How would you feel, when a person is brutally murdered right in front of your eyes and you are helpless, standing and watching him taking his last breath...................

                                                                   Part 4

                                                           The Unbelievable

Have I turned psycho was the first thing that came in my mind, when my eyes opened. I found myself in the same forest, lying on the same grass bed. I could see the forest more clearly as it was evening time. Birds were flying back to their nests. It was so green out here. The water droplets on the green leaves sparkled like small diamonds. I was amazed by the eternal beauty of this place. Soon, I was distracted by some noise. "Ritu, you have actually lost it. So just close your eyes and get back to sleep", my brain gave me these silly suggestions. In these few hours, "shock" has become my favourite word. Denying all the ridiculous suggestions that my brain gave me, I chose to go forward and find out, what was the scene this time, though I did repent later, for taking this stupid decision. I could hear the thunder sound of my heartbeat getting faster and louder at every step which took me closer to the noise. I followed the narrow lane that took me to the place where I lost my senses earlier. Crap! The lake. No, this is not happening to me again. I should have been "shocked" or "afraid", but this time, I was really irritated. Frighten at my own reation, I took few more steps to actually view the whole lake episode, but from a different angle, ofcourse! Kiran was taking pictures, and we were talking about our college fest, which took place earlier this year. But my eyes were busy searching for my new "unknown" friend. There she was, flying like an impetuous wind. Man! "She is so graceful was the first thing that came into my mind." Without wasting any time, she vanished into Rushali's body. She gave me a cold look, just before entering into her body, as if indicating me that something big was coming by my way. It's then, that I saw her reflection in the water and fainted. Oh! I actually passed out due to excess emotional distress earlier this evening. Now I know what had actually happened to me. Kiran cought me at the right moment or else I would have surely hit my head on the rocks. Amrita panicked at the scene and as usual started crying. But, Rushali was carm amd helped Kiran to carry me back to the car. She asked Ramu to drive back to the guest house and made it clear that she would come in the other car. My vision started getting blurred and unexpectedly, I found myself standing in front of a forest.

Have I been here? I have been asking this question too often these days? I saw something moving, and without thinking I entered into a lane that some how seemed so attractive to me. I was totally hypnotized by the beauty of my surrounding. Everything around me was so beautiful, the colorful flowers, long- slender Eucalyptus trees, the green grass. I was in my wonderland. The wonderland that I always imagined in my dreams was right in front of me. I don't know how did my legs coordinated with my thoughts. I was just moving, walking into the forest, unaware of the mysterious future, unware of my very existence in this forest, unware of  my dream and totally unware of my ghost friend's intentions. My spellbound broke to a voice. When did I come here? I found myself standing on the edge of a waterfall. One step and I would have been flying and drowned in the river. No little clues of my existence on this place would have been found. But aah! This was my dream, oh! Excuse me! Anything can happen in this dream world and later turn out to be the truth. Coming of my stupid thoughts, I searched for some evidence to my presence on this place. What the crap? I was dreaming of boys. Wait! Focus, my mind gave me strict instructions. I saw two handsome guys clicking pictures and talking about some girls. The boy in black shirt looked damn handsome. He was really gorgeous, tall and fair in complexion. The other boy was a bit short, dressed in purple color shirt, but very cute. Wait a second. I have seen them earlier. Yah! Yesterday, when our tyre had punctured on the highway, these guys had stopped by and were eager to render their services. But, we had refused to take any kind of help as, we could figure their bad intentions. Our disapproval must have hurt their male ego because, they started blabbering some rubbish stuffs. It was intolerable, when, they threw a bear bottle at Kiran. This action made Rushali lose her temper and she started abusing them. It was very difficult to control her, but those guys were no less. What were these shit heads doing in my dream? I tried to concentrate so hard on what was happening but it was just so stupid of me to trouble my brain this way. They were still talking nasty things about us. I saw a girl far behind the woods. She was so beautiful, so elegant and so ghost like. She was Rushali. But, their was something wrong about her. Her eyes were so black, like my ghost, with full of agony and rage. The same pain and anger that I had seen earlier in the eyes of ghost in the reflection.

