21st September

“Congratulation and happy anniversary.”

It was 9 PM. Nomrota stumbled to see the first part of the mobile message. It was the first message from Soumen in last one year. Anniversary! Of what? Nomrota checked the calendar. It was 21st September. Nomrota could hear the sound of moving tectonic plate inside her brain.

It was last 21st September. As soon as Soumen left for office the heartbeat of Nomrota increased a bit. That was the time for her to leave the house. She took some cloths, a towel, brush, toothpaste, soap, comb and slipper in her backpack. Before locking the door she looked back her household of long 25 years. All seemed to be insignificant except her bookshelf on the wall. She took off her backpack to take some of the books from the shelf. But soon she realized that how difficult to select few books from her lifelong collections. Though she wasted around one hour, yet she failed to select. Suddenly a thought flashed in her mind, ‘Let me taste a bookless life for once!’

Nomrota then started. Destination was Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus. Sitting in the waiting room when she checked her wristwatch, it was around 12 noon. Only a long waiting was left before her eyes. Yet she couldn’t understand, for what she was waiting? She checked her backpack and found a ticket of Rajdhani Express. And the ticket contains only her name. That means she had to go somewhere. But what she had to do there? Everything got messed up in her brain. All the nearby faces looked hazy. A known voice started ringing in her ears, ‘If you can’t obey my words, then give me relief Nomrota, please’. Yes, she could remember now. Freedom! Yes, she also thought about the freedom. But freedom was for whom? Was it for her or for someone else?

She got into the train and tried to arrange herself. But her eyes tried to look outside the window only. Her eyes were looking for the alternative words for waiting. She got a jolt as the train got a little push. No, the train didn’t start. The engine had been attached only. She dragged herself from her engrossed thought of existence and looked back to the platform. She could only see a jungle of compressed black heads in front of her eyes. All the faces were looking hazy. She got confused whether she was looking for a particular face. The alternative words of freedom were swinging inside her brain. Heartbeat was going away.

Green signal! The known curly hairstyle was visible on the top of all the black heads