Write-A-Thon Season 5 Story – Team 3 (Adults)

When the lights came back on, everyone in the room was exactly where they had been, except for one person. There were clear signs of intimidation on their faces. They exchanged petrified glances and their eyes widened, revealing that they had a premonition of this imminent event.

Ratul, Mihir, Sanjay and Mohan were alumni of a reputed university in Kalyani Township, West Bengal. Besides being college union leaders, they were also notorious raggers. In their aghast state, they recalled the heinous deed they had committed that day: how they had ragged Parimal, a first-year student, and disgraced him to such an extent that he had committed suicide. His lifeless body had been found hanging from the ceiling. Since then, an eerie sense of dread had followed them everywhere. And now, Mihir was mysteriously missing from the college union room.

What could have happened to him? Whose turn would be next?

Continue reading Write-A-Thon Season 5 Story – Team 3 (Adults) →

Write-A-Thon Season 5 Story – Team 4 (Adults)

When the lights came back on, everyone in the room was exactly where they had been, except one person.

Rahul was leaning against the window grill, peering out. His hands grasped the bars, his knuckles white. His crutches were resting against the wall. One of them slowly slid down and clattered to the floor.

Even amid the shock, Rahul’s mother rushed to his side and retrieved it for him. The grey-haired lady joined him at the window, absentmindedly handing him the crutch. She squinted into the bright sunlight and asked Rahul, “Do you know him?”

“No,” said Rahul.

The rest of the room came alive now. Seema, his sister, was the next to speak.

“But how, then…” she said.

Continue reading Write-A-Thon Season 5 Story – Team 4 (Adults) →

The Digital Revolution – A Double-Edged Sword

When we say that our world today is undergoing a digital revolution, it is probably the biggest revolution the human race has ever witnessed. Once seen primarily as tools for communication and knowledge, digital devices and the platforms associated with them are now driving a trend where people connect more through social media than with those around them.

Continue reading The Digital Revolution – A Double-Edged Sword →

Price

The cell, rather than a room, reeks of the stench springing up from the surroundings beyond its confinement through the single meagre square vent serving as an open window with triple iron bars within. The pervading odour is aggravated in the aftermath of a downpour, reinforced by the relentless trickles from any of the crevices that gradually tend to burgeon into a small flood along its western perimeter, stirring the dried dirt clinging to the floor into turbid paste, as if reviving the wounds to their rampant smell that have already dried up. But all of it has no troublesome effect on me anymore, as I am just a short-term visitor here, awaiting the footsteps of my death.

Continue reading Price →

Hollowing Silence

Mason hated silence because silence reminded him that nobody in the house really spoke anymore. Ever since his parents divorced, everything felt dead.

His mother dragged herself home exhausted every morning from hospital shifts, barely able to keep her eyes open long enough to ask how school was. Sometimes she forgot what day it was entirely, staring blankly at the kitchen counter with dark circles hanging beneath her eyes while cold coffee sat untouched beside her.

Continue reading Hollowing Silence →

Daddy, May I Have a Taste of This Murder?!

20 years ago:

Funny thing, I used to have this doll when I was six. I used to play with it a lot.

Then the nightmares came.

The same nightmare returned every night. The doll stood beside blood-covered bodies before slowly turning her head towards me. Her eyes were bloodshot and her mouth stained red. Then she would smile and say,

“Daddy, may I have a taste of this murder?!”

Because of this nightmare, I threw the doll away and forgot about it.

Or at least, I thought I did.

Little did I know what would happen twenty years later…

Continue reading Daddy, May I Have a Taste of This Murder?! →

Unboxing the joy of writing!