The Story is about a girl who was travelling from Bangalore where she lived with her parents to Delhi to visit her cousin and her cousin’s husband. She reached the railway station before time. There she noticed a guy who was staring at her; she ignored and boarded the train. The moment train started moving she became anxious as well as excited to meet her cousin after so long. Her heart was fluttering, beating loudly and ready to jump out of her chest. She tried to control herself. Her random urges to get up from her seat and run down the aisle screaming loudly. What was happening to her? Was she out of her mind?
The cause of her anxiety and almost panic attack was the person sitting one row behind her. She did not understand the reason that guy looking at her. She had never seen him before, and she had a pretty good memory. She didn’t recall ever in her life coming across this person, so why did he seem so familiar? And most importantly why was she suddenly reacting so strongly on seeing this stranger? The reactions had started the first time she had eye contact with him, which was when she boarded the train and was trying to arrange her small carryon bag under the seat. The strange guy got up from his seat and help her. His hand had grazed hers making her freeze. She had inadvertently strayed few seconds looking into his blue eyes while she thanked him. She had goose bumps all over her arms. Suddenly her teeth were chattering as she managed to utter a jittery “Thank you”. Later at nightshe had made fake bathroom trips just to get a better glance at him, to get a better chance at recognizing him in case she had missed it is the first place. Red sparkling t-shirt, a pair of blue shaded jeans, Golden highlighted hair with spikes, a pair of red ankle sneakers, and hint of Bengali accent which she detected when he spoke to the little girl sitting next to him - there was no way she knew him. He seemed to be travelling alone because he was asking the woman sitting with the little girl (presumably the mother) for good places to eat in Delhi and also few recreational places. The train was heading to Delhi and she picked up from his conversation as she shamelessly eavesdropped, that this was his first time in the city, he was visiting on work.
Her next reaction had been to dismiss all this as her mind playing tricks on her out of sheer boredom. It was true - she had been bored out of her wits lately. Moreover, she had finished reading the most enticing series of books, “The Clockward Angel”, a mystery series. She had thoroughly enjoyed them and was sad that there were no more left in the series to read. She tried to think again, maybe he knew her from somewhere. Well then he should be the one having this unexplainable reaction, not her. Nothing made sense, maybe he was a terrorist or a serial killer and her sixth sense was warning her about an attack. But it wasn’t fear that she felt, it something more intense, it was an adrenaline rush, her mind was signalling that something exciting was about to happen. Was she losing her mind? Perhaps she was. She went through her mental database again and tried to place him, no this was a total stranger. She needed to get all this under control. And now that the train had reached Delhi, she had a chance to do just that, just get out of here, away from him.
The passengers started de-boarding the train and he must have been a few spots behind her. As the distance grew, her heart eased and stopped pounding madly. He must have crossed tothe other line exiting the train, because she came face to face with him again at the station platform he smiled at her and said, “Goodbye, hope you have a nice stay”.
She was taken by surprise and that made her loose her footing and she stumbled badly and started falling and landed with a crash. She got up only to realize that she was in her bed, her own bedroom, in her own house, cold sweat dripping from her forehead. This had been a dream after all. What a strange dream she thought. She could remember everything with great clarity, right from the colour of his shirt to that of his eyes. It was just so weird and unacceptable. She had been fretting over the idea of visiting her cousin and her sissy husband and that could have triggered this odd dream. This strange feeling was going to stay with her all day at college, and the same happened. She could not do anything but think about the strangest dream she had in the night.
Later that day after she had freshened up, she settled in front of her laptop with a nice cup of coffee catching up on with theemails she received and telling about her dream to her friends over internet. On a whim, she browsed to the website of “TheClockward Angel”, her latest favourite book series. She was excited to read that they had finalized the deal to make aBollywood movie on the first two books of the series. The next page in the article just knocked her off her chair. They had announced the cast members that very day and the lead character of “Detective Mustard Black” was to be played by an unknown actor “Vihaan Singhania”. He was none other than the stranger from her dream.
