag that had seen too many revolutions and too few washes. He had been running this stall since the time when film posters were hand-painted, and when honesty still had some weight in the marketplace.
In walked Junaid, Shahid’s childhood friend, dressed in a crisp suit that screamed new money. Junaid had made it big—real estate, some overseas investments, a few under-the-table deals that he never spoke about. His perfume reached before he did, a foreign scent that didn’t quite mix with the dust of the city.
“Shahid, still here?” Junaid smirked, taking a seat opposite him.
“Where else would I go?” Shahid replied, folding his newspaper.
Junaid clapped him on the back. “There’s a whole world outside this chai shop, my friend. You should see it. Life is too short for nostalgia.”
“Nostalgia is all we can afford,” Shahid muttered, taking a sip.
A new customer shuffled in—a woman, wrapped in a faded shawl. Farzana, Shahid’s former student. She had been the brightest in his class, her essays full of passion, her speeches full of fire. Now, she sat two benches away, rummaging through her purse for coins, her face lined with struggles he didn’t know.
Shahid cleared his throat. “Farzana?”
She looked up, startled. “Sir?”
“You disappeared after college. What happened?”
She hesitated, then smiled, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Life happened, sir.”
Bashir, the chaiwala, placed a cup in front of her, unasked. “On the house,” he grunted.
Farzana took the cup with a nod of gratitude. She took a sip, as if it could dissolve her worries.
Just then, Karim, the local politician’s fixer, sauntered in, a cigarette dangling from his lips. His presence shifted the air, turning it heavier. He slid into the seat next to Junaid and lit his cigarette with lazy arrogance.
“I hear you got that school contract, Junaid,” Karim said, blowing smoke into the fan. “Nice work.”
Junaid grinned. “It’s all about the right connections, brother.”
Shahid flinched. He had applied for the same contract to renovate the government school where he taught. A fair bidding process, they had said. Fairness was a myth he still clung to.
Karim glanced at Shahid, smirking. “Don’t look so betrayed, ustad. The world runs on shortcuts. You should learn to take one.”
Shahid exhaled sharply. He wanted to argue, to remind them of ethics, of principles, of things that no longer had a place in conversations. Instead, he just swirled his tea, watching it turn cold.
From the far end, Bashir chuckled. “The problem with your generation,” he said, “is that you all want to drink chai, but none of you want to let it simmer.”
Farzana laughed softly, shaking her head. “And what’s your advice, Bashir chacha?”
He leaned against the counter, arms folded. “If you want real chai, you have to wait. If you want real success, you have to struggle. The problem is, no one has patience anymore.”
The kettle let out a sharp whistle. A moment of silence passed between them all.
Then, Karim stubbed out his cigarette. Junaid checked his phone. Farzana finished her tea. Shahid folded his newspaper. Life moved on, as it always did.
But somewhere in that small chai shop, in the fading smell of cardamom, between an old man’s wisdom and a young man’s disillusionment, something lingered—like the last sip of a strong, bittersweet chai.
And that, perhaps, was all that was left.
