"It's muggy today, innit?" The barista in a black hat and green apron asked me as she punched my order.

I nodded politely, unable to curate a veritable reaction. While she swiped my credit card over the side of her ordering screen, her gaze lingered over me. 

I was still processing her words, oscillating between my urge to barf out a quick revert or treading carefully into her alien word trap. 

The machine chimed my bill in synchronized ka chings, filling the deserted coffee shop background.

I fished my phone to do a quick check. Muggy. Oh! Humid.

I tossed my head up, replenished with confidence. "Yes. Very muggy. And so crowded too."

Not sure if it was my delayed reaction or the lack of accent but her eyebrows bridged and her forehead crinkled. 

She huffed, tapping her pink polished nails over my card, now laying on the dark granite.

"Name please," she asked, unwilling to make eye contact with a weirdo who took ten minutes to churn a monosyllabic revert on the weather.

"Mia...Francis."

I had some major tuning to do, from understanding meteorically apt slang to the thick British accent and scalding looks every time I smiled at someone. 

Predominantly, I had to remodel my life to the new quotidian that would be my life in Oxford for a whole year.

My phone buzzed in my hand, a Facetime call. The view on the other side of the screen emitted a calming aura.

"Hey Ria," I flipped the camera, presenting the view of the coffee shop. My sister chuckled on the other side.

"All the places you could check out in Oxford and this is where you end up in!"

I plopped near the window seat.

"Did you go to your class?" Ria asked, tilting her phone for me to view her room. "And how are the Bashirs'?"

The view of her pale lavender walls and an array of books on the shelf, all of which were about business rippled memories of home. 

The place I'd spent my initial nineteen years was now a six-month sea voyage via Cape of Good Hope. So far away.

Don't roll your eyes!

I know four thousand miles between Oxford and India was only a matter of an eight-hour journey in a metal aircraft flung from one side to another. 

But what I wanted to convey was the distance from my people, my family. My home. What could convey it better than elongated spaces and time between us, right?

"Class is in half-hour," I said, dipping my lips into my ice crushed, sugar and whipped cream drink. "I was hungry," I rattled my order on the screen. "Bashir uncle and Fati are fine. So is Irfan. Did you know he grew taller since the last time?"

Ria straddled her elbows on the table, her chin atop her knuckle. "Yes. Boys tend to grow tall with time. What were you thinking? That he'd remain the same four-foot boy since the age of seven?"

"You have a point."

I scanned the room for watchful eyes before committing the crime of dipping my finger into the cup and scooping a generous amount of cream. 

My mouth engulfed my finger, and I dipped back to the condescending voice of Ria through my headphones.

"It's not hygienic. You want to be patient zero in another country?"

My widened teeth display made my elder sister roll her eyes. Most of my actions did. She fetched the phone and fell on her bed, bouncing off the spring action, reiterating her previous question about Irfan.

Bashir and Fatima were my parent's friends from their college days. 

They used to reside in Mumbai before shifting to Oxford with their son. Irfan, the human equivalent of an Eiffel Tower in real, seemed shorter on his Instagram account.

Maybe to protect universally cropped versions like me, social media cropped him as a form of self-reproach.

My phone chimed up. Class in fifteen minutes.

"Okay Ri, have to go. Ask mom to call me."

Before she could speak, I pressed the red button and chugged the cold drink, crunching ice like a metal crusher at work.

Brain freeze was not a joke. 

I choose the wrong timing to display the tensile strength of my teeth. My jaws were stuck in their place, gums drumming up Congo and my temples deciding to drill holes into my skull.

I flumped back into the chair, mentally adding to the list of things not to do ten minutes before class.

Ten minutes!

Like a wounded animal, I picked myself up. My heavy bag, heavier violin case perched on my back, rattled as I paced up, pushing open the broad grass doors of the coffee shop.

What I assumed to be the coffee shop next to my class building turned out to be the wrong building altogether.

The map realigned and Google Assistant's sultry tone directed me to walk further.

"Destination arriving in ten minutes." Those might be the musical words for many, but it only jumbled up my nerves.

I couldn't be late, couldn't afford to sit in the backseat. First impressions lasted a lifetime, and I was already lagging.

