Rail Kanya

Two Years.

Get up. Get ready. Go to the same-damned-nut-choking-brain-damaging office. Find edible items in the lunch to swallow. Go back. Surf the same ‘particular’ sites for any new stuff and watch some soap. Sleep. 

Not anymore. It was the summer of 2014. Finally I had the opportunity to bid my mind-numbing work life good bye. For an entire fifteen days.

After my Autowala left cursing me for paying only what the meter said, I made my way towards the entrance. The upside of this embarrassing stint was that the nearby coolies left me in peace knowing I wasn’t going to pay easy, though others surrounded me just around the next corner asking if I wanted a ticket, taxi or hotel.

I swam through the crowd to check my platform number at enquiry. Jumping and hooping over the nice people gracefully sleeping on the floor reminded me of the maze game I used to play as a child where one has to go in at one end find the other way out with just one right path and rest dead ends. My luck wasn’t favouring me yet. My train was on platform seven.  Arrival time was 8:34. It was 8:40. I dashed back towards the exit.

As soon as I reached the platform, I took a deep breath of relief upon seeing that the train hadn’t arrived yet and immediately regretted it, for my nostrils were filled with the National Stench of Indian Railways. It’s a unique blend of ‘Bidi’, ‘Paan ki peek’, ‘Alu Poori’, and just a hint of the residual shit lying on the tracks. Sometimes one can also sense a hint of body odour depending upon where one is standing.

After waiting for another twenty minutes it, I embarked the train for my short journey. I had a reservation in chaircar which I found almost empty.  I quickly looked around. No, not for my seat.

*** Bhaiyyaji Vachan (Indian Bro Code) ***

Jab Bhi Koi Bhaiyya Ji Rail athwa Viman se Vicharan Karenge to Wo Kisi Sukanya ke Saath Baithne ka Prayatna Karenge.  

(Whenever any Bro travels via Rail or Plane, he shall try to sit with a beautiful girl.)

The search yielded an old couple, a few big-black-bald-men with moustaches, and a couple with twins who were having a field day running aimlessly in the aisle. Disappointed that once again life had stuck me up, I moved towards my seat in the back. One of the big-black-bald-men with moustaches was on my window seat. I didn’t want to disturb the sleeping beauty so just sat in the row ahead.

Within minutes, came the Ticket Checker. My heart beats rose a bit out of habit. But then I remembered it wasn’t the usual scenario. I didn’t have to plead or pay ‘fine’ near the stinking toilet after he had checked all other tickets. I felt the pride of Babur beheading Lodi in the Battle of Panipat. I took the ticket out that I had secured in the ‘Battle of irctc.co.in’.

I plugged in my charger to put on Roadies X1. But before I could press play, my eyes fell on her! In the adjacent row was the cutest thing I had ever seen! She reminded me of that Disney mermaid princess. Her cute little face with those big eyes was constantly being annoyed by her beautiful hair. They kept falling on her forehead no matter how many times she tried to push them back. I had missed her in my quick sweep probably because she was slouched in the corner seat. I don’t know for how long I stared at her. Luckily she was too engrossed watching something in her cell and struggling with her hair to notice some loser watching her dumbstruck like a villager watching a skyscraper. 

As I regained my senses, I realized I just had to do something.

I immediately put my cell down and took out the thick and boring Jeffery Archer novel I had been trying to finish since last summer. Now don’t get me wrong here. I love Jeffery Archer short stories! But his novels are just so damn ass boring! It’s like he could have put the same as a short story but decided to stretch the chewing gum until it became all rubber with no sugar! But right now what was important was that my first impression should be that of an intellectual guy. And I felt reading a book was definitely a much better way to go than Roadies X1.

Suddenly she stopped whatever she was watching and took out some kind of clip-looking-object to tie her hair. And after that a small mirror and some brush and colours and stuff. I was puzzled how could she be any more beautiful. For the next ten minutes, she continued her make-up session and I continued stealing stares at her from behind Archer.

Now, the problem was the she was in the adjacent seat so I had to rotate my head by a full 90 degrees to look at her. Luckily, the train was quite empty so no one could see me except her but even then, I didn’t want her to see me as some freak staring at her. So I did what a gentleman should. I put up the divider bars that separate seats and put my legs up on the seat as if for leisure. No she was directly in front of me. Every time I looked up into infinity to give some thought to whatever I was pretending to be reading, I could see her. And that would have been totally justifiable! In the mean time she took out some kind of small bottle. She dipped a cotton bud type thing in the bottle and the put it on her neck. ‘Damn! She must be one high maintenance girl’, I muttered to myself.

Next the problem was how to initiate a conversation. That was the problem of problems.  Next hour passed by while I kept thinking of some excuse to talk to her and she kept taking out different kinds of beauty parlour stuff that I had never seen in my life. The train was about to reach my destination and I was finally about to give up when she took out a candy out of her magical purse that had the capacity to hold infinite amount of make-up items. I knew my way in!

A thousand and twenty eight thoughts went through my mind before I knew it. Though any of them hardly made sense. I hope she doesn’t think of me as some roadside Romeo.  What if she says go away? What if she doesn’t have anymore? The journey is about to be over, we won’t be able to talk much anyway. But what I we do? I knew there was no use thinking. It was time to act.

‘Excuse me, do you have any more of those?’ I somehow muttered up the courage and spit out the words. It was like bungee jumping. You think a million times and then just do it blocking all the thoughts. Then regret in mid-air. My heartbeats went up like a million times faster. Did I say it funny? No, it was cool enough I felt. But why isn’t she replying? Is she ignoring me? Oh Shit! Why did I have to be such a damn fool! She probably thinks am some strange pervert! Wait! She has her earplugs in again. That means she didn’t hear me.

For the next few minutes, I thanked all the Gods I knew of! A calamity had been prevented. She hadn’t noticed me. The next few after that, cursing myself for wasting such a golden opportunity. It was too late to ask for the candy now.  She was putting on some make-up again.

As my station approached, my infatuation went down a bit, because I had never seen any girl put on make-up every fifteen minutes. Who likes Sour Grapes anyway, right?

***

P.S. For those girls who felt that they should have at least talked a bit, this is what happens at our side in most of our love tales. We have heart attacks and our beloveds don't even realize it. Ask the guy sitting next to you if you don’t believe me! ;)

P.P.S. But don't get disheartened, because I and my Rail Kanya didn't talk. It's not always the case. Wait for the next blog to know what happened when I did talk to my next love!