Eighty Days to Elsewhere by kc dyer

Author:kc dyer [dyer, kc]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780593102046
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2020-08-11T00:00:00+00:00

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An hour later, I have cash in my pocket, and directions to the nearest Mumbai Suburban Railway station, which the kind hotel clerk assures me is the quickest connection to the Central Station and my train out of town. Their Wi-Fi was down, but I’m sure I can find somewhere to log on when I get to the station.

Of course, as soon as these feelings of pride and accomplishment rise within me, I walk through the station entrance and everything goes to hell.

Inside, the crowds that fill the streets condense in a way that gives me pause. But by the time I’ve queued for my ticket, and then passed through the turnstiles, it’s too late. The crush is immediate, and overwhelming.

I mean, I’m a New Yorker. I know how to endure a crowded subway. I know what walking down a busy street feels like. But stepping inside Churchgate Station schools me.

You know nothing, Romy Keene.

The first hint I’ve made a big mistake comes to me as I emerge through the turnstile. There suddenly isn’t a single woman to be seen.

Not. One. Woman.

The platform is a surging sea of humanity, and as the train pulls up, things swiftly worsen. I find myself being swept away from the tracks by a crowd as inexorable as a riptide. I’d slung my pack across my chest to go through the turnstile, so my front half is somewhat shielded. But trying to reach the train, I find myself swimming upstream in an endless flow of grabbing, clutching, caressing strangers. I’m trapped in a school of slithering, hand-shaped fish, unable to escape. Unable to breathe.

Barely keeping my feet, I’m slowly, inexorably pushed away from the train. I don’t know how long I spend caught in the crush—several lifetimes, maybe?—before I feel a whisper of cool tile against one arm. Galvanized by the feel of a wall at my back, I use my suitcase as a battering ram and slide along the tile until I’m close enough to the gate to draw the attention of a guard.

The disinterested expression on his face changes as he looks at me, and he flips the latch on the gate and steps out of the way. The crowd spits me out like old chewing gum, and I hit the ground hard with both knees, vomiting my fear—and my mercifully small breakfast—onto the station floor.

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