It was not my friend Rushali, it was her. She had taken full control over my friend's body and soul. What does she want from us? I kept on asking this question to myself. She was getting closer and closer, but not in my direction. She was heading towards the tall guy, who was busy clicking pictures of his friend. As soon as the guys realized her presence, they were completely stunned. But soon their expression changed from shock to delight. The boys exchanged some dirty looks. "Hey girl, what are you doing here?" asked the boy in black. His question made no difference on Rushali, infact, she didn't even care to answer. To her rude action, the short one commented " Are you trying to scare us? See, we are just shivering", and laughed. Rushali was looking extremely attractive and dangerous at the same. Her appearance would have indicated some kind of hint to the tall guy, as he didn't laugh at his friend's joke and started stepping back. " Her eyes, her eyes" were the words that came out from his mouth. He was almost standing a foot distance from the waterfall. I could not trust my vision as, what I saw next was totally insane. Rushali came more closer to the tall guy and caught him by his neck. Without any effort, she just twisted his head in clockwise direction. The sound of his twisted bones made me unconscious. He was standing right in front of me, head perfectly twisted to the back to 90 degrees, his eyes reflected pain, shock and fear of death. With her index finger, Rushali just pushed the half alive, half dead body. Just few minutes back, he was a boy full of life and now in a seconds time, he turned into a dead body. I heard the splashing sound of water and he was gone. His friend went into shock I guess, because when Rushali turned towards him, he stood still as if his body was tied to something. She gently took each step towards him. I could feel the abnormal beating of my heartbeat, as I was damn scared. I wanted to stop her, but, I could not move, could not shout, could not utter a single. I wanted to ask the guy to come out of the shock and run for his life. But I could not do anything, just stand there and watch him die too. His eyes did all the speaking. His eyes were pleading for his life, they were asking why? He was shocked at his friends death, and then, as Rushali came more closer to him, his eyes reflected the fear of death. When Rushali stood in front of him, he just stood helpless and surrendered himself to her without any action and closed his eyes to except his death. She just came closer to his neck and bit a mouthful and jerked away, taking of his life and leaving him in pain. I could see the side of his bare throat and the layers that covered his food pipe. Soon blood started rushing out of the wound, and he lay down their on the ground asking for help, shivering in pain but there was no one who could give him a helping hand. His life was draining out of his body and second by second, his suffering reduced, as he was dying. After five minutes of suffering, he lay their counting his last breath in pain. I wanted to cry, shout, run, but I stood their motionless. Rushali gave me a stern look and started heading towards my direction. The ghost in her, had made her a murderer. At every step, her hideous smile widened. Finally, she stood in front of me, smiling with those stone eyes that carried no emotions for living things. This time everything happened in slow motion. I was already standing on the edge of the waterfall. Just before pushing me, she winked at me. Soon, I was flying and felt the gravitational force pulling me towards the water bed. Things started getting blurred but I was still flying.

Next, when I opened my eyes, the scene had totally changed and I felt more secure and safe out here. I saw Amrita sleeping beside me with a smile on her innocent face, but the whole "good" feeling just vanished when I saw a face on the other side of my bed. My world came crushing down, when I saw Rushali sitting on the ground next to me. Her stone eyes were blankly staring at me, as if she was waiting for me to come out of the dream and fulfill her killer intentions that were incomplete in the dream. I was so damn fixed to the bed. I could not even move a bit. I wanted to call Amrita's name but found no success and my effort was just a waste. She kept staring at me for countless seconds. I could feel that she was slowly draining out my life without even taking my permission. Atlast, she moved a bit and came closer to my ear and said "How was your dream." Her hideous smile was back aand she stood up and went out of the room. After that I could not sleep the whole night and desperately waited for the morning to come. I could move, but was scared to even stretch my fingure. All the thoughts from the dream came rushing and made me more frighten as this was the real world where I have to face "the unnatural".


                                                                         Part 5
                               
                                                                     The Truth


                                                                                               to be continued....................

How do you feel, when you come to know that you are being haunted? That the dream you saw last night was real? That you and your friends are in great problem? What can you do to help your friends?

  “A friend is one that knows you as you are, understands where you have been, accepts what you have become, and still, gently allows you to grow.”
                                                                    William Shakespeare
     
                                                   
                                                                       Part 3
                                                  Encounter with her in the real world

I remember, in our second year of graduation, we (Amrita, Rushali, Kiran & myself) promised each other that "no matter what ever happens, we four are always going to stand beside each other in good and bad times." Then, we didn't know that today was the time for us to make our promises come true and face the unnatural.

