The Unknown

I stayed in a hostel for my graduations....hostels are scary places......there are things going on which you cannot even explain. Things uncalled for.

We studied late in the night four of us and slept around 1:30 am in the morning. I went out once in between to the washroom. My hostel had a long corridor. My room was on one end and the washroom at the other end the corridor had rooms on one side and on the other there was a open area. As I moved on I saw something from the corner of my eyes. I ignored it then it again happened I looked back but there was nothing. I went to the washroom and when I came out I saw the girl who had the room next to me.

"Were you behind me?" I asked casually washing my hands.

"No, Why do you ask? By the way were you behind me?" She said

"No."

When we retired for the night none of us could sleep. After some time, in the dark, I heard someone walking up and down the entire width of the room. I did not bother to look up as i thought it was one of my roommates so, I decided to sleep.

The next morning:

"Datta Ghosh why were you roaming around the room entire night." my bestie Tanu said to me half laughing.

"I was not, I thought it was you. Parul and Divya were you people walking?" I said

"No." said both in chorus.

"We thought....you people were..." said Parul.

We went to the college early that day as no one spoke much.

This is not the first time it happened nor it was the last....alarm clocks sprang to life without any reason in the dark, switch on the light you hear it no more. A sudden gasp of air came with its scents, you could hear people running at the terrace and their were no stairs.

Our favourite pass time was Qija board. We had learned how to make it on papers and I was an expert "Spirit Caller."

The Hostel was old and older than the Hostel was the History. I lived in Agra. In the Mughal Period it was a Jungle and many people were secretly massacred there. So, it was a normal daily routine for us to experience the super natural. We took it with a pinch of salt.

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Years back when I was five or six years old. we were returning back from some family friend's home. We took a shortcut through the ground at the back of our house.

I was as usual counting stars or engrossed on my own and was walking one to two steps behind my mother. I was walking alongside the big boundary wall of the Boys' Secondary School. It was dark and the only light source was the light coming from the back garden of the guest house. I saw the shadow of three extremly tall bearded men dressed in a long cloak or shroud kind of thing. Their shadow was just behind my little shadow walking or floating in a single file. I looked away from the wall and towards the direction of the guest house and found no one whose body could have created the shadow I resumed walking and the shadow next to my shadow raised his hand and ran it gently across my shadow's head. This was a bit odd for me but not scary so I decided that I better leave these shadows and join my mother and her shadow.

I do not know what it was till date. I am searching answers for them. If you all are wondering about my memory, then I can recollect events from the time I was 2.5 years or 3 years old. As a person I am logical and sense reason before believing. I am leaving this to you, the readers to conclude what these are.

As per my views, ghosts do not exist, souls exist. We are driven by energy. The moment this energy leaves the body our body starts to rot. Energy can neither be created nor be destroyed it can only change from a form to the other. What I believe that these energies which are bereft of the bodies roam around and sometimes manifest their existence by breaking the inertia in our physical surroundings. They either do this to make us aware that they exist or there is a point of time they unknowingly breach the inertia to such a level that we sense the resultant diversion due to the break in inertia.

Interesting thing to note is that these energies have a memory. So, can energy be used to store human consciousness even after they cease to exist?

Written in Response to the Indispire Edition 32

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