The week that was & its effects!

The train had just passed Kalyan Jn and was speeding towards Mumbai … I had gone to use the rest room and that’s when I heard this man talking outside the rest room. He was probably on the phone asking if it’s ok to be kept at the station. There was nothing out of the ordinary in that until he said “more would die there”. I was rooted to my spot. Then for a few seconds there was silence. I opened the door as stealthily as possible and peeped out. A man, wearing pant and shirt was standing a few feet away with his back towards me and was fiddling with his cell phone. I did not know what to do. Not having any thing to use as weapon, I just pushed him with all my might and started hitting him. He fell by the compartment corridor and the few people who were there in the compartment, looked out on hearing the noise … I was shouting he is a terrorist but there was no reaction as such … then a man came hurriedly towards us and shouted something which I could not understand. I looked up and saw that he had a gun in his hand … he did not look like a cop so I assumed that the man I had jumped was not alone. All I could do was shout on top of my voice … this new guy was also shouting until he raised his gun and fired at me … All I felt was a push on my chest and then I don’t remember anything …
No! Not coz I was dead (which would be obvious) but because I had woken up …feeling terrified and disoriented … the darkness around me seemed scary till I heard a dog bark and it brought me back to my senses … I was not dead… I was at home … on my bed … no guns, no terrorists … I was safe … that was what I was saying to myself. I saw this dream yesterday night … I looked at the time on my cell and it was 1.25 am … thank god it was not an early morning dream …(for they say that early morning dreams often come true … though I haven’t had any such luck …) I could still remember the guys face … and that unnerved me all the more. Tossing and turning, I tried to close my eyes but it was not so easy going back to sleep. Probably watching all the Bombay attack on tv and reading about the experiences and the deaths for the past 5 days had taken its toll on me … lying there in the dark, looking at the silhouette or the fan, I realized that it was such a big thing … being alive!

I could not go back to sleep after that. After a few minutes, I looked at the cell again. It was 2.40 am … more than an hour had passed since I had woken up. There have been continuous reports of how the terrorists had come in to Bombay or Mumbai … how they attacked the Taj and Oberoi hotels and ghastly recounts of how people were mercilessly gunned down at the CST and Leopold and Nariman house…. It could have happened to anyone… I might have been at one of those places and I would have also perished… it hit me then as if a basketball had hit my face (ever had that happening to you? It is sheer agony, trust me). What could I have done? I couldn’t have dodged those Kalashnikov bullets … I couldn’t have stopped time like Mr. Anderson did in matrix and blown them bullets away (though I wish that was possible)… If The Dream I saw, had not been a dream I would have been dead! As simple as that…

6.30 AM - The alarm went off but I was ready for it … I picked up my cell and called my family … though I could not talk to all but did manage to catch my mom who is usually up well before 6.30 … I just wished her good morning and did some small talk … but I what I really wanted to tell her and other people of my family was that I really love them and they mean the world to me …. I wanted to hug each and everyone but they were too far away for me to do that… we don’t know what’s going to happen … to whom and when … this has always been the case but when such incidents occur, it makes you realize all the more. Why have regrets … why feel shy or think twice or postpone telling a loved one that they are special. It may or may not cost you to do that but it’s worth every penny spent, every moment lived.

So the next time I meet my family, I am going to give them a big hug … hopefully it should be soon.
Like SRK said a few years back … Kal Ho Na Ho!

~KK