At a station.

The black beads of her mangalsutra glistened in the light of the noon sun. For a moment her worry knit eyebrows relaxed as her lips creased into a fleeting smile. Sometimes she allowed herself the indulgence of footboard travel, she liked the wind ruffling her hair. The subji she had prepared that morning had turned out to be a little too salty. Varun, her son had complained, as always. Nonetheless it had gone into all three dabbas, Varun's, his father's and her's. They would have the same subji for dinner too, when they all returned home after a long day. She couldn't afford extravagance. As the 1:10 Churchgate local entered Dadar station, she gathered the pleats of her startched cotton sari , held on to her bag and prepared to alight. An arrogant sunbeam caught a thin silver strand in her hair. She swiftly alighted and walked towards the foot over bridge.
Just as the train blew its whistle and inched towards pulling its serpentine self out of the station, a young man came rushing down the bridge steps. In his pin stripe pants and crisp white shirt, he wore the look of a successful professional. There was a rush of heady determination in his gait. With his eyes fixed on the train that threatened to move any moment, he did not see her in his way. He ran, his arms flaying in the air. She tried to dodge him. Unsuccessfully. They collided.
He twirled her around with his flaying arms now enveloping her in a disarming embrace. Neither knew what was happening. The unwarranted, amused stares of curious onlookers broke the spell. He rushed to hop on to his train.
She was still wide eyed with the joyful excitement the twirl had whipped in her. She coyly smiled as a young bride would, trying to hide from the gaze of the amused bootpolishwala, the chaiwala, the paperwala and others . She didn't yell at him or slap him. She only carried the happiness he had unknowingly passed on to her in those brief seconds.