Chapter 25: Race against time
The auto stand at Malvan bus stand was a patch of cracked concrete with a single tin board bolted to a crooked pole. It was empty. Naina stood at the edge of the road, the strap of her small bag digging into her shoulder, and watched a distant auto rickshaw rattle past on the main road without turning.
"There's a stand near the market," Nirav said. "You want me to check?"
"Check," she said. "Quickly. I have an hour."
He jogged off, his duffel swinging against his hip. Naina pulled out her phone and stared at the train time. Fourty minutes to reach the station in good traffic. In Malvan, traffic was unpredictable. She had not factored in an empty auto stand.
Her phone buzzed. Anu.
"Where are you?" Anu's voice crackled through the speaker. "We're at the station. The train's on time."
"The auto stand is empty," Naina said. "I'm trying."
"Empty? You can't be serious."
"I'll find something. Board with my luggage, I'll come to your compartment."
She hung up and pressed her palm flat against her forehead. That was when she remembered what she was wearing. The thin cotton tshirt she had pulled on at the homestay, the colour of pale tea, worn soft from a dozen washes. It clung to her in the humid evening air, the fabric sheer enough that the straps of everything underneath were visible. No bra, because she had not planned to leave the room tonight. It had been a simple thing, a loose dress to sleep in. Nothing erotic. But the evening breeze was pressing it against her thighs, against the curve of her belly, and she saw Nirav looking at her as he came back.
"Nothing," he said. "The market stand, dead."
"Shit."
He stood beside her and looked at the road. She felt his eyes travel down her back and stop at the swell of her hips. He did not say anything. He did not need to. She had felt that kind of looking before.
"One auto will come," he said. "It's Malvan. Something always comes."
She hated the calm in his voice. She was sweating, her day-old mascara smudging at the corners of her eyes, and he was standing there like he had all the time in the world. Because he did. His train was later. He could wait here for hours and it would cost him nothing.
The phone rang again. Anu.
"There's one auto," Naina said, watching a rickshaw turn the corner six hundred metres down the road. "I see one. Board the train, I'm coming."
She clicked off and ran. The auto was moving slowly, an old black-and-yellow Bajaj with a dented rear gate. It was full. Two passengers in the back, a woman in a cotton saree and a man with a sack of vegetables between his knees. But it was slowing down at the junction.
"Going to the station?" Naina called breathlessly across the gap.
The driver leaned out. "Haan, station side. But seat nahi hai."
"I don't need a seat," she said.
It was a desperate thing to say. She looked at the woman in the saree, the man with his vegetables, and then at Nirav, who had caught up and was standing a foot behind her, watching her night dress lift with the wind.
"We'll squeeze," she said.
The driver shrugged. She climbed into the space between the seat and the doorway, wedging herself half against the frame. Nirav pushed behind her, his chest pressing flat to her back, one hand gripping the roof rail above her head. The door banged shut. The auto lurched forward.
There was no room. The bench seat fit two comfortably, three tightly. With the man's sack of vegetables and the woman's shopping bag, Naina had nowhere to put her weight. The road was bad, full of potholes and loose gravel, and every jolt sent her body backward into Nirav's chest.
"Sit," a voice said. It might have been the woman in the saree. "There is no space to stand like that."
Naina looked at the single seat beside the driver, made for one person. It was empty. The driver's fare metre was running.
"Come," Nirav said. He was already moving, dropping onto the edge of the passenger seat and pulling her by the wrist. She fell forward and landed across his lap, her legs folding awkwardly into the footwell, her hip grinding into his thigh. The driver glanced back, grunted, and turned his attention to the road.
Sitting on him, she had no choice. Her weight was on him, her knees pressed tight against his legs on either side, her back to his chest. The seat was not built for two. She had to tilt sideways to keep her head from hitting the roof.
The first pothole threw them together. Her body slid back, her spine against his sternum, the curve of her ass pressed into the cradle of his lap. His arm came around her waist to steady her. Static, she told herself. Body heat. The auto's engine thrummed through the seat, through him, through her.
Then it happened. Under the thin cotton of her salwar, against the press of her weight, she felt him harden. Not easily, but visibly, a growing ridge of pressure against the soft meat of her backside. She tried to shift forward, to give herself a finger of space, but the next bump pushed her back harder, grinding her down against him.
