SALMA AND ASLAM...... PART 1

He worked in a company of software production. He was in the distribution department and was thus travelling all around the country, was 23 years of age.
She worked in a factory manufacturing spectacles and was only 17 years old.

Aslam lived in an urban area called Highlands and the bus in which he travelled to reach his working place at Belle Rose, had to pass through the place called Phoenix, where Salma lived and was usually seen on the bus stop.
It all happened one fine morning when she got in the bus and Aslam’s eyes went on her. He admired her from the back as she was sitting in the front…
Now from Phoenix to Belle Rose it was a 20 minutes drive and during those minutes Aslam’s eyes did not move from her silhouette….. When he alighted, she kept sitting and from the road Aslam looked back in the bus to have a last glance at her and he found her looking at him, their eyes met for the first time on that morning
The whole day she remained in his mind, her hair, dress, face, eyes, were all graved in his memory……
Aslam kept thinking where could she be going? Did she work? Will he see her again the next day?
He thought it was only a one day show….. Yet the next morning he was expecting to see her again…..
And when the bus reached Phoenix, at the bus stop where she had got in the day before, Aslam’s eyes started looking outside to see if she was there to get in, and his joy had no bound when he saw her standing in the queue waiting her turn to get in the bus! This day he did not sit at the back but in the front expecting that she gets a seat near him……
But someone who got in before her sat near him and she sat just two seats in front of him.....
He tried his best to hear where for she will pay to the conductor, and according to the bus conductor’s reply while giving her the ticket, Aslam knew that she will alight at Rose Hill which is only a kilometre from Belle Rose where he usually alights.
And again when he alighted he stood on the road and looked at her from the pavement and she looked back and had a slight smile, and he stood fixing at her till the bus departed!

This continued for about a month. Without any word said to each other.... Aslam was thinking of her night and day, and someday when she missed that bus in the morning Aslam would wait at Belle Rose on the pavement to wait and look into every other buses passing by to see if he will see her in another bus. And he at times did see her and some days not at all....

Thus one morning when they were both in the bus Aslam paid for Rose Hill instead of Belle Rose, he did not go to work only to accompany her so as to see where she will go, where she works, where she alights and all that....
And Salma always WAITS to see Aslam getting out of the bus at Belle Rose and on that day when she found he did not alight and the bus started to move, she turned back to look for him in the bus..... her face was pale and worried.... she thought he had forgotten to alight or was asleep!!?
And Aslam was waiting to see if she will turn back to look at him on not seeing him alighting, he wanted to see if she cares..... and he was so happy to see her looking at the back, and when she found him smiling happily she felt that she was caught being caring for him, or she had some feelings for him hidden within her..... she blushed.... and smiled to herself..... she wished to ask him why he did not alight, she wanted to ask why he is not going to work on that day..... he wished she asked him that, he wished she talked to him, and she wished he talked to her.... form both side the timidity was invading their selves...

Now at Rose Hill bus terminus, when she alighted and started walking, Aslam followed her and she quickened her steps, and then she got in another bus! Aslam read the indicator, the bus was going to Saint Pierre. So she works at Saint Pierre he told himself! There was an industrial zone at that place..... and now, Aslam also got in that bus behind her, he only sat and kept looking at her admiring her in al the ways..... it was only a seven kilometres trip and they alighted and thousands of girls and women and men were found walking towards the industries.... Aslam felt lost among the crowd, and then she had joined her friends there and she was walking in a group of 10 to 15 girls.... he was more reluctant to approach her... so he followed from a distance and only wished to see in which factory she will go, as there were hundreds of factories in that zone.... and once he found her getting in, he left having enquired with other persons about the time at which that factory released the workers in the evening.

Now, Aslam had among all his friends one who was his closest and knew him very well. Aslam related everything about Salma to him. And that friend encouraged him to talk to her as it was high time to do it.
Till now there had been no talks between Aslam and Salma, only their eyes communicated, they conveyed messages through the eyes only.... yet 2 months had now elapsed in that way of communicating....

And after two and a half months of looking at each other, of waiting to see each other in the bus, at the bus stop, of waiting for one to alight and look at each other from the pavement and all that, one afternoon Aslam went to wait for her at her working place in the evening!!
He was feeling very hard to start a talk, he did not know what to say, how to say.....
They saw each other; she was surprised to see him there at Saint Pierre in the evening! She had a disturbed look, and did not know what to do... he walked behind her, she hurried her steps.... she felt everybody were aware and were looking only at them....

At last once in the bus, Aslam sat close to her on the same seat. This was the first time they sat together after two and half months of knowing each other.... and when the conductor came to take the fare Aslam paid two for Rose Hill. She was tending her fare to be paid but when she saw Aslam paid she kept her money..... and, and he started the conversation.....