YOU ARE GOING TO DIE

As Vineet reached his home, he was anxious to know why there was a crowd near his home, seeing such a large crowd near his house startled him and took away his breath.

 Something is fishy. It was gloomy around him and every one stared at him with those cheerless eyes, which had a glint of condolence in them.  As he passed the gate, one police officer with a fat jiggling tummy and dangling cheeks was just coming out of the house, busy on his phone while his hands wore white gloves which had blood on them. As soon as he saw blood he felt weak and dizziness slowly crept on him.

 

He used to faint whenever he scraped his knee or elbow, just because of blood and make a fool of himself. His father ensured that he stopped outdoor games. His gentle and kind mother reluctantly allowed him to play after making sure that his body was covered from top to bottom, while his father was somewhere away.

Now he is trying his best, to not faint. Walking itself became difficult for him. He just wanted to sleep where he was standing. His vision became clumsy and was squinting, searching for the door or something to hold on. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t control his legs, even his hands went out of his control and the world around him started spinning and before he could touch his temples, he collapsed where he was standing, like an abandoned rag doll.

 

 

He felt something cold crawling on his face; he could hear distant voices deep below the earth. He wanted to get up, but he couldn’t. Then someone lifted him and put him on a soft mattress and as soon as he was placed on the mattress, he was asleep. When he woke up, he observed from the door that there where people pacing up and down and somewhere even shouting commands to no one. Then everything came back to him in a second, but he was in his bedroom.

    “Maybe that was a bad dream,” he said to himself slowly.

      But why there are police in his home. He slowly stood and made his way towards the door. There was utter chaos in the hall. For a moment he considered the choice of not going there, but he knew better, so he slowly made his way towards the hall.

     He was taken aback when he saw his father and mother lying on the floor, blood still gushing down slowly from the clean- cut from ear to ear on the neck of his mother. His father was stabbed in three places, in the heart and other two holes were stabbed in his stomach, here to the blood was still oozing from the holes.

   He was shocked: it was like a huge bombshell which was dropped on him. Tears were already running down his cheeks, the dam opened. He couldn’t withstand that disgusting sight and he was already weak and dizziness was on him as there was so much of blood. He can hardly run, he was crying and on top it, he was weak and was struggling to find his way and bumped into few people on his way.

     “Where are you going child?”  asked one of the police. “You are supposed to stay in Here,” he said the last word with emphasis.

       “The blood has a”, he was struggling to speak as it was choking his throat. “B…b- bad effect on me“, it was all he could manage to say.

       “Ok relax,” said the police. “Suresh take this guy out and do be careful, ok. If we lose this guy, we are going to have a good and peaceful talk with our super chill DGP, which we won’t forget in our lives, understand”

      Suresh gave him a quick nod and took Vineet hand and guided him out of the house. He was waiting for him to take a decision, Vineet gestured towards the vast banyan tree which exactly towards there left, it was too creepy and scary to be in the small and precious garden of Mary (Vineet’s mother).  It felt so out of place there. It felt so strange to him to have a Banyan tree in the garden but his father insisted to keep it there. No friend of Vineet used to come to his home due to the Banyan tree, even the guests complained of it.  Vineet sat on one of the vast and enormous roots. He was crying and he knew he was going faint in a couple of seconds.

 When he was aware of his surroundings again, he started pinching himself making sure he was not in a dream, and he looked at his shirt, which was drenched with both water and sweat. He need to drink something, he was dying of thirst. He turned to Suresh, who was waiting for the call from inside, his eyes glued towards the main door, and Vineet did not ask him any water. He wanted to cry, but he couldn’t: there was no water left in his body and he was weak, no strength was left in him as he fainted two times. Abruptly he started thinking about the watchman.

   “Where is the watchman”, enquired Vineet. Suresh shook his head.

    “Don’t you talk?” asked Vineet.

    Suresh just stared at him. The house of Mohit Sharma was simple and tidy. Mohit beamed whenever someone praised the tidiness and cleanliness of his house however he never took interest in the affairs of the house. Vineet mother, Mary, was the reason behind the tidiness of the house though she never took the credit. He was always away from home. Sometimes he would venture out and come after two days or two weeks.

   Vineet was gazing at the banyan tree, touching its hard and roughed trunk. He was slowly lifting his gaze upwards.

    “What the -”, he gasped. Even Suresh looked up in alarm. Vineet couldn’t believe his eyes. Up above the tree, something was dangling. It was too big to be a monkey and it definitely wore shoes. Suresh was moving back to get a clear view of it. None saw it there as it was cleverly hidden. The banyan tree was exactly beside the main door and the body was hanging on its leeward side, no one could see it from the main garden. Suresh yelled for his people to help him.

    But who would climb half the tree to hang it there, and how did he hang it there: and no one saw him doing it.

     Vineet saw towards the next house which was to his right, it was empty. The house in front of him was also empty and in left, it was a land full of wild grass with a compound wall. The police were trying to climb the tree and were successful in failing to do it, finally, when they brought it down, it barely qualified as a human. The face was distorted, and the shirt had dried blood on it. Suddenly it stuck him; it was the watchman. He forgot how to breathe for a few seconds. All the hatred of watchman in him vanished, and he felt pity and shocked.

    He just wanted to run from there and hide somewhere, so that no one can find him and cry until the fate proved these all surreal experiences is a dream. He stumbled across the rock and fell, but no one noticed him since they were intrigued by their new discovery. He stood up and trudged toward the stone bench which was not polished and rough with a few dark spots. He wanted to cry but he was totally dehydrated and his eyes were red. He needs water but no one cared about him.

 

   “Hey kid,” one the police approached him, “You need this,” he gave him a glass of water and added, “YOU ARE GOING TO DIE.”

                          To be continued