His breath was on her neck. Warm, then humid, then scorching. She closed her eyes and saw the beach at Tarkarli, the dark water, the weight of Shyam's body pressing against her. Then she saw Aarav's face, breathless on the phone, another woman's breathing in the background. Her thighs tensed.
A pothole ripped through the right wheel. The auto tilted hard, and she slipped sideways, her shoulder sliding down the metal frame, and his hand caught her. Fingers closing around the bare skin of her waist, the fabric of her tshirt riding up with the motion and leaving a strip of warm skin exposed above the waistband of her leggings.
He kept his hand there. It settled against her hip like it belonged, thumb resting on the jut of bone, fingers spread across her flank. It was a protective hand, she told herself. He was stopping her from falling.
His thumb moved a half-inch, stroking the skin above her waistband. Just once. Just for a second. The auto hit another bump, and her cheek pressed into his shoulder, and she felt the length of him against her again, impossibly hard now, pressing upward through the thin cloth.
"Curve coming," the driver said.
The auto banked. She slid again, his arm tightening, pulling her deeper into his lap. His breath traced the shell of her ear, hot and uneven. She kept her eyes forward, watching the road unspool in the headlights, and told herself that none of this was happening to her, that she was somewhere else entirely.
The auto rattled through another pothole, and her body sank deeper into his lap. Her breath caught. The thin tshirt had ridden up again, and now the evening air hit her chest directly, cool against skin gone hot. She felt her nipples tighten, two hard points pressing against the worn cotton, visible even in the dim amber light of the auto's interior. She looked down and saw them, outlined clearly, and looked away quickly.
Nirav saw them. She could feel his gaze drop to her chest, linger there. He did not say a word. His fingers tightened slightly on her waist, just a fraction, and his breath against her neck went uneven. The auto hit another bump, and she pressed back against him on instinct, feeling the full length of his erection grinding against the curve of her ass through the thin layers of cloth. Her thighs clenched.
The woman in the saree got out first, at a turning near the fish market. The man with the vegetables followed, hauling his sack across the seat. Each stop was a small reprieve, a breath of cool air through the door, and then the auto lurched off again and she was back on him, his hand firm on her bare waist, his mouth close enough to her ear that she felt every exhale.
Her phone buzzed against her thigh. She fumbled it out of her pocket and saw Anu's name flashing.
"Where are you?" Anu's voice was sharp now. "The train is leaving in ten minutes."
"Nearly there. Platform?"
"A2, coach. Your luggage is in our compartment, don't worry about it."
"I'll be there. Don't wait for me."
She hung up and clutched the phone in her fist. The auto swung onto the station road, and she saw the low concrete structure ahead, lit by a few bare tube lights. Nirav's hand finally left her waist as the auto stopped. She scrambled out, legs unsteady, and felt the crush of fabric where his hand had been.
They ran. The platform stretched long and empty, the train hulking at the far end, its engine already rumbling a low, steady growl. Naina sprinted, her thin tshirt flying, her small bag bouncing against her hip. The train was there, doors still open, but far.
She stopped short and turned to Nirav.
"Stay here," she said.
"What?"
"People from my team are on that train. If they see you, it's a question I don't want to answer."
Nirav's face tightened. Then he was shrugging off his jacket, a plain navy zip-up, and holding it out to her. "At least wear this."
She understood. The tshirt was thin, her nipples still hard, visible to anyone who cared to look. She took the jacket and pulled it on, zipping it up over the evidence. The fabric smelled of him, sandalwood and sweat, and it warmed her instantly. She met his eyes.
"Thank you."
"Go. You still have time."
"Stay here. Don't come after me."
"I won't. But text me when you're on the train."
"I will."
She turned and sprinted. The corridor between the platform and the tracks was rough, and she almost tripped on a loose paver. She reached the train's last coach just as the whistle shrilled, high and piercing. But it was the last coach, and Anu and the team were in the middle. The door was shutting. A guard in a khaki uniform stood with one hand on the handle.
She clawed at the railing, trying to pull herself up, but the train was already rolling, the gap widening. She fell back against the edge of the platform, her hand scraping the concrete, the jacket riding up her thighs. The train slid past her, faster now, its windows a blur of lit rectangles, and she stood there, panting, watching it shrink into the dark.
Her phone buzzed in her hand. Aarav.
She stared at the screen, the name glowing, her thumb hovering over the green button.