Indian Unfolding: Musings Of A Small Town

A girl who ran away

My home was in Firozabad. I made bangles there. Glass bangles in all colours, some of them were plain, some glittery, some hand crafted.
Until one day my mother handed me a set of red bangles and I was taken to a new place where I shared a small room with some boy, who would hold me tight while sleeping. It didn't let me sleep, so I slept through the day. The fat grown up lady there kept telling me to cook dal, but I didn't know how to. I missed bangles.

One day I took mine off to play with them. The grown up lady saw me and I took a beating from her. The boy didn't hold me that night. For the first time in that place I slept through the night. And I had a lovely dream.

The next day, the fat lady took off my bangles. My wrists felt nice without the weight. The lady gave me a new dress to wear. I told her I wanted to learn how to cook dal. She told me that I wouldn't be needing that anymore.

Two heavily built ladies, who sounded like men came and took me away. Their place was bigger than the fat lady's. I had a bed and curtains around it. They fed me good. I had good night's sleep too.

One night the lady woke me up and told me that she is giving me a friend, I should let him do what he wants. I let him but whatever that was, it hurt. It didn't look like a beating but it hurt more. I couldn't sleep for a couple of days after that. The pain went away after a while. Now each night a new man would do the same thing to me. It didn't hurt so much now. But I missed bangles.

So one day I ran away. I started walking to where I could hear the train. I wanted to go to Firozabad, but I didn't know how. So I got on a train, slept for a while and got down at this place. It's been a while that I am living here. This city has a river flowing through it. I found work selling balloons at the traffic signals. They call it char rasta here. I live outside a huge building where people leave with a lot of bags in their hands. There are swings outside the building where people sit quietly, really close to each other during the night. I sit there too sometimes but I have to leave when someone asks me to.

I made friends here. These four girls come here quite often. They wave at me and unlike the other people, they don't sit in silence. They play songs sing at the top of their voices. These are the same songs that played on loudspeakers back at Firozabad when someone was getting married. I like these songs. And these girls. They dance their way to their home. I follow them. They sometimes get ice-creams on the char rasta by their home. One time they saw me looking at them and bought me an ice-cream too. One of them asked me who I was. I told her my name. She asked what I liked. I told her that I liked bangles. She told me that she would get me some. I met them a couple of times after that, always asking her about the bangles. Then one night, she got them for me and put them on. The girls told me they were going away, back to where they came from. I wanted to go back too. But I have bangles now. Feels like home.