*Journal by Mushk* _April 10, 2026 — 11:30 PM, PECHS roof_ The stadium’s on. I can hear it from here. Not the commentary just the roar, like the city exhaling all at once. Pakistan vs West Indies. Nine years since they played here. I’m not watching. I’m up here with my laptop and a chai that’s gone cold. But I’m listening. Because Karachi sounds different when it’s happy. Fiancé texted 20 mins ago: “You watching?” I sent back: “I’m working.” He sent a thumbs up. He gets it. That’s why August 29 happened. Not because I was looking to be chosen. Because he looked at my life and didn’t ask me to put the camera down. I still think about Izmir sometimes. August 2024. Yaşar University. I was 22, alone in Bornova, eating simit for breakfast and crying in the dorm bathroom because a professor told me “Don’t go home and shrink.” I didn’t. Came back, finished IoBM, graduated December 2025. Framed that degree next to the Yaşar certificate. They look good together. Proof and permission. Ma came over yesterday. Saw the ring on my chain and didn’t say anything. Just moved it so it caught the light from the window. “Acha hai,” she said. That’s it. That’s all I needed. I was a kid on _Mar Jain Bhi To Kya_. Oct 2012 to Jan 2013. Ten years old, memorizing lines in a van. I liked the craft. I didn’t like being watched. The day we wrapped, I used the paycheck to buy a sketchbook. I’ve been trying to see instead of be seen ever since. Beaconhouse. Alpha. IoBM. All of it got me here: a one-room in PECHS with a lease in my name and a hard drive full of other people’s 6am. “Roshni” got an email today. Lahore wants to print it. The series I started in 2020 during load-shedding, when I was 19 and saving for IoBM and the whole world was inside. April 6 was different. Consulate. 9 dead. I didn’t go out. Charged my batteries and stayed home. Wrote: “The city bled today. I kept my hands steady.” That’s the job sometimes. Not to shoot it. To stay ready, and to stay human. I’m 24. Engaged. Not married. No kids. No plans to be less me. I still wear blue on purpose. I still photograph laundry between buildings because it reminds me of Izmir and Nazimabad at the same time. The roar from NSK just got louder. Someone hit a six. I’m not down there. I’m up here. And for once, that doesn’t feel like missing out. — Mushk _P.S. If 10-year-old me on that set could see this roof, this ring, this email, she’d think I was lying. Good.