The Trip - Ch 1 - Road to Nainital

Disclaimer - All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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It was the last day before the extended weekend. Rohit and Sachin had made plans for the weekend for celebrating their best friend’s birthday. They were supposed to leave for Nanital by 8 pm after picking Mayank, Aditi and Riya. Gaurav was getting his Scorpio along with his girl Tanya. It was Wednesday. All of them, except Tanya, belonged to a huge software firm in Gurgaon. They took a leave on Thursday as Friday was a holiday. Tanya was still in college final year doing her Computers. She bunked her college. She did not even tell her parents about the trip. They would have refused outright, that too when no one from her college was going along. It was Gaurav’s 25th birthday. His friends had planned to celebrate in the picturesque hill station of Nanital. All of them were on board by 7 pm. They reached the highway after crossing the crowded roads of Delhi in another couple of hours.

Around 11 pm, they halted at a road side dhaba to have dinner. Rohit picked up some bottles of beer and whisky, and vodka for girls hey all got a little high after a couple of drinks and then, had a sumptuous meal. Since Gaurav was driving, everyone made sure he did not drink much. However, Mayank being a teetotaler was always an alternative. They started their journey around midnight with Gaurav at the wheels and Tanya sitting beside him. Aditi and Riya were sitting in middle, while rest of the guys took the rear seats. Loud music was playing inside the SUV. The mood was merry. The guys sans Mayank were gulping down their beers, even on move, including Gaurav. Tanya tried to convince to be easy on drinking. Mayank asked Gaurav to let him drive, but he did not budge from seat.

They had already approached the valley road. The hairpin bends in road were beginning to take precedence over the straight 2 lane highway. The night was dark and chilly. It was late December. It was around 3 am in morning. Thick clouds of fog had descended on the road. Visibility was reduced to almost 5 meters. Rohit and Sachin had passed out drunk in the rear seat. Even Mayank had fallen asleep. Girls were asleep too, except Riya, who was hooked to her I-pod in a semi-slumber state. Gaurav was dozy. His eyes were red. But he concentrated on the road. Heavy vehicles were seen on the road, but rarely. Tanya had been keeping up with him, talking to him till a half hour ago. But now he was on his own, driving his father’s brand new Scorpio. All his friends were asleep or passed out.

Gaurav was struggling with his sleep. An unerring desire to shut his eye lids was being fought. He decided to roll down his window a bit, so the chilly winter air could keep him awake.
He had a sudden urge to pee. But he did not find any suitable location to stop the car. After crossing few more hairpin bends, and struggling continuously with his siesta and nature’s call for releasing all the beer inside him, he decided to park the vehicle at one of the bends. Atop the cliff he parked the vehicle on side and put on the parking lights. He tried to wake up Tanya but of no use. He climbed out of the vehicle and strolled towards the bushes. He stopped with a jerk when he realized the deep valley on the other side of the bushes. He thought, “Definitely more than 1000 feet”. He felt his knees weaken. But the sight was beautiful. He was above the clouds, several layers of cloud. Gaurav was lost in the sheer magnificence of the moment, the place.

‘Gauraaaav’ …. (Scream, screech..) Riya shouted on top of her voice, ‘Look out’. Gaurav was startled. He was holding the wheel, still inside the car. He realized he was dreaming about the deep valley beneath him, next to bushes. All he could see was the vehicle running down the slope with huge thick green bushes slapping on the windscreen. Tanya also got up and was puzzled. The vehicle was going downhill, albeit slowly. Mud was splashed across the windows. It was raining heavily. Nothing was visible. Mayank was awake by now and he made his way till front climbing over the still asleep Aditi. Gaurav was terrified by fear. He was dumbstruck. Mayank yelled at him to put the brakes. Gaurav obliged. There was a huge thud. Their vehicle had crashed into a huge tree trunk. Rest of them were slowly getting up. They were still not aware of the developments. It was raining profusely. The temperature might have been around zero degrees Celsius. It was freezing outside. Mayank got outside first, followed by Gaurav. They were in the middle of nowhere. Huge trees, muddy ground, sound of insects, water running across the hills and the greyness of early morning. Mayank took out his phone to find out their location on his GPS. There were no signals. Meanwhile Aditi started sobbing and Riya tried consoling her. Everyone started looking for signals in their phone. There were none to be. Sachin started yelling at Gaurav for his negligence in driving. He reciprocated. It would have been a huge altercation had Rohit not intervened. Mayank was still harassing his cellphone for signals. Riya scoffed at Gaurav for not letting Mayank drive. Things would have turned ugly when someone realized that Tanya was not to be seen. They quickly checked inside the vehicle. She was not there. They shouted her name. No response. Riya found her phone lying in mud nearby. The rain had stopped. Sun started to peek through the hills and clouds. But the sudden disappearance of Tanya had worsened matters. Aditi was most scared and was howling now. The start to a wonderful trip had turned sour. There were more questions than answers. And the biggest one was – Where are we? Though ‘Where is Tanya’ was the higher priority.

-- to be continued...