Trapped

Chapter 10

"Morning Rachel." Alisha mumbles yawning for the third time in a row. "Looks like you could use some of your beauty sleep that you keep ditching every time." Rachel scolds her as she looks at her innocently. "I am tired, Rach. The weekend needs to arrive already" She whines making Rachel laugh at her childish face.

"Have this extra strong coffee to keep you going today." Rachel places a cup full of dark coffee, making Alisha cringe in disgust. "Who drinks black coffee! At least put some cream in it." "You needed something to stay alert and awake, didn't you?" "Please, black coffee is horrible." "Okay, I know I messed up your first black coffee but that doesn't mean it’s that bad." Alisha puts on her best puppy face and looks at her with a look of pure innocence and it seems to works because Rachel rolls her eyes and mumbles an 'Okay fine' on her way towards the pantry to grab some creamer for her friend.

The amount of work kept piling while her eyes kept getting tired as the day grew older and older until it was finally time for the dusk to bid farewell to the sun. She kept herself to her work and just work, accomplishing her task before deadlines with no intentions of making any attempts to get some company of her colleagues, especially not the one named Peter. She realised that there was no space for her in his life, she might be just another person who existed only in his office. Friends, that, they were definitely not.

The world around her is slowly turning itself into a masterpiece of the nature's art. The drowning sun is painting the soft blue sky to a mixture of oranges and purples and dark blues with the river reflecting every tiny detail like a mirror, only a little blurred with the soft ripples that are scattering around on the water's surface. It must be the chilly wind that made the river shiver with its icy touch or perhaps, the movement of the boats that returned back to the shore, lulling the once silent water. She has an intuition as she walks slowly with tired feet, a weird one, which she hopes with her whole heart, for it to come true. Even though she knows, it's more of a wish than an intuition. Will he arrive again, out of the thin air, just like he does every other time whenever I need him? This thought consumes her totally, leaving her hoping a lot more than she should for such a thing to happen. She knows her intuition is strong but it slightly wavers as her thoughts shifts to how it can be her mind playing tricks on her and nothing much.

As the number of steps she takes keeps increasing, her hopes keep reducing, slowly falling lower and lower which will soon be touching the ground or may crash right beneath the crust of the earth. Why is she expecting so much out of a stranger, is totally unknown to her. Waiting for her bus, she tries to keep her mind busy by observing various people, leaving her stray thoughts about him at the back of her mind for some time, at least. It's been more than an hour now and yet not a single bus of her route has arrived. Even counting the other buses, only two buses arrived and the last one was twenty minutes ago. She is tired and upset and wants to throw herself on the bed, unable to take any more of it.

Something is definitely wrong with the bus service, that's for sure and soon she hears the commotion on the other end of the bus stop where the commuters are arguing with a man in uniform. With a closer look, Alisha realises that it is a man from traffic police department, the uniform is enough for her to tell that. He starts to make some announcements, standing amidst the crowd that is slowly gathering around him. She, too, follows the crowd and finds herself a spot where she could hear the news.

"There has been a fatal accident on the Clerkenwell Street and most of the traffic is being diverted. I suggest the people here to find themselves a cab or board a tube." The moment he stops speaking, it's total chaos. Everybody starts worrying and a few already rushing to get a cab. The situation is slowly worsening when the man speaks again.

"Everyone, please remain calm. A temporary helpline is being setup where you can make a call if you need to find information about an alternative route and according to the news I have just received, extra tubes for various routes will be running shortly for your help." With those words, he starts walking away while talking on the walkie-talkie. These men were surely doing all of the work they could to help the people. Even after the whole announcement of the instructions he gave, it is chaotic and nobody cares if it is creating much more mess than actually getting them any help.