the girl in the bus...

Kolkata buses; they are hot and stifling and yes... overcrowded and noisy. I was on-board one, coming back from watching a movie. The rabble of people fidgeting in the background, fighting for some little volume for breathing, standing or just managing to clamp on to some piece of metal which would enable them to continue their journey.

I have always found that there is a certain lack of humanity in public transports: People are eager to finish their journey, its stuffy and hot and uncomfortable; fights break out , there is an air of irritation and frustration, you hear people cussing all around you especially when you have a large bag with your laptop in it.

It was such hostile environment that I was travelling that day. I was standing somewhere in the aisle and about four feet away from a girl who was sitting in a window seat. Another thing about public transport is that though it may sound ridiculously obvious; there is a tremendous lack of privacy. You can't help it ... there isn't enough places to look at. She was messing around with her phone and try as might as I wanted to avoid it my eyes would inexplicably go to her screen and the Extra Large Font on the large screen of her Nokia.

She had received a message...

I did not know from whom it was from but she was reading the message over and over again; staring at the screen. The message was "I am sry. But I am brkng up with u."

There she was... the girl in the bus... jilted by her lover perhaps... And there was I, feeling like a thief... looking in on moments of her private life.

She typed "Thnks for all the wundrful time we shared." and closed her phone.

I watched her silently from where I stood. If she was in anguish, she controlled it well. She looked out of the window watching the meaningless traffic slide by, trying to suppress some emotions that threated to burst from her in an instant. And I stood there as an invader of her privacy silently watching. Staring.

I could not see her face from where I stood only the profile. I could not see the pain in her eyes. I could not see the minute facial expressions one gives before they crack. Her hand reached up for the window. I thought I saw it tremor a tiny bit, a shiver and a certain lack of belief in her present state.

I was a mute spectator of the controlled implosion of her sentiments, of the deliberate deconstruction of her mind, it was like watching a castle made of cards being swept away by the wind; there was no sound, there was nothing which would say that a world, perhaps, was destroyed here. There was no evidence of melodrama, there was no hint of a tragedy.

It was like watching waves on the beach. The surface of the water often belies the strong current beneath I had learnt;What I had not learnt was that human spirit could mimic their very persona.

Suddenly she turned and looked directly at the culprit, the peeping tom, the pryer of her thoughts, the watcher of the whole episode; me. I tried to look away, but my mind was overcome with panic. My body seized up with guilt. My eyes could not rearrange their point of focus.

I was overcome with sadness which flowed from her eyes, my heart went out for her, but still wracked with contrition my speech had abandoned me.

Suddenly the conductor shook me by the shoulder. I had missed my stop. In a whirlwind of events that followed I was somehow off the bus, one stop further than I had intended.

I was dazed, I did not have an opportunity to look again where she sat. It was over as abruptly as it had begun. I was left as clueless as I was before.

I started to walk slowly back to where I had to go, but all the while my thoughts remained with the girl in the bus.

(picture courtesy Zindy @ http://zindy.deviantart.com/ )