The message came as a screenshot.
A group. A chat. A name that sounded so harmless it was almost cute: “Couriers United”.
Leni looked at her phone, then at Jamal. “I think,” she said slowly, “someone has decided that complaining alone is no longer enough.”
Keks lay stretched out on the carpet, lifting only one ear. Group chat sounded like many voices. Many voices sounded like chaos. He was used to chaos by now.
The first message in the chat was short:
“Hey. We are many. We have the same problems. Maybe we should stop pretending we are isolated cases.”
Below: dozens of reactions. Flames. Fists. Hearts. Fatigue in emoji form.
“That’s dangerous,” said Jamal.
“Yes,” said Leni. “But also logical.”
She scrolled. Stories. Too many. Too similar.
“Account blocked after complaint.”
“Accident, no coverage.”
“Sick = invisible.”
“Tip promised, never seen.”
Leni put the phone away. “I always thought I was bad at the system.”
“Maybe the system is bad at people,” said Jamal.
A meeting was proposed. Offline. A park. Public enough to feel safe. Discreet enough not to be immediately read as a threat.
“Are you going?” asked Jamal.
Leni hesitated. Not out of fear. But out of experience. “I’ve learned that ‘we’ often ends as soon as it gets uncomfortable.”
“Yes,” said Jamal. “But ‘I’ ends pretty surely.”
The park was full of life. Children. Dogs. Music from small speakers. People pretending time was their friend.
They did not recognize each other by logos or uniforms. But by bikes with worn bags. By looks that were both alert and exhausted.
“Hi,” said someone. “I’m Sara.”
“Leni.”
“This is Jamal.”
“And this,” said Leni, pointing down, “is Keks. He is… moral support.”
Keks wagged his tail briefly. He took his job seriously.
They sat in a circle. No stage. No microphone. No agenda.
“For a long time I thought I just wasn’t fast enough,” said a man with scarred hands.
“I thought I just had to sell myself better,” said a woman with pink hair.
“I thought if I stayed quiet, at least I’d stay in,” said someone else.
Silence.
Then Leni said: “Maybe we weren’t quiet enough. But too isolated.”
No one disagreed.
It was not immediately about strike or demands. First it was about words. About naming what is otherwise packaged as individual failure.
“They call us partners,” said Sara. “But partners share risks. We carry them alone.”
“And profits?” asked Jamal.
“We only see those in presentations,” someone replied dryly.
Leni felt something unusual. Not euphoria. More like… relief.
“That’s strange,” she said quietly to Jamal. “I don’t feel motivated right now. But… less alone.”
“That’s more dangerous for the system,” said Jamal. “Motivation can be sold. Community not so easily.”
A few people took photos. Others immediately warned: “Don’t post. Not yet.”
“Solidarity is not a hashtag,” said Sara. “It doesn’t work well with algorithms.”
“But without visibility it doesn’t work either,” said someone.
“Maybe,” said Leni slowly, “it’s first about reliability. Not reach.”
Keks lay down in the middle of the circle. As if he had decided this was now officially a meeting place.
Numbers were exchanged. No big promises made. Just small agreements.
If someone gets blocked, we report it.
If someone falls, we collect.
If someone disappears quietly, we ask.
“That’s not much,” said someone.
“No,” said Leni. “But it’s real.”
On the way home her phone vibrated. The app checked in again as if it had sensed jealousy.
“You were offline longer. Everything okay?”
Leni stared at the message.
“Everything okay?” repeated Jamal. “That’s almost funny.”
She didn’t type anything back.
Instead she wrote in the group chat:
“I’m here. Tomorrow too.”
Many thumbs up. Many short replies. No clichés.
At home Leni lay down on the sofa. Tired. But a different kind of tired.
Keks jumped up to her and laid his head on her chest. Heavy enough to keep her in the now.
“You know,” she said quietly, more to herself than to Jamal, “I think justice doesn’t start with big speeches.”
“But with?” asked Jamal.
“With the moment you stop thinking you’re solely to blame.”
Outside the city roared. Inside a chat vibrated.
And somewhere in between something arose, that could not be measured, not evaluated, not optimized.
But it carried.
And that was enough for now.