The Girl With Jute Bag

I just made it in time. My train at New Delhi railway station would have left the platform, thanks to the overloaded truck which collapsed right behind me near the station and wasted 30 precious minutes. Somehow, just made it.

“Seat number 21. It’s mine, young lady,” I confronted the young girl occupying my seat in B2 coach.

“Oh sure. It was unoccupied so far. You just made it in time,” she looked into my eyes. “Actually,” she said hesitatingly, “I am ticketless.”

“Why?” I asked her politely. She seemed to be from a decent family, and saw no reason she saving money on the ticket.

“Could not get the booking. All booked.” Then, she smiled gently, “No worries. Will settle with the TT.”

She must have been around 23 or 24, and damn cute. Her voice had innocence and expressions so serene. The long, curly hairstyle suited her well.

“Well ok, you can share the space with me. I don’t mind,” I said.

“Neither will I,” she placed her jute bag on the left corner of the seat. I adjusted my trolley bag under the seat.

“So which station are you going to get down at?” I asked casually. She kept quiet. I did not repeat. She probably did not want to tell, and it was not my business after all.

I bent and pulled out a pack of cream biscuits from my bag. I offered her one, which she accepted readily.

“Chocolate flavor, my favorite,” she spoke while munching the biscuit. I offered her more, but she refused.

“So you travelling alone?” the pretty girl asked me.

“I’m going to Jalandhar to attend a family function. My wife and kids are already there. I had some official commitments, so…” I explained.

“Hmm, okay. So you are married, don’t look like though,” she smiled at me. I was 32 and looked my age. Don’t know why she felt different. Anyways, I smiled back.

“By the way, I am also going to Jalandhar to collect my college degree. I hail from Punjab.”

“Okay, nice to meet you, miss…” I paused.

“Sonika. But all my loved ones call me Soni,” she smiled again, this time flirtatiously. “You too can call me Soni.”

“Okay, Sonika,” I hesitated, “Soni, I mean…”

I went to the loo. When I returned, I found the girl comfortably seated on my seat. It was mid-December, but she was dressed in yellow shorts and her bare legs spread across the seat, leaving little space for me. I could not help but look at her legs. I was a man after all.

“Oh, sorry. Please come,” she sat with her legs folded. I adjusted myself and pretended to read a magazine I had carried. We did not talk for the next half an hour. Meanwhile, she kept text messaging someone.

Then suddenly, she came closer and whispered, “You were staring at my legs?”

“What? No. Why would I?” I replied, feeling a bit embarrassed. She must have noticed me starting at her.

“Why wouldn’t you? Are you not a man?” She looked straight into my eyes.

“No…I mean yes I am. But I did not…”

“That’s okay, I did not mind,” Sonika winked. I felt jittery and decided to keep mum.

We casually conversed every now and then to kill time. She told me a lot about herself, and I gradually developed a certain fondness for her. We were just about to reach the destination.

“All right then, it was good to know you,” Sonika stood up as the train halted at the Jalandhar station.

“The feeling is mutual. Take care Soni,” I replied.

“Hope to see you again,” she waved me goodbye and was out of my sight within seconds.

Me too, I wished. But that was never going to happen. I pulled out my bag from under the seat and just as I was about to leave, I noticed the jute bag lying in the corner. Alas! That was Sonika’s bag. How did she forget? I picked it up and ran but it was too late. I felt some sort of personal responsibility to return it to the owner.

“Let me scroll and see if I get a clue,” I murmured. I checked the jute bag and found a few documents, some ladies’ stuff, and a note which read:

444, Preet Nagar, Sodal Road

Unfamiliar with the city roads, I enquired about the address and an old man told me it was some 3 km from the railway station. Though unsure if that address would actually lead to Sonika, I still decided to give it a shot. May be we were destined to meet again. I waved at an auto.

“Preet Nagar, Sodal Road. Chaloge?” I asked the auto-rickshaw driver.

“Meter se nahi chalega sa’ab,” he replied promptly.

“Theek hai, chalo.” It did not matter. Delhi was just the same.

We eventually reached as he asked me to step out of the rickshaw. “Sa’ab, yahin kahin hoga 444 number.” I paid him the fare and started hunting for the address.

“Right in this lane, somewhere at the end of it,” a shopkeeper pointed, helping me with the address.

“441…442…443, oh there it is,” I said to myself, and reached house # 444. It was a single storied building, old and shabby.

I rang the bell twice, but nobody turned up. I wondered if anybody lived there. I stepped inside and heard a female voice talking loudly on phone. It was Sonika.

“Sonika!” I called her name in excitement.

“Goodness gracious me! What are you doing here?” she jumped in surprise.

“You hoped to see me again, so here I am,” I smiled. “Here’s your bag,” I handed over the jute bag to her.

“Oh, thank you so much. I was getting crazy. It has some of my very important documents,” she asserted, feeling relaxed.

