The bus ride home felt longer than it was

Dear Delyara, Nothing unusual happened on the way home. Same route. Same stops. Same people half-looking at their phones, half-looking out of the window like they were somewhere else entirely. And still, the ride felt unusually long tonight, as if time itself had become more difficult to carry. I think it’s because I wasn’t only traveling home. I was carrying the whole day with me. A conversation I didn’t like. An unfinished task. A message I still haven’t answered. That feeling of being slightly too available to everyone and not available enough to myself. Sometimes public transport feels less like movement and more like a waiting room where the body finally realizes how tired it really is. That happened tonight. I sat there, looking at reflections in the glass, and thought: I am not only tired. I am over-entered. By the time I reached my stop, I wanted silence more than home. That’s a strange feeling. But a real one.