All of us live with our past. All of us allow it to shape our future. But some of us know how to shrug off the past. I think that is who I am…or to be truthful, that is who I used to be.
Before this evening, I was a practical girl who did not let clouds of impossible dreams bring torrents of ambitions flooding down into life. Years ago, I had forsaken my dream of becoming a singer, and I was content to toil at a 9 to 7 job to have a fixed, modest amount credited to my account at the end of each month. My relationship with my school friends gradually started weakening as they reminded me of my unrealized dreams. Every time they started talking about how I used to win every singing competition in my school, I felt my heart being pricked by an invisible needle.
I think one does not become adult when one celebrates one's eighteenth birthday; adulthood begins with the realization of the difference between dreams and reality. And I had no complaints about this difference. I had forgotten my past long ago, the past where I dreamed of becoming a singer, the past where I dreamed of reading all the classics once I finished school. I had even forgotten my hobbies. Months had passed since I had watched TV, something without which I couldn’t survive in my school days. But like a gust of wind, an incident which took place this evening blew away the fog of my past dreams.
I was at the stop near my office waiting for the bus that would take me home. It was raining heavily. The sky looked like a young lady in a gray dress, weeping bitterly for her lover who was faraway. I was tired after a long day’s work at office, so I sat on the wooden seat under the shelter. There was no one else at the bus stop, and that was a pleasant change for me for I loved being alone. The seat was a comfortable one, and could easily accommodate two people. Just as I had put my office bag beside me on the seat, I heard a sound. It was the sound of someone running through the puddles of rain water. I looked in the direction where the sound was coming from. A man was running towards the bus stop, holding an office bag over his head. The bag was no help keeping him dry from the rain. He stood near the seat, panting. I felt that I had seen him somewhere.
“Could you please…?” he said, pointing towards my bag, which lay innocently on the seat.
“Oh, yes! No problem!” I said, taking the bag to put it over my lap.
He sat beside me. I got a close look at his face. "Is it him...?" I asked myself. Yes...it was indeed him. But he was looking much different without his glasses.
At that moment, the past was pleading like a timid tenant for me to let it come back into my life. And I allowed it to come in.
Ten years before, I used to take the bus to school. I had to wait for my bus at the stop near my home. The waiting time varied from fifteen to fifty minutes. One day, when the bus was later than usual, I grew tired of looking at the gaudy shutters of the shops which had not yet opened in the early morning. So, I started singing my favorite song.
In the middle of the song, I felt that someone was looking at me! A boy with thick glasses covering a large portion of his shy face was staring at me. I felt awkward, and he must have felt the same, for he started to look away after I caught him looking at me. We didn’t speak a word to each other. After half an hour, my bus came, and I got on. I intentionally chose a seat where he could not see me.
From then on, each day he used to arrive at the bus stop before I did, and we used to wait for our respective school buses without speaking anything to each other. He just used to look at me, and blushed whenever I caught him. It was evident that he had developed a soft spot in his heart for me since the first day he saw me. But I didn’t want to be involved in any such thing. So, I adopted a cold attitude towards him, so that he wouldn’t get any wrong signals from me. I behaved in a haughty manner, in front of him. But sometimes it was hard for me to suppress my giggles at his nervousness in front of me.