“Yes, I saw them.”

“But how did you reach here?” she asked, eyes wide in astonishment.

“That note in your bag. It had the address of this house. So I thought…”

“Thank you again. This is my chachi’s house. I will be here for a couple of days,” she told me. “Coffee?”

“Well, I am getting late. I would rather leave,” I stood up.

“C’mon, let me do this much for you,” she came closer and kissed me before I could react.

“That was a thank-you kiss. 2 minutes, and I’ll be back with the coffee,” she rushed into the kitchen.

I was in a fix. One part of me wanted to leave, but the other part dominated and I stayed back. I love coffee.

She returned with two coffee mugs while I was still engrossed in thoughts.

“Don’t worry. There is nobody else in the house,” she comforted me. Sonika sat next to me and gave me my cup of coffee. She picked her coffee mug from the table and cheered, “Cheers!”

“Cheers!” I joined her.

The next thing I remember was my head spinning and her pretty face gradually fading as I lost my consciousness. I woke up with a heavy head, only to find myself semi-naked under a velvet blanket.

“What the fuck?” I breathed heavily. I searched for my phone but damn, it was missing. The wall clock struck 5. It was still dark outside.

Gosh! What happened last night? And where was Sonika? Nothing happened last night, I assured myself. I was freaking out. I put on my shirt and leather jersey.

“Sonika….Soni….” I shouted. No response. I was hell nervous and was sweating badly. I checked one room but no one was there. Kitchen. No one. Restroom. No one. Lobby area. No one. Finally, I pushed hard door of the second room which was a bit jammed.

And there she was. But…dead! The sight sent a chill down my spine. The girl was lying in a pool of blood, brutally murdered. I froze for a few seconds. Then, realizing the gravity of the situation, I ran out of the house and ran and ran until I thought I was distant enough from 444, Preet Nagar, Sodal Road.

2 days later

“What connection did you have with the girl?” the police inspector roared.

“Which girl, inspector sa’ab?” I tried to play innocent.

A tight slap answered all my questions.

“Tera bag mila hai hamein uske ghar se. Ladki ke saath teri photos bhi. Dirty Picture. Samjha?” Yes, I had left the trolley bag before I ran for my life. And nude pictures? Oh boy! It was game over.

I revealed them all but they said I was talking stupid. I had no guts to talk to my wife but I knew she must have been frantically searching for me. We had not communicated for the last 3 days, and I had no clue about my mobile phone.

Eventually, I called her from the police station and she cried hard on the phone. I hired a lawyer who, after listening to my case, gave me little hope but promised he would fight hard.

“Life term or may be a death sentence,” the police inspector told me. “Tere finger prints mile hain knife se. Pehli baar murder kiya hai kya?” he laughed. That was not funny.

I mostly kept quite. Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw death. The court hearings over the next few months brought me closer to losing the case.

3 years, 4 months, and 5 days later

“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to Vaibhav & Vishal. Happy birthday to you!” we all sung the birthday song for our twin kids. They both had turned 5 and we had called in our relatives to celebrate.

“It was great fun today,” my wife said later in the night, as she prepared the bed to sleep. “The kids were so happy!”

“Yes,” I smiled at her. A tear rolled down her cheek.

“Hey, what happened?” I asked her for her sudden change of emotion.

“I just thank the almighty to be kind to us. We could have never experienced these moments had that criminal not confessed to his crime 3 years ago,” my wife recalled.

“Oh, c’mon. Stop thinking about it. It’s past,” I put my arms around her and pecked her on the cheek, wiping her tears. I turned the lights off for her to sleep.

It’s easier said than done. Whatever happened to us 3 years back was not forgettable. The images of murdered Sonika still haunted me. I closed my eyes and got lost in the past…

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“Kismet hai teri. Someone has confessed to your crime,” the inspector said, signaling the hawaldar to let me breathe free.

“I told you I did not commit any crime,” I spoke as I stepped out from behind the bars. “Who did it?” I asked him inquisitively.

“He says he knows you,” the inspector replied and walked out of the police station.

I met him later in the jail. He was Prashant Bhushan, my junior in the office against whom I had complained a couple of times regarding matters which involved huge amounts of corporate money. After he was proved the culprit, he was thrown out and I was rewarded a promotion.

“So that was your revenge, huh?” I grit my teeth in anger.

“Yes it was,” he replied with firmness in his voice.

“So why did you confess?” I still couldn’t believe my luck.

“That’s a long story.”

“I want to know. I guess I have the right to know after my suffering in jail, courtesy you,” I gave him a cold stare.

“I planned to kill two birds with one stone. Revenge was all on my mind, from you and from Sonika.” Prashant paused for a few seconds, looked at me and revealed, “Sonika was my girlfriend.”

“What!” I exclaimed in astonishment. “She was your girlfriend, and you killed her! But how did you do that all? Tell me, now,” I commanded.

