Stranger

I found myself waiting to catch the train to Barnala at the Ludhiana Station. It was extremely difficult for me to imagine just how cold it would be at this time of the night. As the neon lights of the platform read 2:00 AM my mind went into a rewind mode.

Last time I was there it was below 10 degree Celsius with spine chilling winds. It was enough to make me nervous and uncomfortable as I was without any warm clothes. It was a few hours before the train-scheduled time, my eyes felt sandy from the lack of sleep, too many cigarettes and coffee. The long journey from Delhi to Ludhiana in general bogie of a passenger train with open windows, passing through the clouds of cold made me feel misty and strange inside. The sun seemed to have gone on a vacation in this part of the country. The irony of this was knowing the fact that spring was everywhere else, but strangely here the snow still hugging the ground. After a time, rum was the only way to keep warm or it seemed that way.

The coffee guy, an old man with long beard and small eyes looked on as he poured coffee out of his pot to weary commuters who were trying to beat the chill. The station was full of the invisible crowd, every now and again a train was coming but the crowd remained in a standby mode signifying the omnipresence of life.

Stamping her foot to give a shake to the cramped muscles in her feet, the young girl came out from the train walking a bit, limping a bit. She finally sat down on the platform seat pushing her bag between her legs, underneath the seat. She revealed a flock of auburn colored hair as she removed her monkey cap. Her face was rosy from the cold. A punju rose with a plump face.

She looked at me for a moment, and then turned her attention to the coffee guy. She pulled a crumpled 100 rupees note from her pocket and gave it to the coffee guy.

The old man shook his head saying “Memsahib, chutta nahin hai”. The girl looked at me enquiringly.

“I might have some change”, I said fumbling through my pocket wishing I did have some change to give so that I could start a brief conversation with her to cut the monotony of waiting alone. I only had ten bucks with me. “Here take this, it will be enough for a cup of coffee, you can pay me back later” I said.

She smiled, shook her head and took the note. As she stood there waiting to get her cup of coffee I noticed that she was feeling uncomfortable with the smell of gas stove. By then I had not learned to forestall my observation, I was hasty, relying greatly on my first impression. As my fantasy machine was already in the full gear the small conversation that ensued was enough to put me on an overdrive mode. As I was wondering how to get the conversation going she walked towards the waiting room much to my dismay, sipping her cup of coffee.

In the half-light of the morning I lay awake waiting for her quiet, almost silent feet to come out of the waiting hall. Till morning, I waited in that state, for the circles of azure and plump and auburn to gather, like clouds inside my closed eyelids as I felt her steps down the hall, the clouds burst suddenly revealing her large eyes framed with demure lashes, the smile on her bud-like lips, no longer a phantom, stirring slowly her second cup of coffee, the movement of her hand deliberately and grossly delicate.

I noticed the cold on her face, spread generously and glistening now in the damp wrinkles of her skin. Sometimes I was unable to see those bud-like lips since every sip left a smear that she would try surreptitiously wipe off when she thought that I was not looking.

“Would you like to have…?” she asked me after a very small sip from her coffee cup. She held her coffee cup with both of her hands as if the hot cup would give her additional warmth, though by then the coffee would have gone cold with all the stirring.

"Yes, but where were you?" I asked, meeting her effort to break the silence. I thought how strange it was to sit here and to wait for some stranger.

As I realized I knew nothing about her at all I heard a train entering the station and the attendant announcing the arrival of the same.

Before the top gear of fantasy machine could plunge to reality, I heard the dreaded words “Bye, I have to leave now”. Without looking back she just walked past me towards the waiting train. My fantasy machine had come to an abrupt end.

As the smell of coffee got me out of my reverie I started fumbling for the change to buy a cup.