It was a cold Saturday morning and I woke at around 10 with the hangover of the last night's dream. My mind was busy questioning things. Was it real? Is she a spirit? Did she really come along with us? Is she still here? Should I speak about it to my friends? Oh God! What should I do? Why is this happening to us? Blowing off all the stupid thoughts out of my mind, I tried to notice the interiors of the beautiful room. I must say Rushali's guest house was beautifully designed and was damn spacious. Rushali belonged from a rich family and the guest house was just 2 minutes away from her bungalow, but still she chose to stay with us because her parents were out for a business trip. I stepped out of the bed and stood near the window. Soon, I was captivated by the alienness of the place as it was so green, so calm and so quiet out here. The air smelled so fresh, pure and tasty. Suddenly, I heard Kiran's voice and she was sounding upset which was not at all a good sign. Amrita woke up to the noice and we ran into the next room to examine, what has made Kiran so upset that she was literary screaming?

We reached her room within a second, and what my eyes saw next was questionable.I caught Amrita at the right moment, as she was about to faint. As soon as Kiran saw us, she came running in our direction and started crying in my arms. Someone had to act as a strong person, so I some how collected my strenght to face the real as there, on the floor, lay my friend Rushali in an unconscious state with stains of blood on her dress and hands. Beside her, was a black dead crow, beheahed and drenched in blood. The scene was so scary that it took some time for me to swallow the fact. The crow lay down there lifeless with stiff claws. I wanted to puke at the site but somehow controlled myself and sat beside Rushali,  investigating her present condition. I tried to wake her up but it was not successful enough. In the meanwhile, I asked Kiran to call Ramu who was the caretaker of the guest house. He helped me to shift Rushali from the floor to the bed. I said him to ask the other servants to clean the room and call the doctor. Rushali's family doctor was there within half an hour. He examined Rushali, and gave an injection which would bring her back to  her senses within sometime. He told us that there was nothing to worry about and that Rushali is fine, just she was in a bit shock. It was around 2, when Rushali came back in her senses. "Rushali what was it? Why did you faint and how you got all this blood on yourself," I asked her. She simply said that, she dont even remember a thing about the incident. Looking at her mental state, we did not force her further and started to talk on some other topic so as to cheer her mood. I could feel something different in her but could not exactly figure it out. She quickly jumped off the bed and announced that, we were going out to visit "Pine Forest". I asked her to take some rest but it was useless, as she assured us that she was totally fine and ready to rock. But actually, we were not in the mood to go out after the morning incident but could not say "NO" to Rushali's brilliant smiling face. We started for Pine forest at 4 and reached there within half an hour. For our safety reasons, Ramu had also accompanied us in the other car. It was excessively cold, but I was some what excited to see the famous place. The ground was wet and slippery. We were busy making fun of each other as it was a bit difficult to walk straight without slipping or falling down. The canopy of tall Pine trees was a pleasure to eyes. After walking for around 10 minutes, we finally reached the lake which was surrounded by the forest. I could hear the birds sing somewhere far away. I was totally memerized by the beauty of the place. We went closer to lake so as to click some memorable pictures which, we could cherish in the future. I was busy talking and blabbering something nonsensical when something horrible caught my attention. What the hell? I saw Rushali and quickly stared back into the water. Crap! How can this happen? To confirm, I again repeated my action, but there was no change. The ghost from the last night's dream was there in front of me, she was Rushali's reflection in the water. I slightly flinched as could feel all the emotions from the last night's dream flooding into my veins. I repeated the action again, but still no change. I knew Rushali but I hardly knew her reflection. The unknown was right there. Her face slowly turned towards me, with that hideous smile on her face. My body rejected to the stimulation of my brain cells and I stood right there looking into the water. Like the last night's dream, today also I could not do anything in the real world. I could see her more clearly today. She looked scary, more horrifying, more horrendous. Her features were enough horrid to cause heart attack, and her eyes were filled with anguish and anger. Her hideous smile was conveying some kind of message that indicated "Game on!" She winked at me and in a second Rushali's real reflection reappeared. I dont know what happened next. When i woke up, I found myself at the same place where I was in the previous night.

                                                                              Part-4


                                                                            The Unbelievable