It happens....

I grinned at the librarian as I walked past her. She rolled her eyes in response but smiled nevertheless. As usual I was the last to leave. The librarian used to joke that I’d probably never leave if she didn’t ask me to when the closing time comes. Eh….it’s probably true though. What better place to find quiet and peace than a library!

My hostel is about 20 minutes walking distance from the library for a normal person. However it takes me a solid 40 minutes to reach my hostel. Stumpy corgi kinda legs are to be blamed for this.

Anyways, I made a beeline from the library to the nearest food stall and bought a sandwich, then finally started my way back home. Winter is almost here and the streets looked dark and forlorn even at 7:30. My way back home just consists of a long curvy road with a few streetlights here and there. There were trees on one side of the road while a quite a many individual shops were open on the other side. After the shops, if you follow the road, there is a catholic school, a children’s park and then a bus stop. The bus stop is near a traffic intersection and it’s probably the brightest lit area of the entire road. My hostel was just a few more steps ahead of hat.

I usually used to take this route to go back since usually around this time, people returned from their jobs, so the street wasn’t empty. With my earphones on and my beloved warm sandwich in my hands, it was really very pleasant daily routine for me.

Today, though, for some reason, i was getting all bad vibes and feeling buzzy. Hmm….my instincts are almost never right (shrug), so I didn’t pay any attention to it.

 I started walking along the tree line on one end of the road. That’s where the streetlights are. Anyways, I noticed a young girl walking fairly quickly about 10 steps in front of me. She must be going back home from the coaching class hats situated near the library. because of her speed, she had gone a little more farther than me when I started noticing something weird. She kept glancing sideways to the other end of the street. My eyes followed her nervous peek and I saw a guy walking with his hands on his pocket on the other side.

What’s going on?

I noticed that the guy seemed older. Maybe 30ish something but it was hard to tell. He kept matching her pace and seemed quite adamant on looking inconspicuous.

Ok creepy guy, that’s not working….

We had just walked past the row of shops, when I got the shock of my life. The guy started crossing the road to come to our side. The alarm bells were going on my mind and I quickly called 100 ( Indian Police) and told the operator the area we were in. I knew it would be a total disaster if the guy turned out to be her uncle or something.

I turned around to find help but the street looked empty apart from a few random vehicles whizzing past in full speed. I could see a few other people walking but they were far from us and there was no way I could call for their attention without alerting the creep in front of me. My pounding heart and inability to keep my eyes off the incident kept me from waiving down a car.

Due to their speeds they were probably 30 feet from me now but I have crazy good eyesight. I could see the guy clearly now. He was tall, was wearing spectacles and looked kinda older than 30.

My pace had turned into a sprint by this time, placing my hands on my bag so that the laptop inside it doesn’t make much noise. They were a good 20 feet from me now but the guy had started talking to the girl. For a moment I considered throwing my heavy bag at him but there was a 90% chance that I wouldn’t even reach the guy if I threw from here.

Then, like magic, I came up with a stupidly brilliant plan. The two people in front of us had finally noticed the chubby and kinda huge girl half sprinting half walking behind them.

I mustered all of my courage and did something that I’m sure could have gone wrong in so many ways. Now, I’m someone who looks way more matured than my actual age. This worked in my favor, I guess..

“OYE! YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE HOME HALF AN HOUR AGO! WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!? THAT TOO TALKING TO A MAN AT THIS TIME!! I WAS WORRIED SICK! YOU JUST WAIT TILL WE GET HOME, I’LL LET YOUR FATHER KNOW ABOUT THIS. “

I shouted looking at the girl, trying to impersonate the voice in which my mom scolded me.

I didn’t stop walking towards them, angrily. Even though I was still at some distance with them, I could tell that the guy looked like a deer caught in headlights.

“WHO ARE YOU?” I barked at him so suddenly he actually jumped away a bit , “ WHAT KIND OF GUY TALKS TO STRANGER GIRLS AT NIGHT? EXCUSE ME. LOOK AT ME WHEN I AM TALKING TO YOU. OYE! WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ARE GOING HUH? SAW A YOUNG GIRL AND STARTED FOLLOWING. DON’T YOU HAVE MOTHER SISTER AT HOME? “

 He moved backwards till he was at the middle of the road and then turned and crossed it, then he glanced at us. I had stopped and was giving him the stink eye. He started walking back from the path he came from but still frequently glanced back. I kept staring at him till he went past me on the other side, and then took long strides towards the girl who was staring wide eyed at the whole ordeal.

I grabbed her elbow when I reached her and walked furiously till the intersection point, where there were many people around. We didn’t talk even a word till we reached there. Finally, I turned half fearing that guy was following us but there was no one there.

I finally apologized to the girl if I had scared her and explained that I had to get her away from him. She still looked damn shaky and her voice was quivering when she told me that he had been loitering outside her coaching class for some days and today he just started following her. I tried to get her calm a little but there was little I could do. I was terrified myself and all those days of binge watching Criminal Minds was kinda not helping my blood pressure levels. 

The police came while we were walking past the intersection bus stop. We described as much as we could. The police dropped us to our destinations and I’m so grateful they did. I don’t think I had enough strength to walk anymore. The girl, her name was Sumukhi, hugged me and thanked me profusely when she reached home. I made it a point to see her off to her home before coming to my hostel. 

Turns out, looking older than your actual age can be beneficial too.

I wonder what would have happened if I had left the library early or if I hadn’t done what I did. It was dangerous; I agree but think about it for a minute. What would you have done?

We see so many news about women getting assaulted on a daily basis. It’s a scary world out there. We got to take care of ourselves and I know we would rather jump off a cliff than confront a criminal, but all we have is each other.

Take care, guys and stay safe. And never doubt your instincts. They may help you save a life.