Haunted

I stood there looking at the house, it had been only a week since we had rented it, and now had decided to move out. My wife Prachi had strong reasons to believe that there was a lot of negative energy in the house. She had not even spent a night in the house, a couple hours and she was convinced that the house made her very uncomfortable. My younger brother had selected the house, and we were supposed to move in as soon as we moved from Delhi and came down to Bangalore. Prachi went straight to my brother's place and stayed there till I returned form my office tour.

Prachi spent all the days searching for a new house to move into, while I was away on my office tour. I had spent a lot of time on phone convincing her to stay in that house for at least 6 months, but she was adamant, she threatened to live alone, if I didn't bow down to her request. I finally gave into her request and agreed to move, but Prachi's reaction had left me curious to see what was it that made her change her mind suddenly. What was it, which made her not come back to that place? I decided to see it for myself.

I decided to spend the last night in the house. I thought it was best not to tell her about it, I told her, I was going to spend the night at my friend's place.

My brother drove me to the house, i instructed him not to tell Prachi about it, and asked him to come pick me up the next morning.

I looked at my watch as I moved towards the door, 11:15 pm. I opened the door and stood there for a second, I stood there surprised to see all the lights in house lit. I entered the house, walked straight to the centre of the living room, and looked around to see all the windows covered with thick curtains on them. There were a lot of boxes lying around the living room. The boxes looked like ones which Prachi and my brother had moved in with on the first day. They were all still packed. I opened the box, which was marked "bed sheets", and walked towards the bedroom on the ground floor. There were two more bedrooms in the first floor, but I had decided to sleep in the ground floor room. I entered the room to find the bed on the floor rolled and tied up. I untied the bed; put the bed sheet over it. There was no fan in the room, so I decided to open the window, I opened the window, and looked out, and I could see the neighbour's balcony clearly from the room. I was about to turn back to my bed, when a kid walked in and stood in the neighbour's balcony. I looked at the kid, and smiled at him. He stood there, with his chin on the balcony railing and his hands clutching the railing. He looked to be frozen in that position, he did not move, his big jet black eyes were fixed on me. I felt a strange and a little weird; I smiled at him again and waved my hand. He just stood there starring at me. I decided it was too weird for me to continue smiling while he stood there looking like the kid straight out of the exorcist movie. I started to walk backwards towards my bed, as I walked I shouted "Goodnight kid". He gave me thumbs up and shouted "Good Luck".

I sat on my bed with words "weird kid" and "scary kid" jumping around in my mind. I was about to lie down when I felt thirsty, I had a bottle of water in my bag pack, which was in the living room. As I walked out of the bedroom into the living room, the bed room door suddenly closed. Must be the wind I thought to myself. As I removed the water bottle from the bag pack I was a little confused to see the main door bolted up, I didn't remember bolting the door, or did I close it, I was a little confused. I must have closed it, who else will? I thought to myself as I neared the bedroom door.

I tried to push open the closed bedroom door. I stood there shocked for a few seconds, to find it closed tight. It felt like someone had bolted it from the inside. I tried pushing it again, but to no success. I tried to bang open it with my shoulders, but only hurt my shoulders with the process. Confusion and fear were the two emotions going in my head. I took a step back and kicked hard at the door. "Bang" the door opened and immediately there was a power cut. Darkness engulfed the room, there was zero vision. I searched my pocket for my cell phone, but then realised I had left it on the bed. I walked slowly into the room, and tried to make myself to the bed. I was in the middle of the room, when my shoulder hit something, I went a few steps back, I tried to see with my eyes squint, but the room was too dark. I was about to move, when the lights came back. I screamed loud and fell backwards and almost hit my head. A dead body hung right in the middle of the room, it looked like a small child's body. The face was battered beyond recognition; blood trickled from her feet onto the floor. The eyes had popped off from their sockets, but it looked like the eyes were fixed on me. I pushed myself away and screamed loud hoping someone would hear me, and come to my rescue, I jumped onto the bed and quickly picked up my cell phone, I decided to get out of the room, the power went off again. I tried to stand up, but legs slipped, I pushed myself off the floor and ran out of the room. It was pitch dark and I could hardly see anything, my run was abruptly halted when I banged my face into a wall. I started to bleed from my nose, within a few seconds there was blood all over my shirt. My head started spinning, the pain hit me. I clenched my fist and bit my lip trying to control myself from screaming. I wiped my nose with my shirt, but the bleeding wouldn't stop. I stood there cursing my luck, cursing myself for entering this nightmare.

