By Armaan Tariq

Zaid wakes up with the birds outside his window. They leave each morning in a flurry, soaring into the sky. His elder brother once told him, “They always return together in the evening.”

At the time, it sounded like a passing thought. Years later, it became the line he clung to through everything.

He had done everything right. Top scores in his twelfth-grade exams. A head full of dreams. He aimed for NEET, like thousands of other students in Kashmir who see medicine as the only path out. He studied hard. Still, it wasn’t enough. He didn’t make the cut.

And before he could process that loss, his father collapsed. Ahsaan, his older brother, rushed him to the hospital. Their savings didn’t survive the week.

Zaid didn’t give up. He visited SKUAST on a college trip and came back with a new plan. He would study and work, both. He found a job at a pharmacy. It wasn’t much – long hours, poor pay, no future – but it gave him purpose. Then the pandemic arrived, and with it, a pink slip.

For a while, he drifted. Then he found a marketing internship. He worked with everything he had. Helped the company grow. Earned........

© Kashmir Observer