The Unforgettable Journey

The gentry in 3rd ac is no longer what it used to be, thought Somesh as he pushed his suitcase under the seat. The 5 minutes it took him to reach his berth from the door, amidst clamour and congestion had left him exhausted. After catching his breath in a few pants, he surveyed his companions for the journey. The happy and complete Indian family; a husband, a semi-educated wife, a shy daughter and two overweight sons. Why he never found a shy son and overweight daughters with semi- educated mothers, he could not reason. What he knew with certainty was that they were not going to make his journey any easier. A tad disappointed, he focussed on the other side. The occupants of the side berths were not in sight but the luggage, or the lack of it, told him there were no women and certainly not any his age. “Not worthwhile to sit uncomfortably and converse with the other two, in that case”, Somesh thought and resigned himself to finishing the badly written “If God was a banker” during the journey.

Somesh loved travelling by trains. He had loved it since as long as he could remember. So much so that he would take the onward journey to Mumbai by train and only return by flight, whenever he went to meet his girlfriend, Simar, over an extended weekend. Although this cut in to their time together and almost always resulted in a quarrel with her, but he could not help it; these journeys were equally dear to him. They gave him time to introspect, the space to think uninterrupted and the freedom to be what he liked sans the presence of familiar faces judging him. This speeding sea of humanity was the only place where he got some time alone and stillness of thought.

He had, though, one regret: quite a few friends of his boasted about chance encounters in trains whereas he, a veteran by travelling standards, had never even been fortunate enough to have female company of the same age. And this journey was no different. “It would be worse, if anything”, thought Somesh. In a mental game he loved to play, he played out the movements, actions, questions and responses of each of the passengers. He secretly prided himself on predicting with reasonable accuracy, which was enhanced by years of experience in stereotyping and travelling. His train of thought was broken by the ruckus accompanying the middle aged men, occupying the side berths, who had arrived and were now stacking their bags. As soon as they had settled, both took out their phones and began talking in fluent, loud English so that their position of respect was established among fellow passengers.

As the engine blew the final whistle, Somesh’s mind started jogging; all the men are sharing some information about themselves. Highly likely that the businessman’s curiosity is aroused by someone’s line of work and questions and responses fly. Without any deliberation, the conversation flows like the mighty Ganga, exploring a variety of topics and finally settling in the vast ocean of India’s plight, politics and leaders. Once out of words, the businessman takes out a Hindi magazine from his bag and the other two return to making authoritative-sounding phone calls. At this point, the two boys who had been sitting quietly begin quarrelling, running around and generally wreaking havoc in the compartment. The others won’t complain, their gratitude bought by the laddoos which the wife had offered everyone.  By 9 PM, the younger one starts wailing non-stop for an hour, finally falling asleep by 10. The elder one though, carries on uninhibited until about 1 AM. Somesh is only able to fall asleep after the kid runs out of steam. And even before having a proper dream, it’s 5 AM and the younger one is up, all set to rule the kingdom in the absence of his older sibling. Somesh is more tired at 6 AM than he was at 6 PM.

“This can’t be allowed to happen. I must appear fresh and energetic for the interview tomorrow”. Somesh scratched his head, thinking hard. And then, like a flash, an idea crossed his mind. He again played out the whole scene with a minor tweak. Confident of his little scheme, he relaxed, biding his time.

Soon enough, they were looking at each other, expecting someone to start the conversation. Somesh listened as the businessman explained his business and the two men elaborated upon their company and role. “We shall be rivals if I get through”, Somesh murmured.  It was a brief moment before he realised that the others were staring at him, expecting him to ramble on about himself. Gathering his courage and wits, he calmly introduced himself, “My name is Somesh and I am in to smuggling stuff”. “Smuggling what?” the wife asked before she could check herself. With a carefully placed grin, making him look sinister, he said, “You don’t want to know”.

As he hid his hardly controllable smile behind the spiteful novel, he could feel everyone shifting uneasily in their seats – even the children. From that moment the compartment went unnaturally quiet and remained so until he had alighted the train the next morning.

As he sat waiting for his turn, he reflected on the incident. Not only was he better relaxed but also felt more confident, thanks to the wily trick. The masterstroke, he felt, was Simar’s call when he spoke to her pretending she was a call girl. On the one hand, his girlfriend was pleasantly surprised by his “naughty” behaviour and on the other hand, his sleazy choice of words reaffirmed his identity as a low-life among his fellow travelers. Talk about one stone and two birds. Lost in his own thoughts, his lips had broken in to a silly smile by the time his name was called out.

Walking in with a swagger, feeling supremely confident, he looked up to read his interviewers. In an instant, his face became the second thing to fall, right after his confidence had bungee-jumped without the safety rope. That his body did not follow suit was nothing short of a miracle. Sitting in front of him, were the two middle-aged men from the train. He wanted to turn around and run, run back to yesterday evening and re do that one moment when he had lied. Little beads of perspiration were now forming on his forehead and the back of his neck was itching. “Get ready to be slaughtered”, he told himself as he mumbled good morning.

Shamelessly sneering, they offered him a seat and glass of water. He only has hazy recollections of what happened next. Questions were fired and inadequate attempts were made at responding for a while. He kept gulping water until they had closed his file and returned it to him. He remembers the word congratulations and his hand being shook. What he clearly remembers is the instruction, “You are clearly gifted when it comes to convincing people. However, you are going to stop lying from now on.”