I have an extra-terrestrial inside me. It keeps looking at human beings with a suppressed smile. Some kind of a paranoid happiness.
Being the host, I could never detect its presence. Only once did it slip, revealing itself.
That happened on a train journey. One of those monsoon days. Rains lashed around the whole day soaking Calicut in a mucky mess. And by evening all was quiet. Creatures of dampness started squeaking and creaking after a prolonged lull.
People inside the train compartment started raising their windows reluctantly. There were almost a dozen people in front of me somehow pressing themselves on a four feet seat. Half of them were a family with few slumbering kids.
Kids kept dozing, their heads swinging up and down.
One kid kept crying for tea and they got it for him. With shaky little fingers, he kept balancing that paper cup, huge in his tiny hands. Another started wildly swinging so much that his mother arranged a long towel on the floor of the train to sleep.
Everyone slept off after a while. Except me. I kept watching all these people while the damp winds from outside blanketed me.
And my alien smiled for the first time, unable to suppress anymore. Out in the open.
That’s when I knew it.
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