A few adjustments were made to accommodate friends travelling together, and hence my seat, number 10, was already taken. Some chaos followed, and when the dust cleared I was put into the only remaining seat, right next to a girl who was fast asleep. I thanked God briefly for not giving me the 40 year old pot-bellied man he gave me the last time I travelled alone, before I tucked my luggage away and sat down, humming songs from 'Hum Tum' to get into the mood.

The journey started off rather sweetly. The girl's head dropped on my shoulders and she apologized before shifting to another position. Ahh, how sweet our lady is, I thought. Plently of time to talk tomorrow morning, let the poor girl sleep now. Apparently she didn't think anything on similar lines. Our lady is not a sound sleeper, and her constant shifting and turning kept me shifting and turning as much. But the really scary part was that everytime the bus jerked on the road, our lady would let out a soft moan, which sounded rather scandalous and scared the shit out of me. I looked around to see if the other passengers could hear her, but apparently God had reserved this treat only for me. I tried to exercise my telekinetic muscles to make the bus go slowly, but the driver was probably several levels higher than me and I gave up soon.

As the night went on, her right shoulder seemed to get heavier and heavier, and everytime she shifted on my side, I would push her back to her side, upon which she would emit that strange moan again. This happened quite a few times throughout the night, and by about half the journey I had shifted to humming 'Norwegian Wood' instead. Boy, she really had me!

Come early morning, I was woken up (yet again) when the attendant yanked my blanket off of me and did the same for the damsel who caused me a lot of distress. I turned to my left to see a mess of matted hair covering a face that I realized for the first time that I had never really gotten to see clearly the night before. She cleared that hair away, revealing a face that condemned the world for troubling her by waking her up so early in the morning on an uncomfortable bus. That face, which was the best personification of about a dozen negative emotions I have seen in a while, remained locked in that contorted state till I finally reached my stop. I picked up my luggage calmly and marched down, but my shadow must have leaped out the window instead.

In closing, if that 40 year old dude is reading this, I would like to apologize. I really shouldn't have cursed you or my luck when I sat next to you. In fact, when are you travelling next?