LOC - the line that hurts

The Line of Control isn’t just a line on a map. It’s a wound, raw and painful, splitting Kashmir between India and Pakistan. People on both sides call it theirs, but it’s the folks living there who bleed.

In Muzaffarabad, Amina sifts through the mess of her little tea shop. Indian missiles hit at sunrise, the news called them “spot-on.” Spot-on enough to kill her husband, buried under a broken teapot. The media brags Pakistan shot down Indian jets. Amina doesn’t care. She wants her shop, her husband, her old life. But the wound took them.

Across the Line, in Pahalgam, Ravi sits in a hospital, his sister’s blood still on his clothes. She was one of 26 killed when gunmen attacked a market full of tourists. The TV shouts about India’s “Operation Sindoor,” missiles hitting terrorist hideouts in Pakistan. Ravi doesn’t feel better. He’s empty. His sister’s gone, and nobody talks about the kids in Muzaffarabad who won’t wake up.

In Delhi, a big-shot leader yells about protecting the country, and people clap. In Islamabad, another leader promises to hit back, and the crowd cheers.

On X, it’s a war of words, videos of jets, soldiers, and flags. #PakistanArmy. #BharatMataKiJai. Every post makes the wound deeper.

Somewhere on the Line, two soldiers run into each other. One’s Indian, one’s Pakistani. Both are young, bleeding, too worn out to fight. The Indian, Arjun, pulls out a cigarette. The Pakistani, Bilal, takes it. They smoke quietly, the smoke rising like a wish they don’t trust.

“Why are we here?” Arjun asks, looking at the sky.

“For our land,” Bilal says, but he’s not sure.

“This land?” Arjun points at the bloody ground. “Who’s it for?”

Bilal stays quiet. He thinks of his mom in Lahore. Arjun thinks of his kid in Jammu. Both wonder if they’ll make it home.

By morning, the media says there’s a truce. But the wound’s still there, worse than before. Amina tries fixing her shop, but nobody buys tea. Ravi buries his sister, but he’s still lost. The leaders move on to new speeches, X moves on to new fights. The Line keeps hurting, the land keeps hurting, waiting for the next spark.