The intersection

Sailen Routray

Translated by Samprati Pani

Rabindra Mandap, Bhubaneswar
Photo credit: commons.wikimedia.org/Soumendra Kumar Sahoo 

I’m returning from the Old Bus Stand on my Luna. My speed is 25 km per hour or so. I take the route from PMG Square and turn left from Rabindra Mandap. As soon as I cross the side gate of the Mandap, I overtake him. He’s on a Hercules cycle.

My Luna slows down. His cycle too. He turns to look at me. I too. He’s slender, fair and frail. Has a chiseled face—what you’d call ‘high-cheeked bones’ in English. His hair is of medium length, falling till the shoulders. Not curly like mine. Not straight either. Wavy. I probably wouldn’t say he has a beautiful face, but it’s beckoning, ‘Look at me!’ I look. Then look away. And leave.

A few seconds later, I’ve hardly crossed the State Guest House, when I turn back. He’s waiting just before the intersection. I drive towards him and stop by his side. He smiles. Letting go of my shyness, I ask, ‘Where are you going?’ He says, ‘The Mother’s Centre … Will you come?’ I say, ‘Let’s go.’

He starts cycling furiously, leading me on. I follow in my Luna, slowly. Him in front, me behind, we take a right turn before Kesari Talkies, and in a short while, we reach the Centre. I really like it. It’s clean and beautiful, decorated with care, and quiet. The smell of incense wafts in from all sides. He sits down to pray. I sit next to him with my eyes closed. Neither the Mother nor Aurobindo appear before my closed eyes. All I can see is his chiseled face.

We leave in some time. 

As he’s unlocking his cycle parked near the gate, he says, ‘My name is Sandeep.’

‘I’m Raja’, I say.

‘What do you do?’

‘I dropped +2 last year and am appearing for the exams this year’, I say, though I’m yet to start my preparation for the exams. 

‘Oh, we are the same batch then’, he says. ‘I haven’t taken admission anywhere and am preparing for the engineering entrance. Didn’t get a rank for a government engineering college the last time I appeared.’

I meet him four times after that. The second time at the Centre. But those are other stories.

This one is different. 

Note: This English version of the story (originally written in Odia) was first published in the blog Chiragh Dilli as a part of the piece titled "The city, in love" on September 4, 2022. It is part of a larger series of stories set in Bhubaneswar. In her editorial note to the piece published in Chiragh Dilli, the translator Samprati Pani describes the series in the following words - "The stories are around the theme of ephemeral and routine encounters of love, or its possibility, located in places that serve as public and private landmarks of everyday life in the city."