It’s easy to grieve with someone who shares
your feelings.
Soon after we lost our second baby, my husband
had to go to New Delhi on a work assignment for a month.
Sometimes, in moments of self-absorption, we
tend to lose our reasoning.
Just being together heals the heart so I
impulsively booked a ticket to New Delhi a few days after he had left.
He had to work late so he couldn’t come to the
airport to pick me up.
I hired a taxi to the hotel where he was
staying.
It was late evening.
I shivered in the freezing air as I came out of
the airport and got into the taxi.
The taxi driver was young and gruff-looking.
I gave him the name of the hotel.
He got into the taxi without a word.
I did not speak too.
He drove for about 15 minutes. We reached a
part of the city which had no streetlights or buildings.
Then the taxi came to a slow halt. We were nowhere near a hotel.
The taxi-driver got out and met his friends in
the dark shadows of the trees.
Not a word to me.
It was only then that I realised that New Delhi had
a reputation for being unsafe for women travellers.
I joined my hands and closed my eyes.
After a few minutes, the taxi-driver got into
the taxi and drove me straight to the hotel.
“Fifty rupees” he said.
I gave him a hundred rupees and said “Thank
you, brother” in Hindi.
(Last December, my brave sister,
Nirbhaya, met demons instead of brothers while travelling in a Delhi bus. May
her soul rest in peace.)
