The train reached the station exactly seven minutes late. That was equivalent to a millennium when she was running late for her college - which was very often. Her college was a good ten-minute walk from the station and she had to reach class in two and a half. She could never depend on her luck to find an auto rickshaw too; especially when she was in dire need of it. But before that she needed to wiggle her way through a swarm of crazy women trying to embark the train, and then run up forty steps on the staircase simultaneously dodging the nudges and pushes from the multitude of people at the station running around in all possible directions. It was a usual Monday morning in Mumbai.
As she counted the fortieth step, she was puffing with breathlessness while trying to protect her bag and herself from the hostile passers by on the foot over bridge. Her feet were impeccably trained and before she knew they had turned toward the exit. That is when she first saw him. They were walking in opposite directions. She was barely short of sprinting, and he too moved on at a steady pace. As they crossed, she risked walking on the bridge with her turned around to watch him until he was out of her sight. He, on the other hand, was trying to grasp the world as much as he could while trying to keep pace with his master. The master callously tugged at the chain that was tightly fastened around the monkey's neck. She watched them cross a trash pile, where the master cunningly steered the monkey closer to the heap. The primate took the cue and lunged forward. Like a pro he picked up a couple of rotting pieces of food and began to nibble at them hungrily.
It was a matter of seconds, but that monkey's plight had pierced her heart like a warm knife would through butter. Her feet kept moving, but her mind remained transfixed on what she had witnessed. The next few minutes seemed to go by in a jiffy. Mechanically, she hailed an auto rickshaw (which she found after some struggle - usual story), reached college, ran up six storeys - around 144 steps - and made it to class totally out of breath and sanity, but just in time. It is important to attend class - she was instructed all the time - come what may; the world and its problems could go take a hike. She took her seat at the end of a row, but nobody noticed that she had actually stayed behind on that foot over bridge at the station.
~
