Darkness has drenched me and my inmates. The only glimmer of light is coming from the old, worn-out church that stands in front of us. Huge, cracked up walls with broken bricks and tall trees covered in cobwebs, also embellished with dried up nests surround me, separating us from the living world out there. I'm more than a hundred years old.
Dry autumn leaves are spread like a carpet throughout my grounds and crunch under your feet as you walk through me to bid homage to your near and dear departed souls.
I'm filled with new, old and forgotten graves. My roof is the sky filled with blemishes of its own. Day and night, a sinister silence envelopes us and scarily captivates whoever comes for a short visit. The only sound is of chirping birds by the day and howling wind during the night, that rustle the leaves of my sky-scraping trees. People come here on tender hooks, all the time feeling uncanny, as if they are being secretly watched by someone. You need a nerve to step in my spooky and bone-chilling environment, especially at night.
I am a graveyard. Only I know how the souls that are buried in me behave and come to life when they are alone. Only I can see how their beating, undead hearts cry in grief when nobody comes to meet them.
Tonight a very young and extremely beautiful girl has become a new member of our family. As soon as her parents and relatives left, we hear a soft sobbing sound coming from her coffin. She slowly comes out and sits on her own grave. Her head is lowered and using both her hands, she covers her face in her white veil and is weeping bitterly.
A young man who died a week ago, in a very bad car accident, is watching her, while sitting on his personal gravestone. His left side was completely burnt to the bones and the right side was injured all over, when he was brought here.
"What happened?"
He asks her gently. She jerks with fright, frantically looking around. She sees him and gasps incredulously.
"Relax. Here we are all the same. Why are you crying?"
The girl is now breathing heavily, choking for air. She glances around and finds all the inmates sitting on their graves, all in white and all of them staring at her. She squeals with fright and brings her hands up to her chest.
"Where am I? What's all this?"
The boy replies softly,
"You are dead and now this is your home, this graveyard. What transpired with you?"
Still finding it difficult to breathe, she manages to say,
"I committed suicide."
"Why?"
"I was in love with a boy of a different caste, but my parents didn't allow."
The boy's face twisted in a lopsided grin when he said,
"Forget it. Don't expect any of them will ever come back to visit you again."
An old lady, who has been with me for more than fifty years, got up from her broken, tattered grave and goes to the crying girl. She tells her motherly,
"Darling, now this is your home and we are your family. Dear, souls don't cry, that is the doing of the living. We only rejoice and pray in this after life."
Out of the blue, the enticing girl laughs out loud and disappears, leaving behind chills of sinister echoes. This has never happened to us before.
Shamim Merchant_______________________________________________
