Chapter 1
Chapter 1
14th March, 2022
It was an unsettling night, very unusual for me. I glanced over at my phone. A wallpaper of Laxmi Narayana peaked back at me. I sighed inwardly. It was two-thirty in the morning. The constant swaying of the train kept me awake. The fan whirred above my head, and the rexine beneath me clung to my exposed shoulders. I tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable, before finally settling on my back. My eyes drifted to the passenger occupying the berth across from mine. She was on a call with someone, engaged in a heated discussion. Her voice rose and fell, as if synchronizing with the train’s rhythmic sway and the steady clack-clack of its wheels. She listened intently to the person on the other end, her sniffling mingling with the low rumble of the train. After a moment, she ended the call and stared at her Android screen for a few minutes, wiping the corners of her eyes. Her face glowed faintly in the screen’s light, accentuating her dark circles. Lovers’ fight? I wondered.
A crisp draft slithered through a half-closed window, making me shiver. I sat up, rubbing my cold feet, and wrapped my red orna tightly around myself. It was surprisingly chilly for a night like this—I hadn’t expected to feel so cold during the journey. The night before, as I stood scrutinizing my suitcase to ensure nothing was amiss, my mother had bustled in with packets of chips and cookies for me to take along. “Be safe out there. Don’t catch a cold,” she said, scurrying after me anxiously. “How many days are you going for again?” My mother is a beautiful woman, even with her nose flared, cheeks flushed, and hair unkempt. “Ten days,” I replied. “What time is your train? Did you check with your father? And your ticket and—?” “Don’t worry, Ma, I have everything sorted,” I interrupted with a clipped smile, hiding how anxious I felt. My father hustled into the room then, carrying fruit and medicine to pack. “Go to sleep early tonight,” he said. The next morning, I left for the train before daybreak. The sun had yet to rise. My Baba carried the suitcase, and I can still recall the dragging sound of its trolley wheels against the pavement. He walked a step ahead of me, grumbling about how heavy it was. “Only God knows how you’ll manage,” he murmured under his breath.
The train jerked to a stop as it reached the next station, letting out a loud squeal that pulled me back to the present. Suddenly, I heard a metallic clang. A few passengers had forced open the door to our compartment, and a stream of people barged inside. I was surprised to find the compartment packed to the brim. The woman from the opposite berth caught my eye as she watched the chaos unfold. Our gazes met, and I mouthed, Is that normal? She shrugged in reply. I noticed a woman, draped in a dark brown shawl, quickly pull a blanket from her plastic bag. She spread it beside a sleeping man on the floor and laid her young child down, resting his head on her lap. She stroked his back gently, lulling him to sleep. One of the new arrivals started grumbling when a stranger tried to sit near his head. Another man attempted to place his luggage on my seat, but a groupmate who’d been sleeping on the lower berth stood up and shoved the bag off. “Don’t let anyone put their things on your seat,” he warned me. It was my first overnight train journey, and no one had advised me to bring bedding or a shawl.
The seat was stiff, its plastic smell lingering on my skin and making a squeaky noise against my jeggings. As the night grew colder, it became even more uncomfortable. A few months earlier, I’d come across an advertisement on Facebook: Cholo Jai Kedarkanth. It featured a stunning, high-resolution image and a short video clip of Kedarkantha’s snow-capped peaks, pristine trails, and dense pine forests. I’d heard of people going on pilgrimages to Kedarnath, but not Kedarkanth. Is it a religious place? I wondered. Swiping through the images, I spotted a trail of people ascending the snowy mountain in colorful ensembles. Fascinated, I read on. The ad promised, Are you ready for the adventure of a lifetime? Join us for 10 days and 9 nights, immersing yourself in pine- and oak-forested snowy Alpine meadows. My skin prickled with goosebumps as I imagined trekking through the dense forest. The snow didn’t call to me—it was the forest that inspired my decision. I was determined to go to Kedarkantha. Convincing my parents, though, had been a struggle. “Do you even know them?” they asked. I lied. “Yes, I do.” It was a tedious journey from Salar to Katwa, where I finally met the team after waiting two hours on the platform. There were fifteen of us, and I’d only met two of them before. Swarup and Archita, the main organizers, seemed friendly and kind, which reassured my mother—she’d tagged along to meet my so-called friends back in December 2021.
At Katwa station, I noticed a short man in a blue jacket, white trousers, and a large hat strolling around with a woman who had distinct facial features—perhaps from the Northeast. I wondered if they might be one of us. They glanced at me curiously too. Several times, I considered approaching them to ask directly but stopped myself, feeling foolish. Later, I got a call from the captain, and I saw the same man join our team, though the woman wasn’t with him—she’d been there to see him off. We all gathered on platform no. 1, where a local train was already waiting. My Baba asked the others to help me during the journey, then stepped off the train. He stood outside, waiting until our train pulled away from the station. After a quick luncheon at Howrah station, we boarded the Upasana express.We huddled our luggage together and shoved it under the lower berth of our compartment for safekeeping. To my surprise, the day went by smoothly.
