Scum

He hated it when the night falls.

Though he loved it for the solace and the comfort it gives to a loner like him, at times, he sometimes felt like pulling out his mane of hair. At times such as this, it never failed to act as an amplifier, multiplying his emotions by a gazillion times it seems. Whatever feelings he harbour, be it loneliness, despair or sorrow, it would be multifolded when it was night.

Night should be a time of prayer, a time of self-reflection within one's soul. Why has it turned out this way? He never realised that there was so much activity during the night. Looking at the denizens scurrying under the cover of darkness, he was amazed that how alike he was compared to them. No more was he a human being than them, living on scraps of food that he could scavenge from the dumps or by begging.

Once, he had his pride and honour. He refused to beg nor stoop to scavenging. He deemed it too lowly beyond a man of his stature. He was not going to resort to that. But can pride and honour feed a man? Slowly, his primordial instincts took and pride and honour was thrown to the winds. For survival, he had to resort to anything. No longer did his pride mattered. And that was how he ended up on the slums today. From a powerful broker on Wall Street to a denizen of the slums, slinking along under the cover of darkness, where not even a single human had noticed, a nameless and worthless soul.

But they would never know, some day, they might end up like him as well. Cast out of the society by their own kind into the bottomless pits. Humans.