I suddenly felt a tap on my shoulders; I didn't turn, but instead stood there like a statue. Hot blood trickled off my shirt and made their way onto my chest, but I was too scared to move. I shut my eyes closed. I felt another tap, this time on the other shoulder, and before the feel of the tap could end, there was another tap and suddenly there were hundreds of taps. It felt like hundreds of people continuously tapping all over my body. I had to move away, it got too painful to bare. I started to walk swiftly; I didn't want to risk banging myself again by running. I moved quickly and in a few seconds my leg felt like hitting the stairs. I ran upstairs, and hurried into a room and locked the door from inside. I sat on the floor with my arms around my bent legs and hid my face between my chest and my legs. I shut my eyes, tried to think, how to get out of this night mare. I thought of running down and escape through the main door. As I got up, I felt the bleeding in my nose had reduced, but it pained severely each time I took air in; I opened my mouth and tried to breathe with my mouth. As I turned to open the door, I felt the cell phone in my pocket. I quickly pulled it out and dialled my brother's number. There were several beeps which gave way to a harsh but a child like voice "The number you are trying to reach is sleeping please do not disturb and you my friend are trapped here. Please do not use your phone again." My hand felt hot, my ears started to burn I jumped and threw my phone which was on fire now. I froze there thinking if I would ever get out of there, if I would ever get to see my wife. I sat on the floor and stared at the fire, my cheeks felt cold and my vision got blurred. My eyes were filled with water and in a second I started to cry. The reality of some energy bigger than me, trying to kill me just set in.

I sat there silent with tears down my eyes for 10 mins, nothing happened. The fire was still there, but it got smaller and smaller by each passing minute.

I heard a voice, I was not sure where it came from, but I heard a very soft voice. I shut my eyes and sat still. A little later I realised that the voice was coming form with me, the voice was in my head. The voice shouted "Don't lose hope. Believe in God, believe in positive energy. There exists no evil. It is just a figment of your imagination." The voice kept repeating the sentence over and over. I opened my eyes, clenched my fist and shouted "Yes, I believe in you God. There exists no evil. No evil. It is just my imagination. I don't see it, I don't believe in it."

The fire in front of me grew suddenly; it became huge and reached the ceiling. The whole house felt like shivering, the windows shut tight suddenly opened. The fire flickered by the wind that blew in. The window slammed shut again. The same harsh child like voice shouted "You fool. If there is good, there has to be bad. If there is positive, there exists a negative. The same God that made you, created me. I am as real as your feeling you don't see, but feel."

I felt something strange happening within me, there was a sudden surge of energy. I felt like a wave coming form within me, I felt a strange feeling of courage come from deep down my heart. I shouted back "No! No! You do not exist. I do not believe in you. You are just my imagination."

I heard the scream again "I do not exist. Here feel me". "Feel me"

I suddenly felt like thousands of pins poking at my skin. The pain got unbearable, but the courage in me surged even higher. "I do not feel you. I do not feel you."

The pins pushed harder, several parts of my body started to bleed. My head hit the ground as I felt someone punch on my nose. There was a sudden kick at my face and I could feel my nose and my jaw break. I shouted out in pain, but I could not let the evil win. I shouted out "I feel no pain, bring it on. I do not feel you." The pins pushed harder, almost all of my body had holes in them and I started to bleed heavily. I rolled on the floor in pain, I felt someone kick my back. Then the kicks reached my head, my forehead cut and started to bleed. The pain had reached new level.

With all the energy I had, I pushed myself up. I stood with my knee bent a little and with my arms wide open; I shouted "Is that all you got bring it on. I DO NOT FEEL YOU." I repeated the shout a few times before falling head first onto the floor.

"You do not exist"

"You do not exist"

"You do not exist"

I suddenly woke up, and slowly sat up. I looked around the room, my head was aching. I was confused, shocked and surprised to see myself on the bed in the ground floor room. Sun's rays entered from the open window and lit up the room. I sat there for a few minutes trying to recall what happened. I looked at my body, there seemed to be no scar or pain. I felt my nose it seemed to be perfectly alright. My thoughts were interrupted by the phone ring. It was my brother; I picked it up "Hello. Ya good morning, just got up now. Where are you?" I said still sounding sleepily

I heard him say, he was just round the corner and would reach the house in a minute.

I got up from the bed fully sure that, everything I saw or happened last night was a very bad dream. I looked around the room, thinking to myself, Prachi was right, this house doesn't feel good. It was a good idea that we decided to move.

I opened the main door and let my brother in, who had come with a couple of helper boys and a small truck. I stepped out and told my brother, I would stay near the car while he and the boys load all the boxes onto the truck.

I opened the car door to sit in, but then decided to have a smoke before I sat in. I pulled out my cigarette pack, and lit up a cigarette, I stood leaning against the car. I couldn't help but think of the night mare I had last night. Strange is the mind I thought. It clearly was the worst night of my life.

I looked straight at the road. The neighbour boy stepped into street, looking at him I thought to myself "That weird kid was the reason for the night mare and the voice in the night mare just sounded like his". The kid looked to walk straight at me; he reached me, stood in front of me. I didn't smile at him; he didn't look to smile at me either. He handed me an me a sheet which looked like a drawing sheet. I took it in my hand and before I could ask him what it was, he ran away. I turned the sheet over read it, and stood frozen in my tracks. My hands shivered, my stomach churned and my legs felt weak. I read the sheet again to make sure if I had seen it properly

"LAST NIGHT WAS ONE HELL OF A NIGHT. NEVER RETURN AGAIN

RIP

YOUR FEAR"