You know how public transport is often filled to the rafters with no space to breathe and harried commuters stomping your feet on their way in and out? This bus wasn’t.

Most passengers, like me, found seats. But still, a man of about fifty, who stood a little away, insisted on crashing into my shoulder every time the bus swerved or braked or just trundled down the road.

When I told him to move away, he replied with a torrent of abuse that ended with a smirk and a threat to throw acid on my face.

So easily said. I don’t know if he meant it, if he really had it in him to do what he said he’d do, if he’d even remember me the next day and if the threat had only existed in the heat of that moment. But I did skip the bus for a couple of days after the incident and then talked my dad into waiting at the bus stop with me for a week after.

Of course, I was convinced I was a wimp and embarrassed about my silly precautions. But the fear of something going wrong is always much greater.

For women, safety is never a given. And living with that knowledge is as draining as the stories of rape and sexual assault the television beams at you through the day.

You are not safe anywhere and can never hope to be – not from the relative, the neighbour, the watchman, the friend, the rickshaw driver, the boss, the fruit-seller. Not in the clothing store’s trial room, not in the lab with your chemistry teacher and not after a late night concert in a large parking ground that doesn’t have floodlights.

Trying to stay safe means having to second guess my every move every single day so much that it’s no longer a conscious decision.

It’s become part of how I live. And what’s worse – I don’t expect it to change.

(Tanya studied commerce at Stella Maris College and then went to the Asian College of Journalism, Chennai.)

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