Myself

Something That Happened

The route to my house involves a transfer at Culver City Transit Center. Usually, if I time it right, I get the second bus minutes after the first bus arrive there. The sweetest days are the ones when both buses come into the Transit Center at the same time, and I breezily hop out of the first and walk over to the second, not even looking up from the iPad, knocking the old ladies aside and elbowing the other commuters just so I can get in and take my pick of the seats. My experience in India makes me extra-aggressive in other countries.

Actually, I am sweet and totally let the old ladies get in first. Just so you know.

This happened on one of those evenings when things weren’t going right. One of those awful days at work that makes you want to pick up a baseball bat, then toss it aside and pick up a scimitar instead, wave it a few times just to hear that nice swishy sound, and then turn to the baseball bat again. And then you proceed to trash your computer into teeny-weeny pieces of glass, plastic and metal, shouting “Who’s your daddy now, huh?” over and over again. Yes, and as the clock strikes 6, you strike it right back and walk out with your head held high.

A day like this would feel a little better (and kinder to the universe at large) if I managed to catch the second bus immediately when the first bus reached the Transit Center. If only. That did not happen, and I gnashed my teeth in impotent rage when I stepped down from the first bus to see the second one turning around the corner. I took a deep breath, allowing Nature to chuckle and savor its moment in the sun. The next bus was 45 minutes away. I walked toward the bench and sat down, heaving a sigh.

Any other day, I would have sat there and people-watched to my heart’s content. Usually that time of the day would see a lot of shoppers milling around. Chubby young women and nattily dressed men waiting for other buses. A bunch of Japanese girls, dressed to kill, chattering away on their pink and white cellphones. A skateboarder or two, a few bikers, executives holding their evening lattes and briefcases. You get all kinds at the bus stop, every single day, a familiar pattern of faces and dresses. But that summer day, I was too pissed to notice anyone around me. I sat in a corner of the metal bench willing the minutes to pass by faster, Eminem spitting murder and mayhem in my ears. I probably had a very don’t-mess-with-me look on my face, because no one came and sat next to me.

And then, from the corner of my eye, I saw this little girl.

She was there with her mother, and the lady was sitting on the other end of the bench, far away from me. The little girl must have been five or six years old, and she was, like any other young lady her age, trying to extricate as much joy as she could from her surroundings. She ran after one of the skateboarders, stopped suddenly and grinned at someone, and then felt embarrassed and ran to her mother. She spent some time investigating the underside of the bench, discovered that she could crawl from one end to the other, and began playing hide-and-seek with anyone who looked at her.

I did not. I was feeling too antisocial to let the sight of something like that make me feel any better. If you know what I mean. I went back to staring at the distance and let reality fade away into the thump and growl of my earphones.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the little girl stop and stare at me.

I looked at her. I looked away from her. And then looked again.

She was still staring.

Any other day, I would have smiled at her. A nice friendly smile that would have acknowledged her presence and reassured her of her importance in the fabric of life at the bus stop. Maybe she would have smiled back, looked away and then would go  back to her playful running around. None of what followed would have happened. But I did not. I looked at her without moving a muscle on my face, and then looked away again. It was nothing personal, believe me. As far as I was concerned, all the cumulative cuteness in the universe would not have gotten me out of my blue funk that evening.

As you may imagine, this just made the girl try harder to get my attention. She began to run around me, giggle loudly, stop for a while and look at me again. Wanting me to look at her and smile, or at least acknowledge her presence. Yes, it was obvious. No, I did not relent.

After some time, she quietened down and went towards her mother, who was talking animatedly to someone else. Being a little curious, I turned slightly towards her to see what she would do. She took a bunch of papers from out of her mother’s purse, and came over and plonked down right next to me. Now, it was her turn to pretend like she had nothing to do. I watched her as she flipped through the sheets of paper in her hand, each of which was a drawing, presumably by her. They were childish scrawls done in crayon. A house and a tree. A bird. Trees on a beach. An apple. She flipped through each of them slowly, with deliberation, like she was trying to come to a decision. When time she came to the last one, the apple, she glanced up at me, and took the drawing out. And held it out to me.

I had no idea what to do.

I could sense that some of the other adults at the bus stop noticed the goings-on, some of them smiling to themselves, others just curious about what would happen next. I flicked my head towards the girl’s mother, who by then had stopped her conversation, and was staring at her daughter trying to offer a stranger a drawing. Everybody seemed eager to see what I did, how I would respond.

I folded. I took the paper from her. Looked at it. Looked at it some more. And then I handed it back to her. She shook her head, and ran back to her mother. Looked back at me again and smiled.

I remembered something, something I had forgotten to do that morning. I took the piece of paper, unzipped my bag and put it inside. Zipped it up. I looked at my little art benefactor, looked her right in the eye. Then I turned to my bag, and stared at it. Stared at it long and hard and even frowned a little, like I was willing something to happen. She looked puzzled, and more than a little bemused at my strange behavior.

And then I unzipped my bag, took out the apple that I had packed as a snack that morning and had forgotten to eat at the office, and crunched into it.

I believe it was the expression on her face, as well as the moment in itself, that caused the spontaneous outburst of laughter and the scattered applause.

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