Fair Fare

She pulled her dupatta tightly over her head. The cold air from the A/C chute was biting.
Her mind kept racing back. She looked out of the window. Perspiring motorists. Blinding heat.

“Will this bus go to Tambaram?” the old lady had asked,folds of age flapping about her bones. “I will take the bus to my village from there”.

“Yes”, she had replied, her voice sounding strange.

“But you may not be able to afford fare, this is a special bus”, her glance spoke these unsaid words.

Was she understood? Did her look say the things that wouldn’t come out her mouth? She searched for the old lady in the bus. If only she had had more tact.

Why do they have to make the fare so high? She didn’t need this A/C bus. The office is air-conditioned anyway. Why did it have to be her? Why hadn’t the old woman asked someone else?

She felt caged inside the Volvo bus. It was not her fault that she could afford this bus. It wasn’t her fault either that the old lady couldn’t. She shuffled uneasily in the cushioned seat.

The lady next to her was absently fingering the Ipod dial. What a marvel, this device! And what a model! She thought of her own shuffle, which paled in comparison.
Wish she could afford this one.

“One Tambaram, please”, someone asked the conductor. Her thoughts reeled back to the bus stop. Was the old woman still waiting for the bus? The heat outside was horrible. There was a slight jam. A poorer cousin of the Volvo was belching out excess passengers, who were hanging from all crevices.

Was the poor old thing being nailed by this human sledge-hammer? They should give free rides for the elderly. Especially the ones below the poverty line. She cursed the lawmakers of the land for their ineptitude.

She could have purchased the ticket for the old woman. Brainwaves like this occur only in retrospect.

She got up way ahead of her stop. Balancing in the standee-unfriendly bus drugged her hyper active conscience.

Getting out of the bus, she waited for a while to see if any other 21G would pass by. Nothing was visible as far as her line of sight could reach.

Her legs slowly joined the beat of the street. And she walked into yet another day at the office, her conscience lulled to sleep by the music of monotony.