Bolting through the pavement, my focus stayed on the map. I was running in parallel to black-gowned students, riding their bicycles.

"Let me cross, I need to get to class," I hollered but those stream of demented lawyer cows considered their journey more important than me attending class. "Dammit."

I checked my phone.

"Seems like you are not moving," The map's voice mocked me. "Still ten minutes to go."

"Oh is it?" I screamed at my phone.

A couple of tanned people wearing England's flag as a cap and holding a selfie camera watched me in amusement.

I was now the demented cow, mooing at her phone.

Picking my pace, I darted to the right.

"Turn left," the voice said.

Breaking stride, I skid. 

Onlookers peered at me as if they'd never witnessed anyone running on the street. Maybe it was my rattling bag that alerted them.

My lungs burned, my eyes heated up and my butt was assaulted with constant backlash from my bag and case. I was too worried about the timing to think about my appearance. 

My violin case was ready to go fly off the strap if I didn't slow down.

"Five minutes to destination..." I swear Google lady was mocking.

I checked the time. It was already six-thirty in the evening. I was already late.

Someone smoking at the entrance of the building blocked my race against time.

"Sorry, my bad, Sir," I yelled, scurrying up the stairs.

There was a flight to the entrance and four more to the second floor.

My lungs gave up on the ground floor.

Sweat beads formed on my forehead, dripping down my sides. My hair had floated in all directions like I was statically charged. 

But it was the knot, midway between my diaphragm and stomach that made it impossible to breathe or take another step.

I slid on the stairs, leaning my head over the intricately carved woodwork of the spokes in the banister. 

Warm, humid air added fuel to the heat from inside. The setting sunlight streaming from the window behind did nothing to soothe my aching glands.

I was ready to give up, lie down on the stairs and let the grim reaper conduct his task.

"Are you okay?" Someone asked.

I sat up like a remote-controlled being.

A woman, tall and slender, stepped closer to the stairs but not nearly approaching me. I was sure to resemble anything but a lost, tired student.

"Six-thirty cla...ss," I heaved with the residual air in my lungs. "Six-thir-"

"Meeting at six-thirty?" she asked, her eyebrows touching her neatly defined hairline.

I nodded vigorously. 

Maybe she would lend me a hand for support up the stairs.

"Oh honey, that's just here," she said, tilting her head towards the sidewall. She was pointing to the first door at the entrance.

She lent me her hand, pulling my deadweight off the stairs. 

Like a soldier commanded to march, she tapped at my shoulders and winked, pulling out her thumb before disappearing into the crowd.

I turned the corner and stood near the plain brown door which held the bold words on a piece of paper, Meeting.

My phone was out of charge to check the room number once again.

I kept my head low as I entered. 

The draft caught me off-guard. My semi-dry hair fluttered onto my face as I tried an attempt for an unnoticed entry. Certain heads turned, setting my nerves aflame.

Sliding into a corner seat, I dropped my belongings. The weight off my shoulders was a relief.

A boy, standing in the center of the room with black strands of hair caressing his forehead seemed to have noticed my struggle. His mouth remained ajar as he walked back.

The congregation in the room spanned into an all-age category. 

Neon-colored clothed woman with a sullen look, grey waistcoat donned lugubrious man to a girl sitting at the far end, unsmiling, unwelcoming. 

All glared at me.

My heart thumped into my ribs. The air conditioner running on the wall behind me did nothing to me. 

The room and its people, all fell silent. All I could hear was the pulsating rhythm in my ears.

It was supposed to be the best day, the day I boasted about my scholarship. Of my awards and achievements.

Then I entered this room, a different portal in time where an alternate reality was projected.

I had never felt more out of place, never did I experience a call from the inside to scream at those people who watched me as if my smile hurt them. 

My conduct, my activeness mocked them.

It's just your nerves. You are fine. Everyone here is fine.

A deep, rejuvenating breath cleansed my vision, my sour palate and my heaving chest.

Searching for the class pamphlet, I scanned through the paragraphs about the maestro. 

Oscar Wellington - the man, the maestro - was nowhere to be found.

Maybe he was running late too. 

~

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