All in One Night

I am suddenly flinging forward, head snapping up, stomach lurching, amid screaming bus brakes and screeching tyres.

- by Sreelekha Chatterjee

A brief disorientation, with blinking, heavy-lidded eyes, sensing something like glass shattering into a thousand pieces, followed by an uneasy silence. My heart continues to hammer against my ribs, while the phantom of sleep lingers in every muscle of my body. The city outside is gradually slipping into the hazy labyrinths of the winter night.

A momentary quiet and then the rumble inside the bus resumes. I must be halfway through my journey home. Seated beside me is a young man, probably in his early twenties. Upper body stooping over his lap at the impact of the hurried freeze of the bus; his slender torso appears like a rope that is stretched too tight. He is busy conversing on the phone.

“What the hell! This isn’t a bus stop.” His head and face are covered with wildly overgrown hair; his eyeballs, unusually shining—almost hidden beneath his hanging tresses—regarding the surroundings without any simulation of intelligence, along with his elongated nose and high cheekbones that protrude outward, lending him the physiognomic features of a belligerent fox. I get jittery, with shivering teeth, when he speaks, hissing like a snake, to no one in particular, or perhaps to the person at the other end.

The bus has halted near a market. Illuminated with dazzling, multicolored, showy light displays of strings, icicles, nets, themed shapeslike stars, balls, geometric patterns, Santa, reindeer for Christmas, there is a carnival going on witha smorgasbord of melodies and gustatory delights. At times, shoppers board the bus from here instead of the bus stop at a distance.

“I will blow up this bus.” The lad says over the phone.

“Yes, yes, I know. Everything is ready. So far, no one has doubted anything. It will be done seamlessly. You wait and see. Don't forget to watch the ten o’clock news.” He continues, oblivious to my gaze.