No Turning Back - Part 2: A Tale of Memory and Myth | Thursday Tale No. 13

  The past has a strange way of returning, sometimes through the stories we tell, sometimes through the silences that follow them. They don’t die; they wait for the right silence to breathe again. 

  In No Turning Back – Part 2, the line between memory and haunting grows thin. What began as a nostalgic retelling now echoes with fear, as the night itself joins the circle of listeners.

No Turning Back - Part 2

Photo by Nitin Chauhan on Pexels.

  “She was an old lady draped in a white saree. She was lying on her stomach, and was deeply lost in reading a book. She was moving the calves of her leg back and forth, just like the way we do when we lie down while reading. And with one hand, she was fiddling with her powdery white hair, similar to our aachi's, but hers were really long… In the darkness of that night, her appearance was whiter than the moon, and her book illuminated the same glow, but not in the right way. And guess what? She was lying at the entrance of the kitchen from where we had just then passed…”

  Everyone's face turned pale with shock, and their mouths involuntarily gasped. Miranda, after the shock had passed, took a moment to wonder how true this story could be. She did not doubt Veda, but she did account how our mind creates illusions. But considering Sai tai’s assertive expression, she let the doubt drift away. 

  She returned back to Veda explaining further, “A shrill passed through every cell of my body. I tightly pressed Sakhi’s palm, who was still oblivious of what I had just then seen. I tapped on her shoulder. And I wasn't imagining, or hallucinating. She was there. We both saw her. Really! We both froze in the very spot we had just a while then felt safe. Then the worst of all happened… She slowly turned her head, looked us in the eyes and called ‘Va!’ in a whisper so ominous, I yelled out a cry…Ahh!” 

  The fear from the night of twenty years ago felt so near as she narrated it.

  “Frantically my aachi and a few others woke up. They quickly turned on the light to find out what had happened.”

  “It was really a terrifying night, I still remember her face, she looked like… I can't really tell… but for sure it was scary,” related Sakhi. 

  “Then?” 

  “She wasn't there. She just vanished. Just like that. She was nowhere to be seen in the brightness of the light. Everyone asked us why we screamed, and I told them everything. But the funny part was, Sakhi was quiet, as she always is. She didn't let out even a whimper,” Sakhi smiled at her silly introvertedness and everyone giggled.

  “Then?”

  “Everyone dismissed it as my silly imagination. They later made us sleep beside our mothers for us to sleep, put off the lights, and went back to sleep. Through the thumbing of my heartbeat I dared to look at the dark entrance and she…wasn't there. I can't remember how I fell asleep after that, but yeah, I saw her. And Sakhi is the witness,” concluded Veda, curving her spine inward eked with fear, the waxed hair of her body rising in defence of the memories of that night.” 

  “Woah!” exclaimed everyone with thrill and disbelief. 

  “So is your house haunted?” asked Kaveri. 

  “I don't know! But I have never experienced anything similar ever again.” 

  “Hmm…!” observed everyone. 

  As they gradually shrugged off the ghostly vibes, the green led light on the top slab blinked. Everyone jumped with momentary fear. Their mothers, used to their chuckles  and chatters, remained undistracted from their own elderly conversation. 

  Laughing at their fragile impulses, the girls continued talking about other things. 

  And then it blinked again. 

  It blinked again and again.

  Veda turned pale, being the faintest heart in the gang. Even Joyce and Miranda, who did not believe much in paranormality felt a tint of terror, and they drew closer to the physical touch of the circle. 

  Nervously laughing, Nadia rose up. 

  “Wait, I'll turn it off,” she assured them. 

  “Nadia, what are you doing? Don't put off the Lord's light at night, it's bad,” reprimanded her mother. 

  “No mummy, the light is gone mad, it keeps blinking. See Veda babi got scared.”

  “Oh okay,” smiled the aunt. 

  “Veda is always like that. Shee Veda, grow up a little,” said Aunt Sivagami,  Veda’s mum. 

  “Amma!” Veda protested.

  “Stop speaking about such things at this hour. We are going to the market, so behave, girls! Brinda, take care of them,” said Aunt Sivagami and left, followed by the other aunt, and Miranda’s mother. 

  “Akka, wait! I'll also join you. I'm done cooking,” called Aunt Sudha, who, like her daughter, was the quietest of the elders’ group and oftentimes forgotten. She hastily climbed down the spiral stairway and followed the three through the living room’s entrance and down the flight of stairs that led them to the main door. 

  To dissolve the unappealing aura, Nadia asked, “What nicknames would we give each one of us if all of them agreed on one?’

  “Hmm…I would call you a coconut tree for sure. Within a year, you'll grow 7.5 to the point that I'll have to look up and cramp my neck in order to talk to you.”

  Giggling, everyone agreed. 

  “What name will I be anointed with then?” asked Miranda.

  “Miranda Masquerades,” said Brinda. 

  “Why though?”

  “I don't know. For me it just suits your personality… sophisticated.”

  “Ohh…okay!” she acquiesced. 

  “And Brinda babi will be bestowed with the title ‘sleepy-head’. If she continues doing this all the time. We'll leave her alone in the house,” said Nadia, drawing a sly smile, raising her eyebrows and nudging her sister Kaveri. “We'll let bhoot take her away,” she emphasised. 

  Brinda smiled. 

  And the green light turned on without any stimulation. Everyone turned petrified.  

  Veda let out a shrill cry, Brinda covered her mouth in apprehension, Sakhi winced, Miranda’s arms puffed with goosebumps, Joyce's eyes popped with shock, Nadia shut her eyes, and Kaveri leaned closer to the wall protecting her back. For odd reasons, she believed that protecting her back from whoever prompted the light would save her. For a brief moment, there was an eerie silence, which could be overtaken by something even sinister. But it all diminished when the light stopped blinking, and shone brightly and steadily.

  The terrified cousins, this time less frisky, began to release their defence. 

  Then, it happened again. The light flickered. All the lights in the house began to rebel. 

  The girls jumped to their feet. They held each other tightly. 

  “Click!” 

  All the lights of the house went off.

  With a chorus shriek they rushed towards the door, leaving behind a dark room and the green light flickering above Lord Ganesha. 

  Miranda tried to turn on her phone's torch light, but it would not respond. Shoving it away, she took the first blind step down the stairs. 

  Sticking to each other, they all silently followed Miranda out the living room door, and through the staircase with Joyce at the end ensuring their safety. 

  “Wait for me!” cried Sakhi, who had weaselled out of the group to pick baby Saanvi from the adjacent room. 

  As they slowly progressed towards the main entrance, with Miranda attempting to trace the latch in the pitchest darkness of the stairway, and trying to unlock its mechanism, she heard baby Sainvi’s wail. But not from behind her.

  Scared, she fiddled her way through the lock’s pattern and pushed the door open.

  “Thud!”

  The breeze circulating over the vastness of their front yard under the moonlight, cooled the sweat that trailed down her chin, only for her to perspire at the sight in front of her — baby Sanvi crying to coax her mother into handing her the fifth bar of chocolate, her sister and other cousins feasting on cones of ice-cream, and their mothers walking behind them with bags of overflowing household stuffs. 

  “Paapa utli!” exclaimed Joyce. 

  “Miranda, why have you not turned on all the lights yet? It's a bad omen not to do so in the evenings,” explained her aunt. 

  Miranda, still bewildered by everything her eyes perceived, turned around to find a silent dark stairway staring at her in intermittent winks of a green beam. 

- Mercy Rebonica