- best-of
“You have to see it,” My brother told me.
“I want to go back.”
On our third day, we went looking for train tickets to Agra.
We started near Connaught Place, moving from one travel agency to the next.
“Any trains to Agra?”
The agent tapped at his computer, studied the screen for a few seconds, then shook his head.
“No trains available. You need a private driver.”
He quoted his prices. We thanked them and walked out.
At the next shop, we tried again.
“No trains. Private car?”
Again, we left.
By evening, we’d spent hours moving between agencies.
Then we ran into some of my brother’s school friends.
They pointed us around the corner.
“Any trains to Agra?”
The man called the shop next door.
A few minutes later, someone brought over cups of hot chai that he set down while the agent worked at his computer.
This time, the search took longer.
~
The next morning, my brother and I pushed our way through New Delhi Railway Station.
Fluorescent lights blazed overhead.
The smells of chai and diesel floated over the tracks.
A vendor shouted over a portable loudspeaker.
Boxes of live chickens were stacked along the platform.
Our train was an hour late.
We sat on the floor, leaning against one of the metal supports holding up the corrugated roof.
A small crowd had gathered—the other travelers sitting nearby in huddled groups with their bags pulled close around them.
A commotion caught the corner of my eye.
A group of children moved along the concrete platform.
Barefoot.
Some were shirtless.
They stopped beside each group of travelers and held out their hands.
Most people ignored them.
The children moved on.
Then the shouting started.
I looked over.
Several of the boys had surrounded a man and were pulling at his backpack. He held onto the strap with both hands, leaning backward and digging his feet into the concrete.
One boy pulled.
Another grabbed the bottom of the bag.
The man shouted.
The backpack slipped free.
One of the boys ran.
The others scattered after him.
My brother nudged me.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small handful of bills.
“It’s enough.”
I put my hand over the money belt.
My passport.
My camera.
Then deliberately moved my hands somewhere else, and I looked back at the children.
The noise started again somewhere down the platform.
A child shouted.
Someone yelled back.
A train horn sounded in the distance.
My brother was already standing.
“It’s enough.”
Then he walked toward the children with the bills still in his hand.
When the train arrived, our carriage was already full, the bench seats holding people the way a shelf holds books.
We found our places anyway, showing our tickets and watching people shuffled until we could sit.
My brother took the seat nearest the window.
I took the edge. The vinyl still felt warm.
Once the train pulled out, the city thinned into tents and agriculture.
I watched families crouched close to the rails, cooking over small fires. Men stood with their backs turned, a few steps from the tracks.
I looked away when the window framed someone looking back.
Our agent had reserved us seats, but the reservation felt like a suggestion.
If I leaned forward, someone rested on the backrest behind me.
If I left a strip of bench, a hip found it.
When I shifted my feet, a boy slid into the space between my knees.
Each time I stood to stretch, I came back to find someone else in my spot, smiling as if we were playing a game I hadn’t agreed to.
Beggars moved down the aisle in slow traffic. One man stopped beside me and placed his hand on my shin as if we were friends.
His eyes stayed on my face.
“Chale jao,” I said, and he lifted his hand away.
A moment later he set it back down, patient.
I repeated myself.
He waited me out.
There was no room to argue without making a scene, and there was no room for a scene. So, I stared out the window and tried to keep my body small.
~
Later, I felt something wet hit the side of my face.
I blinked and wiped it with my sleeve before I could think. Then I followed the drip back to its source: a kid—maybe fifteen—coming out of the toilet area and walking down the aisle with his left hand held out.
He flicked his fingers as he went, scattering little arcs of water onto shoulders and seat backs.
The bathroom had a hole in the floor. No sink.
A plastic bucket sat inside with cloudy water and a dented metal cup.
I’d seen men go in and come out with their hands dripping—shaking them off wherever they stood.
I felt my face again, and the drops on my cheek suddenly had a history.
I started to stand up.
The words were there in my throat. Then the kid flicked his hand again and no one reacted.
A man beside me kept reading his paper.
A woman adjusted her sari and looked past the boy without flinching.
I sat back down and took out my hand sanitizer and rubbed until my palms burned a little.
To distract me, my brother told me about a train he once took to Varanasi.
He described twelve hours upright in a crush of bodies, then climbing onto a baggage rack when he finally found space.
He said it like a campfire story, but his eyes stayed on my face to see how I was doing.
I tried to laugh. I didn’t do a great job.
After a while he nodded toward the door at the end of the carriage.
It was open.
The metal steps hung over the tracks.
We walked down the aisle and stood at the doorway.
Wind slapped the sweat off my skin.
The sound of the wheels filled my teeth.
He stepped out first, holding the rail with one hand then nodded for me to follow.
I too moved onto the narrow ledge and kept my other hand locked on the handle.
For the next hour we rode there, half outside the train, watching the ground blur inches beneath us.
The air smelled cleaner out there, like rust and dirt dust.
It felt cleaner.
~
At some point the engine jerked and the train slowed onto a side spur.
The countryside pressed in—dark trees, wet earth, a few lights far off.
People jumped down. We did too—because everyone did.
A dozen men ran into the trees without speaking. They didn’t look back. Behind them, the train waited, idling, lights shaking with the vibration.
Then the couplers clanked, and the cars tugged forward.
We ran beside our carriage, hands sliding on the painted metal, and pulled ourselves up as it gathered speed.
Inside, the aisle had filled again.
Someone had taken our seats.