“We had been seeing each other for the last 2 years. Lately, she had gotten very possessive about me, obsessed. She acted weird all the time. I had lost my freedom, myself. She was nothing but an albatross around my neck.”

“So you murdered her and trapped me. And how did you do that?” I asked.

“Well, Sonika had asked me to marry her. I wanted to get rid of her, so I promised I would marry her if she’ll assist me, and she agreed readily. As part of the plan, I managed to learn about your visit to Jalandhar. And then….,” he continued after a short pause, “And then I searched for an empty house. A friend of mine knew a property dealer in the city, so he helped me,” he spilled the beans.

“And what did you tell Sonika?”

“I told her about your role in getting me suspended from the workplace, and the miserable life that followed. Girls are very emotional, you see,” Prashant asserted. “I wanted to create havoc in your personal life. As a first step, I asked Sonika to get her nude pictures clicked with you,” he explained.

“And she got ready to be clicked?” I asked in a thoughtful manner.

“Yes, she knew she was doing all this for me. And her face was nowhere in the frame. So for her, it was kind of okay to pose with you like that,” he replied.

“And then?”

“After clicking the pictures, I killed her with a knife,” he told me in a casual manner.

“My fingerprints were on the weapon…”

“That was necessary to get you trapped. Earlier, I had taken your fingerprints on the knife while Sonika was away in the washroom and you were lying in the bed, unconscious,” Prashant explained.

“Hmm…I got it all. But tell me, after all that meticulous planning, I am restless to know what made you come to my rescue. You know the consequences of your confession,” I told him.

“I know. But I am broken-hearted. Don’t feel like living,” he said, mournfully.

“Why? What happened?” I asked him.

“It’s all because of that bitch. I contacted her on a social networking website, we eventually met, and gradually fell in love,” he told me.

“So you were two-timing Sonika…” I stated the obvious.

“Don’t know. It just happened.”

“You rascal! And you say Sonika behaved in an over-possessive manner. You surely had lost interest in her after your new love interest.”

He kept quite. He knew that every word of my statement was right. It was too late now.

“Then what happened?” I wanted him to finish the story.

“She cheated on me. Her parents had found a match for her who was financially very sound and also had plans to settle abroad. I was no match for her, according to Megha.” Prashant’s shaky voice indicated he would weep anytime.

“Megha, oh, you mean your social networking girlfriend...”

“Yes. She dumped me. I was madly in love with her. She got married day before yesterday. I do not want to live now, hate myself,” he sighed.

“See, Megha dumped you after you murdered Sonika. That’s God’s justice,” I said.

“Go away. It’s all finished,” Prashant lamented.

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I woke up next morning at 10 am. It felt as if I didn’t sleep at all after the kids’ birthday party last night. My eyes were burning from the lack of sleep.

Later in the afternoon, my wife got a phone call.

“My uncle has expired, Jalandhar wale tauji,” my wife told me after the phone call.

“Oh, sorry to hear that,” I sighed.

“We should visit them tomorrow,” she said. “But I can’t go, need to stay back with children,” she expressed her concern.

“Then?” I asked, and waited for her to speak.

“You leave. You’ll easily get a bus.”

“All right then, I’ll go to express our condolences to the family.”

I boarded the early morning bus to Jalandhar the next day. The seat next to me was vacant, until a young lady came in the front and occupied it. I looked at her, and then got busy reading newspaper. She was attractive.

“Have you been to Jalandhar earlier?” she interrupted.

“Long time back. Why?” I asked.

“Actually…I am travelling to Jalandhar for the first time, and I’m alone. So if you could do me a favor and help me reach the venue…”

“Well, I have to reach somewhere urgently. May I know the location address…I can try,” I tried to help her out.

“Yeah, it’s….sorry, got a call,” Kolaveri Di played out loud from her cellphone.

I resumed the piece of news I was reading, and as the time passed by, I dozed off in the bus.

“Mister,” a female voice woke me up. It was the girl sitting next to me. “We have reached the city,” she said.

“Oh, okay,” I stood up as the bus applied the brakes.

“It was nice meeting you,” she shook hands with me. “My name is Priyanka.”

“Avaneesh Mathur,” I responded.

She left the bus, and her bag. She was carrying a small, designer jute bag which was now lying on her seat. I picked it up hastily, and shouted from the side window as she was still within my sight, “Lady, lady….Priyanka, your bag….”

She probably didn’t hear me and disappeared in the crowd. I was getting late and hence decided to hand over the bag to bus authorities. Suddenly, a beep sound diverted my attention. There was an SMS on her mobile handset, which Priyanka had left in the bag. Apart from that, there was nothing else; just a piece of paper, which I flipped, and I read, and I shivered, and I trembled, and the note sent shock waves through my soul. It read:

444, Preet Nagar, Sodal Road

(End of Story)