Tea Kadai Tales

Train of Thought…

Sighing, she looked around the practically empty Velachery station. She desperately needed to sit down! Just put down the files, the laptop, the tote… Damn everything… for a minute… just sit down and think about what to do next… She needed to collect her thoughts. With waiting for a code to run, slides to upload, and watching the sunset through the glass windows of her office, she hadn’t sat down in a while.

I am too good at my job to quit easily, but not happy enough to stay unquestioning!

Hell! Where did that come from! She chided herself as she walked towards a bench she espied near the exit. Holding on to the ‘let’s look at the positive side’ mantra, she thought, work pays well. I am settled.

Or

‘Did you settle!

The traitorous inner voice continued on its disruptive path. No! she shook herself mentally, as if she were dislodging some unwanted junk from her mind. As she neared the bench, she saw that the other end was occupied.  A man was sitting there staring at nothing in particular. Almost as if in meditation, she thought. She didn’t notice him so much as the camera by his side, recognising the Nikon Z9 (her dad was a keen photographer).

He looks up as she approaches, and she gestures towards the seat. He nods. She sits down, much in the style of a tightly wound sail unfurling!  

He seemed okay, she thought, not your typical serial killer— Perhaps! as the thought of Ted Bundy crossed her mind!

Hell! Too tired, she told herself, ‘Benefit of the doubt’ won over ‘err on the side of caution’ as she smiles politely and asks, ‘Was that the last train?’

‘Yea. Beach side left two minutes ago,’ he replies.

‘Course it did,’ she mutters fretfully.

‘Usually does,’ said her bench mate wryly.

‘You don’t seem particularly upset,’ she says.

‘Uh huh. I was hoping it would leave,’ was his answer.

And at her quizzical look, he clarifies,

‘Not today, in particular. Just… you know… in general.’

‘Good heavens! I’ve never missed a train or a bus in my life’ she exclaims forcefully.

‘First time for everything,’ was the wry comment.

‘What! You work for the Railways or something?’ she questions.

‘Or something…,’ her blank look prompting, ‘I am a dentist,’ he says, sounding almost apologetic.

‘Dentist with a side hustle,’ she motions toward the camera beside him.

‘Nope. Wildlife photographer with a dental degree,’ he asserts.

‘Teeth by profession, animals by passion,’ she smirks.

‘Can you blame me, animals don’t complain,’ he counters.

‘I get your calm. Waiting for the perfect shot probably taught you your composure. Patience is often a euphemism for long-suffering endurance. Not always a virtue, you know,’ Ira says knowingly.

‘And you are, perhaps, the spokeswoman for free thinking?’ he asks curiously.

‘Yep.’ Smugly.

 ‘So, when do you schedule it, Monday or Wednesday,’ he asks dryly.

‘Mostly cancelled, meetings take priority,’ at her breeziest.

‘Figures,’ was his response.

She almost laughs. Catches herself in time.

The fan creaks above them, the silence rattles.

Why am I being so familiar with this guy. Don’t know him from Adam, she mused. Need to go now. No time for epiphanies, she thinks and gets up.

He gets up too.

‘I need to catch an auto or something. Bagged a project at a reserve near Bangalore. Need to get to a bus station. Can I drop you on the way, if you’re headed in the direction of Tiruvanmiyur,’ he enquires.

‘Oh! I am, but don’t want to be a bother,’ she avers.

‘No bother,’ he says, picking up his camera equipment and slipping the overnighter over his shoulder.

They walk out of the exit and onto the road. A Tea Kadai (shop) a little ahead on the road glimmers with fluorescent lights, highlighting unevenly stacked tumblers.

‘Tea.’ He asks.

‘Sure, nowhere to go in a hurry anyway…,’ she says.

‘*Rendu tea master,’ he requests the vendor. ‘Double strong.’

‘Are you usually this confident ordering for strangers,’ she questions.

‘Only after 10 pm. People are more agreeable then,’ he smiles. ‘Okay that came out wrong,’ he says, shaking his head ruefully.

She smiles, ‘Iam Ira.’

‘Yash,’ offering his hand.

The teaboy hands them their tea, and both of them lean against the counter, sipping the hot drink. A stray dog looks hopefully at them for a bite of something. Yash motions to the boy to give him a biscuit. Ira watches absently, lost in thought.

Yash enquires, ‘One more tea?’

She shakes her head. ‘I stay here any longer, will probably start making life decisions,’ she says draining the glass of tea.

