Sunita Chandra
Within a couple of years, when both the boys started to go to school, Justin started to have ample time to himself before the evening set in. Giving much time to read the Bible and spend time in prayer was now his prime interest. He would sit down with his Bible and make notes on all the thoughts that kept enlightening him from time to time. This was a new experience and each new revelation from the Bible would enthrall him. Every day, he eagerly waited for such afternoons until it was time for him to pick up his sons from the school bus stop.
At the bus stop, Rahul would alight first, followed by a beaming, five-year old Armaan, who would take small-but-quick steps to run into Justin’s arms. Immediately thereafter, Armaan would start his story session, rounding up all the happenings in the school that would continue non-stop until they reached home, which was a mere five-minute walk from the bus stop. The trio, along with Justin’s mother, would then sit down for evening snacks and fruits, followed by some games and then study-time for the boys. By evening, Pearl would also join everyone in the family activities and by dusk, Justin would go out to make pastoral visits to some of the church families.
That evening, Justin crisscrossed the city of Delhi, visiting some families living on the other end and returned rather late in the night.
In the third watch of the night, when people drift into a deep slumber or are enjoying a pleasant dream, Justin’s phone broke the silence of the night with its shrill ring. He jumped out of the bed with a start and reached quickly for the phone to ensure that the ring did not disturb others in the house.
‘Hello’, he said in a hushed voice, covering the mouthpiece with the curvature of his palm to minimise the sound.
‘Hello, brother’, was a feeble response of a woman on the other side.
Justin looked at the wall clock; its iridium hands showed that the time was 2 am.
‘Who is it?’ narrowing his eyebrows, he asked again.
‘Brother, this is Sunita Chandra’, was the response. ‘I am very disturbed and cannot sleep, could you please come and pray for me’.
After thinking through it in his mind, Justin said, ‘Okay, I will come, give me some time’.
Pearl, who was a light sleeper, had woken up by then and asked, ‘What happened?’
Justin was always a man of few words except when he was preaching or discussing the Bible with someone, so his explanation was short and to the point, conveying at the same time that he would have to go to Mrs. Sunita Chandra’s house and that she should go back to sleep.
It took him slightly more than a quarter of an hour to reach the DDA colony where Sunita Chandra lived. Night travel at such an hour was fraught with many dangers, one of which was to avoid the self-appointed guardians of the colony—the stray dogs. These custodians would embark to patrol their territories in the night and furiously follow any intruder who dared to venture there. Travel on a motorcycle was even riskier because the noise that the two-stroke engine made would immediately catch the attention of such guardian dogs who, on seeing the rider, would run alongside the two-wheeler barking and baring their fangs. Justin was praying to avoid any such encounter. He reached the colony that had many blocks of four-story buildings made up of one-bedroom apartments. Originally built by the Delhi Development Authority, all apartments were of the same design from the outside, generally painted with grey colour. However, the colony that was now more than two decades old had undergone a complete transformation undertaken haphazardly by the occupants of various apartments. Most of the occupants had extended their balconies beyond the authorised plan, thus converting the one-bedroom into three or even four-bedroom apartments, and in the process compromising the structural safety of the whole block.
Justin started looking for a place to squeeze-in his motorcycle and park it in between a fleet of scooters, motorcycles and bicycles which were parked any and everywhere. People had a tendency to park their vehicle closest to the staircase and many-a-times, one had to jump over the front wheel of such two-wheelers to get to the first step of the stairwell. Incidentally, and to Justin’s surprise, the stairwell in this block was nicely lit but the excessively depilated steps and the peeling paint on the walls stood a mute witness to the absent upkeep of any kind.
On reaching the apartment of Sunita Chandra, Justin paused for a few minutes to comb his hair and clean his face, which would have caught the soot that hung around this industrial area, and then pressed the doorbell.
Sunita Chandra, a woman in her mid-forties with a physique that trumpeted her enmity with any regimen of physical exercise except that of climbing the flight of steps to her third floor apartment, opened the door. After the pleasantries, that were too much to ask for at that hour of the night, Justin settled down in the sofa-chair in this otherwise nicely kept apartment.
‘So, Sunita ji, what happened?’ Justin asked with concern in his voice. ‘Is everything fine with you?’
These few words of sympathy by Justin were enough to break loose the dam of sorrow that had lately engulfed her life. Sunita Chandra had been leading a rather hard life, with not much emotional support from anyone. After the death of her husband, she was now living with her only son on whom she was pinning all the hopes of her life. However, the relations between the mother and the son, who was in his twenties, had strained because of their daily clashes on trivial matters. The disagreement reached such proportions that her son decided to walk out on her. Justin was aware of the situation and was already in contact with the son, who with some prayer and persuasion had agreed to move back with his mother.
By then, Justin had understood that Sunita Chandra did not face any new situation of great concern, and it was because of her depressed feelings that prompted her to call Justin at this unearthly hour of the night. However, at that time, just listening to her woes would help her regain her composure. That is exactly what Justin did.
While on his way back, he thought in retrospect that this all makes a part of his Pastoral ministry. People would wake you up, for they themselves cannot sleep.