The Rickshaw King
"Aaliya, a British Pakistani journalist, returns to Lahore for a story and hires Hassan—a rickshaw driver with dreams bigger than his vehicle. Their journey through the city becomes a journey into each other."
The Rickshaw King
"You want full day tour? Best price, best driver, best stories!"
Aaliya laughed at the rickshaw driver's enthusiasm. She'd been in Lahore for three days, working on a piece about the city's transformation, and this was the first person who'd made her genuinely smile.
"What kind of stories?" she asked.
"Every kind!" He hopped off his painted rickshaw—a riot of colors and truck art. "I'm Hassan. I know every gali, every secret, every place tourists never see. You want real Lahore? I give you real Lahore."
His confidence was charming. His smile was devastating. And his English was surprisingly excellent.
"Where did you learn to speak like that?" she asked.
"YouTube, Netflix, and The Guardian." He grinned. "I'm saving for university. London School of Economics, inshallah. Until then, I drive and I learn."
The tour was nothing like she expected.
Hassan took her through winding streets she never would have found—hidden gardens, crumbling havelis, food stalls that made her taste buds weep. He narrated everything with a poet's flair and a comedian's timing.
"You're wasted as a driver," Aaliya said over street biryani. "You should be a tour guide. Or a writer."
"Inshallah, someday. First I need the degree. Then people will take me seriously." His smile flickered. "In Pakistan, it's not enough to be smart. You need the paper to prove it."
"Same in Britain, honestly."
"Ah, but you have the paper." He gestured at her. "Journalist for big London magazine. Oxford, right?"
"Cambridge, actually."
"Even better." He looked at her differently. "What brings a Cambridge journalist to my rickshaw?"
"Research. And maybe..." She hesitated. "Running away."
"From what?"
"A broken engagement. A career that feels hollow. The suspicion that I've achieved everything I was supposed to and I'm still not happy."
Hassan was quiet. Then: "Come. I want to show you something."
He took her to the rooftop of an old building in the Walled City, where Lahore spread out in all its chaotic beauty.
"When I feel lost," Hassan said, "I come here. To remember that the city doesn't care about my problems. It just... exists. Keeps going. And somehow that helps."
Aaliya stood beside him, watching the sun set over minarets and satellite dishes. "It's beautiful."
"You're beautiful." He said it simply, without expectation. "Sorry. I shouldn't—you're a client, and I'm just—"
"You're not just anything." She turned to face him. "You're the most interesting person I've met in months. Maybe years."
"Aaliya..."
"I know this is crazy. I know we're from different worlds. But right now, in this moment..." She touched his face. "I don't care."
He kissed her as the azaan echoed across the city.
They made it to his small flat—clean, simple, full of books.
"It's not much," he said apologetically.
"It's perfect."
She kissed him again, and he responded with a hunger that belied his earlier restraint. Clothes fell away as they stumbled to his bed, and when he finally pressed inside her, Aaliya felt something shift in her chest.
"Meri jaan," he breathed, moving within her. "My life. That's what you've become in three days."
"Hassan—"
"I know. You'll go back to London. We're impossible." His hips rolled, drawing a moan from her. "I don't care. This moment is ours."
She came apart in his arms, and he followed, and afterward they lay tangled in his thin sheets, the sounds of Lahore drifting through the window.
"Come to London," Aaliya said impulsively. "I'll help you apply. Write recommendations. Whatever you need."
"You'd do that? For me?"
"For us." She propped up on her elbow. "I don't know what this is, Hassan. But I know I don't want it to end."
"I have nothing to offer you. No degree, no money—"
"You have everything that matters." She kissed him. "Dreams. Ambition. A heart that sees the world differently. That's worth more than any degree."
"Tum pagal ho."
"I'm crazy about you. Different thing."
Hassan's LSE application was successful—fully funded, with a glowing recommendation from a certain journalist. He arrived in London on a grey January morning to find Aaliya waiting at Heathrow.
Their story was just beginning.
The rickshaw still sits in Lahore, waiting for its king to return. He does, every summer, with his British wife.
Best tour guide in the city, they say. Best love story, too.