Little did he realize how much more was to come his way.
***
His bus arrived within a few minutes and as Arnab climbed on, he realized the advantages of staying back late. Most of the students would have gone home at least an hour earlier, and now there were just a handful of other passengers on the bus. He sat down near the back of the bus, took out his book and began reading. It would be at least an hour-long trip to the bus stop near the Delhi Zoo, where he changed buses to complete his journey home. He had been so lost in his book that he had paid little attention to what was happening on the bus, when he heard a bit of a commotion. When he looked up, he saw that the bus had halted at a stop, and picked up two new passengers who seemed to be making the noise. Both were young, dressed in torn jeans and tight tshirts, and sported the gym-buffed bodies and loud mouths that Arnab had come to recognize as the trademarks of such louts around Delhi campuses. One of the earliest pieces of advice Jayantada had given him was that such characters were best avoided-to tangle with them was always more trouble than it was worth. So Arnab blocked out their off-key singing, their insisting on speaking loudly in sentences peppered with the vilest of Hindi abuses, and tried to focus on his reading.
A couple of stops later, and Arnab's reading was again interrupted, this time by loud whistling noises coming from the two young men. Arnab saw that the target of their whistles was a young girl who had just climbed onto the bus. She was carrying a bag that she had clutched close to her chest, and was keeping her head down, trying her best to ignore the whistles coming her way. There seemed to be no other passengers on the bus. As Arnab looked at the scene before him, he wondered what a shame it was that even today, young women were not really safe on Delhi's streets, even in broad daylight and on a public bus. The girl looked no more than eighteen, and while clearly uncomfortable with the attention she was getting, was already a veteran at coping with what was euphemistically known in today's India as 'eve teasing'. Suddenly one of the boys looked at Arnab and he realized that he had been staring at them for way too long.
'What are you looking at, four-eyes?'
His friend responded by saying that Arnab probably had the hots for the girl on the bus. Arnab looked away quickly, flushed with shame and anger, but not daring to look back up. One of the boys took a step in his direction, but his friend stopped him saying, 'Forget that joker, let's chat with our heroine here.' Arnab still didn't dare look up. He was pretending to read, but was actually simmering in his impotent rage. He knew what he was witnessing was wrong, and that someone, he, should try and stop it. But the rational part of his mind told him that there was nothing he could do, that to intervene would just get him hurt, or worse, that tangling with such ruffians was somehow beneath him. So, like millions of Indian men, he used various excuses and self-justifications as a fig leaf to cover the simple fact that he was either too scared, or too apathetic to do anything about it.
The verbal harassment continued for several minutes more, the girl remaining silent through it all. Arnab was hoping that she would soon leave the bus or that the two boys would tire of it and leave. But things suddenly took a turn for the worse. The two boys settled themselves on a seat across the girl, and took out hip flasks, the contents of which they proceeded to guzzle down neat. Even at a distance of a few feet, the stench of country liquor was unmistakable to Arnab.
Please leave, he kept pleading in his mind, but after the boys finished their drink, they seemed to get a new idea. One of them, the taller and stronger-looking of the two, motioned to the girl and said loudly to his friend,
'Rajesh, I haven't screwed in a long time. I think today's my lucky day.'
The girl sensed what was coming and screamed at the driver to stop the bus. But as she got up to try and leave, two things happened in quick succession. The boy who had just been referred to as Rajesh rushed over to the driver and snapped out a small knife, telling him not to stop if he wanted to live; and the other boy grabbed the girl from behind, clamping a hand over her mouth. As he dragged her towards the back of the bus, he came within touching distance of Arnab, who was now terrified out of his mind. He brought his face within a few inches of Arnab's and growled,
'Get the fuck out of this bus or I'll tear you apart.'
Arnab recoiled from the stench of alcohol on the boy's breath. He was frozen in place with fear when the boy shouted at him again to get lost. In almost a reflex action, Arnab got up and began picking up his bag, when his eyes caught those of the girl. Her mouth was covered by the boy's large and callused hand, but her eyes were wide with terror. As Arnab began to walk past them, she managed to prise the hand off her mouth and shouted after him,
'For God's sake, please don't leave me here with them!'
Arnab didn't know quite what to do, but he gathered the courage to turn around and face the boy.
'Please let her go. Please.'
He was ashamed when he realized just how plaintive his tone had been, and even more so when the boy laughed in his face saying, 'Are you deaf or what? Get off this bus now.'
Arnab wished he could have marched up to the boy and smashed his face in, like one of his fictional idols, but reminded himself that he was but a weak and scared man, and no match for these goons. As he asked the driver to stop the bus, he began formulating a plan in his mind. As soon as he got off, he would call the police from his cellphone, giving the bus number and details of the incident, and hope that they got there in time. But before he could do so, things went horribly wrong.
The girl mustered up all the strength she could and kicked out at the boy's shin. Surprised, he let his grip on her loosen and she bolted for the door, and ran straight into Arnab. The boy caught up with her a split second later, and pushed her hard into a seat, screaming at her to not try anything stupid. He then faced Arnab, his eyes bloodshot from the alcohol and anger.
'Get out, unless you want to join in and enjoy what's left of her when we're finished.'
Arnab wasn't looking at him; his eyes were locked on the girl. As he saw her lying there, bleeding from the lip where she had struck the seat, his anger boiled over. Without realizing it, he felt himself crying. He was angry with himself for being such a coward, and for being so weak. He looked at the book in his left hand and realized what a hypocrite he was, for reading about great men and their courage, while his courage had been limited to intellectual debates as he sat in evening chat sessions with his college mates in Calcutta. He was all talk, but even he had limits, and he realized today he had reached his breaking point. As he looked at the girl, he realized he could not live with himself if he left her here to be raped while he escaped to the cocooned and make-believe world of his middle-class respectability. He knew he didn't stand a chance, but today for a change, Arnab Bannerjee was not going to look the other way and walk away.
As he turned towards the boy and looked him in the eye, the boy laughed out loud, spitting in his face. As Arnab instinctively turned his face away, the boy lunged at him, shooting out his right fist, aiming at Arnab's head.
That was when things became very strange.
Arnab looked up to see the boy's fist coming at him, but the strange thing was that it seemed to be moving in excruciatingly slow motion. For a second, Arnab watched in fascination as the fist arched in towards his face, and then realized that if he just stood there, he was going to be knocked out cold. While he didn't understand why the boy was moving so slowly, he ducked out of the way and moved a foot to his right.
The boy never saw Arnab weave away, and continued through with the momentum of his punch, losing his balance, and falling onto a seat. He looked up at Arnab with fury and disbelief. His friend was about to move towards Arnab when he stopped him.