Dear Man who followed me,

Dear LoverBoy who followed me,

When you brushed by me on a busy main road yesterday, I instinctively thought it was an accident. You walked by me, moving in the opposite direction. I was walking towards home and you, maybe you were heading to catch a bus? I felt your hand on my thigh, felt it through the layers of my sari, and I turned around. You did not look back, and I walked on, merely chalking it up as yet another experience of the streets. I had been thinking about something else, a sweet New Year’s message a boss had sent me, allowing myself two seconds of distraction when on a public road. For affording that luxury, I apologise.

I turned into a marginally quieter lane, using you as a convenient continuation to a conversation I was having. Some dude just brushed up against me, I texted, in the same indifferent tone as I would use to describe the car that just drove past or the movie poster that was blaring out at me. But of course, the reply came, and we went on to speak of more interesting things. For thinking that was the end of it, I apologise.

Halfway down that road, I heard your voice behind me, just that then I did not know it was yours. Stupidly enough, I thought it was one someone talking to another someone on the street. It was New Year after all, and everyone seemed to have somewhere to go and someone to talk to. I focused on not tripping over my sari in an effort to get home. Vathakozhambu and carrot curry were my only thoughts just then. After all, it was my penultimate dinner at home. Of course that had to be more important, right? Right? For not giving you any importance, I apologise.

And then you spoke. Hello madam, you said, and I turned around on instinct, checking for a stranger who was too close. You couldn’t have been talking to me, I thought. You were a stranger. Turns out that does not matter. My legs decided they had a mind of their own, and I found myself moving forward faster. I stepped across deflated tyres on the street, around autos parked in the middle of the road, all the while wondering whether it was better to walk into oncoming traffic and risk getting run over or towards the darker shadows on the side of the street. Would you follow me there? Or would you get bored and walk away? For not accounting for your persistence, I apologise.

Hello Madam. Wait, Madam. Give me five minutes, Madam. I want to talk to you, Madam. I just want your time, Madam. Why are you walking away, Madam. Just five minutes, Madam. You kept talking, I kept walking. You kept pursuing, I kept planning. What if you reached out and grabbed my sari? What if persistence gave way to frustration? Would that fuel aggression? Was I better off ducking into my neighbourhood departmental store? But what if I got caught in an empty aisle with you, a stack of pickle bottles behind me and just you in front? Was the street safer than that? What if I followed the rules of a self-assured confident woman and caused you pain? What if instead of reeling in shock after that, you decided to retaliate? For not having any of the answers, I apologise.

You were barely a step behind me. I couldn’t cross the road without walking in to you. I couldn’t stop walking without you bumping in to me. I couldn’t do anything but keep going. Reflexively, I picked up the phone. Did I make the call to ward you off or to calm me down? I don’t know. Lady Luck decided to take a nap just then and my first two attempts weren’t answered. Finally, when the phone was answered, I spoke a little too cheerily, trying to hide how much my hands were shaking just then. So, I am being followed, I said. The response was measured to the point of being scary. Oh ok, I heard, what are you going to do? For expecting a reaction more violent, I apologise.

You were still behind me, asking me to stop. In a last ditch effort to ward you off, I did. Enne thaan venum, I asked. What do you want from me? Pesanum, you said. I want to talk to you. Ungale pudichirukku. I like you. So what, I shot off. Ungalukku pudichirukku nna naan nikkanuma? Why should I stop just because you like me? I stormed off again, you followed again. I paused to avoid traffic. You spoke again. Nillange, you said. Stop. Do we know each other, I growled, and even as the words slipped off my tongue, I knew the words I would hear in response. Therinjikalaame, you said, in what I am sure you thought was a smooth comeback. We can get to know each other. I rolled my eyes, told myself off for not pre-empting that, and kept walking. For giving in to those few lines of conversation, I apologise.