‘Fair warning was given,’ says Yash, paying the tea vendor.

They step back into the night and walk down the road. Yash hails a cruising auto.

‘*Yenge saar?’ asks the auto driver.

‘Tiruvanmiyur pa,’ says Yash.

‘300 ruba saar,’ says the driver firmly.

They accept and get in.

Ira – ‘That tea felt good.’

Yash – ‘Everything tastes good when you are not rushing.’

Ira – ‘You say that as though it’s an option.’

The auto rattles on, jolting over a pothole. The night air shifts, warm, familiar.

Yash – ‘It is an option, expensive, but there.’

Ira – ‘You say that as though you made some hard choices, quit some stuff…’

Yash – ‘Yes. I quit pretending I’ll do things later.’

Ira, admiringly – ‘That’s a big quit.’

Yash – ‘Baby steps. Started with not checking mail after 8 pm.’

Ira, smiling – ‘Rebel.’

A bus rambles past them noisily.

Ira, musing – ‘I take this route daily, never noticed the tea stall.’

Yash – ‘Well, most people don’t notice places they pass through.’

‘Or people,’ she muses aloud. Catching herself, she asks,

‘This project… do you take off from work this way often?’

Yash – ‘When I can. The animals don’t wait.’

The auto swerves, brakes hard, as a truck roars past.

‘*Paathu po pa,’ Yash admonishes.

Ira – ‘Doesn’t it complicate things?’

Yash – Only if you think life is meant to be a tidy little bundle.’

She watches the road slip by.

‘I plan everything so carefully. Still feels like I am scrambling to catch up.’

Yash, gently, ‘Maybe you’re running toward the wrong things.’

He says that lightly, as if speaking about the traffic.

Ira – ‘And you? Don’t you feel torn?’

Yash – ‘All the time. Simple Math. I surrender to the side that pulls harder.’

Ira interjects, ‘That’s my street.’ The auto takes a turn into her street.

‘How do you know?’ She asks.

Yash – ‘Not so tough. I just figured out what I was willing to miss and what I wasn’t willing to let go.’

She feels something rearrange inside her.

Chance encounters, she muses, or In-between people who appear only between places; they belong more to the crossing than the destination!

She then points at a house near the end of the street, and the auto stops at her gate,

She gets out and pays her share of the auto fare, despite Yash’s protests.

‘This helped. I didn’t expect it to. Take care, Yash, and …. Good light,’ she says warmly.

‘Good night,’ he replies cordially, and the auto resumes its rickety progress into the night.

She stands for a moment watching the auto disappear and senses her street settling back into its familiar sounds—a dog barking, a gate creaking and closing further down the street, the murmur of a television behind closed curtains. Home!

She reaches for her mobile out of habit, then lets her hand fall. She hadn’t looked at it once during this strange interlude!

Back into her room, she sets down her bag without opening the laptop. That in itself felt like an act of defiance that surprised her.  

She gets herself a glass of water and stands near her window watching the city lights flicker and go out one by one. She realised she hadn’t thought about work once during the entire encounter. Instead, she had been listening …to everyday sounds, to a stranger’s easy certainty, to that part of herself that had been quiet for a long time.

Before she gets into bed, she opens her calendar for tomorrow.

9:30 — Team sync call

Review Q3 deck and send comments.

Follow up on Kannan’s email.

Approve vendor invoice

One-on-one with Anitha

Update tracker

Lunch (if time)

Reschedule dentist appointment

Evening walk

She looks at it once more, then draws a single line through two items.

Review Q3 deck and send comments

Update tracker

The list still holds. But it breathes differently now.

As she lay down, the sound of the city softens around her. Somewhere, a bus would arrive at its destination; a camera shutter would open to first light. Lying in her room, Ira understood that missing her train hadn’t delayed her life at all—it had gently brought her back to it!

And what of Yash……

The auto moved faster after she got down. The road opened. He adjusted the bag at his feet; the weight of the camera steadied him. At night, the city asked less.

He replayed the ride in fragments—the phone set aside, the pause before fear, the smile left unfinished. Some encounters stayed because they were exact.

At the bus stand, the sky thinned. He held the camera without turning it on. Mused on what he had learned—patience from one life, attention from another.

When the bus conductor called out the destination, he stood up.

Somewhere along the MRTS line, a woman would wake and choose one small thing differently. He carried that thought into the light.