15 for 15 minutes

I talked to Hafiz Sahab today - my QURAN teacher . It had been six—no, seven years. Long enough for a voice to fade in memory, for a face to blur at the edges. And yet, there he was, on the other side of the screen, unchanged. The same face, the same voice, as though time had paused for him while it had raced ahead for me.

Mummy had told him about my marriage. He had visited home, sat in the same chair where I once sat, teaching lessons in the same voice that once guided me through childhood ambitions. But today, I wasn’t there. Today, I was miles away. And yet, the moment I saw him, I felt like I had never left.

My eyes burned. I did not blink. I would not blink. If I did, he would see—he would know—that I was holding back tears. So I smiled. Or at least, I tried.

He gave me duas, endless duas, the way he always had.

“Please pray for my exams.”

“Please pray that I become school captain.”

“Please pray that I go to a good university.”

And each time, he had nodded and said the same thing: Be consistent with your five prayers.

And each time, I had nodded too, half-listening, already distracted by the next thing on my list of wishes.

But today, on this video call, I wasn’t twenty-five. I was fifteen again.

Who says we can’t travel back in time? Our brains are magic. Memory is magic.

He had the same face, the same voice. Time had moved forward, but he had remained—constant, unchanged, familiar. I asked him about his children, and his eyes brightened, just like they always did when he talked about them between lessons. Back then, I had listened just to make the time pass. Today, I listened because I wanted to.

And then, just before the call ended, he took out a handkerchief and wiped his eyes.

He always said, I am your Ustaad.

( which means teacher )

Not was.

Am.

The best teacher. The kind that time cannot erase.

For fifteen minutes, I was fifteen.

And then the screen went dark.

And just like that, I was twenty-five again.