You see, that entire conversation was at 7:30 in the evening, at a junction so busy that we used to crib about traffic jams in an otherwise quiet neighbourhood. I was aggressive in stance, angry in tone, and standing in the middle of the street. Why didn’t you call attention to yourself, people asked me later in the evening. Because of the half a dozen people who made eye contact with me in those few minutes, no one as much as paused. Diverted glances, awkward eye contact. For not having the confidence that I would be helped, I apologise.

And then you gave up. You threw a few choice words at my retreating back, and took the other turn at the junction. You cursed at me for rejecting you, yelled at the illogical prospect of my ignoring your advances, and swore at any possible relationships, present and future. I didn’t stop walking at a frenzied pace till I got home. All the choice words I could have thrown back at you just propelled my feet farther and farther away from that junction. For not opening my mouth, I apologise.

A friend called me back on that last stretch home. I couldn’t take the call ma, I am sorry, he apologised. It was fine, I told him. What’s up, he asked, and for the next few minutes he was assailed with a rather intense response to a safe opening question. But I am fine, I breezed, just walking into the house. And then it hit me. The minute I latched the door behind me and breathed in the confidence of being in a safe space, it hit me. For underestimating how much you could get under my skin, for believing I was numbed to the experience, I apologise.

Dear Stranger on the Street in your grey graphic t shirt and blue jeans, I remember your face much too clearly. I remember the swagger with which you walked next to me as I tried so hard to get away. I remember the casual confidence with which your hand brushed my thigh as you walked by near the busy-as-hell bus depot on New Year Day. I remember the entitlement in your tone as you told me off, your vocabulary choice describing various characteristics of me and my body. Your scruffy beard, the black thread around your neck, the red string around your wrist, the belt with the too-big buckle on your jeans, they have all been stored away as the latest addition to the Vermin file in my head. And for even having that file, as I am sure most other girls do, I do not apologise. That one is not on me.

You see, Stranger, I have the theory to back this up. I could rationalise this plenty, tell myself how you probably saw every Tamil movie on the face of the planet where the hero stalks the heroine into submission, and they love happily ever after (no, not a typo). I could explain it away as something you’ve deeply internalised, the laws of patriarchy and gender norms dictating that you chase, I refuse, you chase some more, I refuse slightly less vociferously, you keep chasing and I swoon. It isn’t your fault, is it? I could explain it away in big words with multiple syllables that roll off my tongue with an ease only born from habit. But I refuse to give you that leeway, and for that I do not apologise.

When I finally let it all hit me, lying on my bed just before heading to a shower, I was shaken, frustrated at myself. No, I did not ask for it and what I was wearing was immaterial to the moment. No, it was not my fault and I knew enough to discount anyone who suggested it. Why must it be a luxury to feel safe, I fumed, a righteous anger threatening to overwhelm me. Yet even that I understood. What I did not get was the speckles of thankfulness. Thank God you didn’t touch me, I found myself thinking. Thank God your idea of wooing did not involve reaching out and tugging at my sari. Thank God you did not decide to show me how much you loved. Thank God you didn’t follow me home. Thank God all the ‘it could have been’ horror stories remained just that. And in that moment, I felt a deep sense of disgust, at the world for teaching us to expect this on the streets, at you for blindly buying into these tropes, but mostly at myself. For having it in me to say thank you for how this panned out.

Dear Stranger, I will apologise for a couple of things from yesterday. For allowing myself a moment of distraction. For not slapping you or yelling or creating a scene at a busy junction on a Sunday evening. For not being able to control the quiver in my hands and the shiver in my knees the closer you came. But you, in the kilometre and a half that you walked with me, behind me, you showed me how much I had internalised. You made me ask myself difficult questions. So maybe next time this happens, for there will most definitely be a next time, I will be better prepared. Maybe next time, I will not automatically dial a guy’s number, as if the only source of strength in that situation can be male. And maybe the next girl you stop on the streets because you know, pudichirukku, would have fought these battles already.

Happy New Year from the girl in the white sari.