The eerie sentence echoed in the cupboard. Manorama felt Renu’s breath, cold and unflinching, next to her. She looked around, squinting her eyes in the dark. She couldn’t see a thing. The voice and the cold breath were too close for comfort. Frantic and unnerved, she shrunk to the corner of the dark, small cupboard and closed her eyes tight, pinching herself repeatedly. Maybe this was all just a horrible nightmare that she would finally wake up from. Or perhaps she could will herself to stop hearing that horrible hiss. But no, all these years of believing in herself, her abilities, and practicing positive thinking; all of it came to naught. Nada. The pressure on her windpipe mounted at a consistent pace, making it increasingly difficult for her to breathe.
Never one to give up, and gathering every ounce of courage within her, Manorama put up one last-ditch effort. She pounded on the cupboard.
‘Help! Someone, let me out!’ she cried, her voice a croak.
‘Rama. tch tch, never the one to give up, eh? When will you get it? It is time for you to pay – for everything,’ a voice whispered in her ear – a different voice. Not Renu’s.
‘Who … are you?’ she asked.
Loud, bitter laughter reverberated through the cupboard, forcing Manorama to shut her ears. It was becoming unbearable – the pain in her ears, the dull throbbing in her head, and the pressure on her chest and windpipe. She shrunk further, covering her head in her knees and settling in the umbilical position, desperate for some respite.
‘Why, Rama, now don’t you remember me? Do I not sound familiar, darling?’
‘Ranjit, is that you? How can that even …?
Manorama’s eyes widened in absolute horror. She was unable to speak. No matter how much she tried, no words came out. Utterly desperate and desolate, with tears flowing down her eyes, Manorama started flailing her arms and pounding on the door. What seemed like many frantic minutes, she gave up, resigned to her fate, and fell back into the cupboard’s corner. Trapped, unable to speak or scream, she sat awaiting her executioner – whoever that was to be. Renu or Ranjit. At that moment of intense dread and fear, a rare sense of calm crept in. She remembered what her yoga instructor’s words. Breathe in, breathe out. Stuck in this strange place, she tried her best to follow that. Breathe in, breathe out. It seemed to work. The loud booming echoes finally stopped; the pressure on her chest, the feeling of being suffocated slowly began to subside. Manorama began to make peace with her weird, dystopian situation – maybe she would survive after all.
‘Rama, how could you?’ Renu was back. The shrill voice, cold and unflinching, rent the air, startling Manorama and sending shivers down her spine.
‘Rama, don’t you even remember me? Have I become that much of a persona nongrata, my love?’ chuckled Ranjit, his deep baritone a few notches higher than Renu’s.
He was also there. But how was that even possible? Ranjit Berry was alive – as far as she remembered. She had had nothing to do with his death. If at all she was guilty of anything, it was of killing his girlfriend (and her best friend) Renu. Oh yes, and then dumping him when she met Vinod. Bas, that was all, Manorama reasoned, without remorse, as the now-familiar agitation and dread coursed through her veins … again.
The voices grew louder, questions booming, and the overall cacophony levels reached a new crescendo. The pounding headache and breathlessness were also back. The brief reprieve was over! Her comeuppance was due.
Steeling herself for the inevitable, Manorama held her hands firmly together and took in a few deep breaths. Glimpses of her life, her marriage, her kids, and her guilty, evil past flashed through her mind. The memories, sharp and clear, showed her what she had done. The lives she had ruined, both literally and metaphorically, the people she had wronged and hurt, all came up vividly as if she were being made to relive the moments as punishment. The loud booming, hissing, terrifying voices in the background and the long mental cinematic flashbacks with the special focus on those uncomfortable moments ensured that Manorama’s headache worsened.
Can it just not end now? What are they waiting for? Her impatience also reared its ugly head.
Unable to speak, unable to stop reminiscing, and unable to attract the attention of her invisible captors, Manorama desperately started pounding on the door. A last-ditch attempt – no, not to escape anymore, but to attract their attention. Maybe her invisible captors would react and end her trauma. From a distance, she heard a voice, feeble but vaguely familiar.
‘Who is there? In that cupboard?’
Help was at hand. With renewed hope, she again pounded on the door mercilessly, and with all her remaining strength—this time, definitely with an intention to escape.
The cupboard door opened. It was Vinod. No, not Vinod. This man, no, boy was too young, pleasant-faced, and so much like Vinod. Who was he?
‘Oh! Are you Manorama? I am Vivek, Vinod’s son. We spoke on the phone, remember?’ he said.
Manorama almost died of relief! Never could she have imagined that she would be relieved to see her husband’s grown-up son, but such is life! She grasped his hand hurriedly and pulled herself out of the cupboard and collapsed on the floor.
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Chapter 1 by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Chapter 2 by Sumira Khan
Chapter 3 by Krusha Sahjwani
Chapter 4 by Sandeepa Mukherjee
Chapter 5 by Neha Gupta
Chapter 6 by Mohana Talapatra
Chapter 7 by Snigdha Mallik
Chapter 8 by Kanchana Banerjee
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