The Bridge… Maybe

By Richa Srivastava

A lot had been said about the bridge, some probably true, some make-believe but most of it yet to be confirmed. The Hanuman Setu bridge in old of Lucknow was a much-cowered place by the locals especially in the later hours of the clock. Residents took extra efforts to avoid crossing it at night, even if that meant taking a much longer route or deferring their travel plans until dawn. All-in-all, no one wanted to even remotely experience what the folklore suggested in murmured whispers.

As legend went, it was said that anyone who tried to cross the bridge at night would regrettably be placed in path of an unpleasant identity, a form of sorts; one that will move alongside the vehicle through the length of the bridge, even trying to communicate if spoken to. What happens next nobody really knew, cause not many people were brave or foolish enough to dare the excursion. No one, except our protagonist.

Looking at himself in the full-length mirror, Vishwa smiled. Dressed in his best formal attire, a maroon tie, light-grey shirt and black formal pants, he completed the ensemble by putting on a long black over-coat. It was late January and winters in the North of India were at their peak. He looks at his watch. It is half past two at night. Vishwa was going to receive a relative from the railway station whose train was meant to be arriving in an hour. Locking his hostel room, he informs the night-guard about when he is expected to return.

Vishwa was a man of logic, or so he believed. He tried to stay as resilient as possible to the possibility of entities other than those living. It was with this resilience, that Vishwa decides to take the quicker route to the railway station, one that involves crossing the enigmatic bridge. With strong resolute, Vishwa turned the key of his scooter and kicked the starter pedal. With a bursting sound, the engine turned to life.

         The night seemed darker than usual. Moonlight was unable to cut through the unseasonal clouds, casting a gloomy darkness over the panorama. The air was engulfed in a thick blanket of fog and mist. With icy wind freezing his gripping fingers, air escaping his mouth in a smoke-like fashion and eyes already striving hard to stay open against the cold winds, Vishwa sped his scooter through the eerie silence of the dimly lit streets.

         Just at the abutment of the bridge, Vishwa suddenly hit the brakes. He stared hard at the narrow bridge. For what seemed like an eternity, he felt enthralled by the spookiness of the atmosphere. The bridge seemed longer than usual. The latter end of the bridge seemlesly tapered indefinitely into a cloud of mist, with no horizon in sight. A diddly street lamp shone dimly at what should have been the middle of the bridge. The night was cold and extremely quiet. The only voices Vishwa could hear were of the canal’s water nearby and of his own thumping heart. Emptying his mind as if in a trance, Vishwa accelerated his scooter onto the bridge.

         A few moments passed. And then some more. It seemed like the other end of the bridge was not getting any closer as against Vishwa accelerating his scooter full-speed ahead. He kept trying to keep his spooky, intrusive thoughts at bay but not to much avail. After what seemed like an eternity, he could see a tiny speck of light at the farthest lengths of the darkness. A minuscule sense of relief slithered into his mind and he took a deep breath.

A warm sensation had just started to percolate through his body on seeing the distant twinkling light, when Vishwa felt a hard pat on his shoulder. It took him a couple of seconds to register what happened. And then another pat, and another one. Vishwa’s body froze. His neck stiffened. A weird chilly sensation started to sweep through his body, down his spine. The hair on the back of his neck stood up on its end. Vishwa’s hands went numb and his eyes were now aghast with fear. For just a tiny second it felt like he’d gone into a trance and that his heart had stopped beating.

At that very moment, a small rock came under the wheel of his scooter, jerking him awake from his aghast state. Consuming all the courage he could possibly muster, Vishwa wrung the accelerator on the handle of his scooter to its maximum capacity. That again, there was another very discernible pat on his shoulder. He further accelerated his scooter into the darkness. As he did so, so did the pats on his back become more and more violent and aggressive. The tiny speck of light and the far end was now gradually enlarging in size.

Keeping his eyes glued onto it, as the pats continued coming in incessantly, Vishwa kept speeding towards the end of the bridge, resisting his fright-induced urge of turning back to see who it was. Moments that seemed like eternity, passed, and with meteoric acceleration Vishwa reached the other end of the bridge. As he crossed the bridge and upon seeing a couple of pedestrians at a distance, Vishwa slowed down. He noticed that the pats now too had died down. He ultimately stops in front of a tea-stall.

Almost on the verge of fainting, his neck still stiff with fear, he turns back slowly, double-checking that no-one is sitting behind him. His heart beats were still racing. Drying the thick beads of sweat on his forehead with his handkerchief, Vishwa asks for a cup of tea. The shopkeeper glances up and smiles. At this very moment the shopkeeper remarks, “Sir, your tie has flown back over your shoulder. Clip it up or it will flow back again when you ride”. Listening to these words, Vishwa suddenly realises that amidst all this cacophony, what could have been.