Things That Bang

Fiction: Dust

Strange shadows beckon my vision and things that move insidiously in darkened corners leak fear in my heart. The bed feels strange, the fluffy pillow awkwardly soft against my neck, my legs lie tangled in a sheet and beads of sweat emerge and pool in the narrow ridge between my tender breasts. I lie on my back and try not to let terror clench an irrational fist in my mind. My eyes stare at the still fan with its soot darkened blades, the one thing the landlord had forgotten to get cleaned along with forgetting to give me the number of the shop where I could pick an inverter up. Bangalore is suffering one its usual power cuts. The entire community lies enthralled under the glamour of sleep. But I remain awake and suffer the trumpeting approach of terror, real or imagined being a matter of perception and the lateness of the hour. I blink away a single drop of sweat that rest heavily against my eyelid and watch the still blades of the fan phantom swing gently as if being lulled into death sleep by a sneaky earthquake but the room, the materials within its four walls and I remain still. The soot leaves the fan in gentle waves and cling together midway between my body and the ceiling above. My fingers tremble and bunch up the sheet’s poppy flowers in a blundered watercolour stain and the heart misses more than a few necessary beats. The soot gathers into a tangible form and reaches down. The flow of dust gathered together by an unknown force lightly rests against my breath deprived chest and begins it journey upwards. I lie paralysed and protesting the approaching death with the blinking eyelids. Dust to dust , ashes to ashes screeches a voice in my head. Come be mine, be me. You and me. One for the city, one for the humans within. One for you and one for me. Love me like I love you. Mine forever, one you and me. It croons and I suck in the dust and remember the metallic taste of chalk – indicates iron deficiency, so said my kindergarten teacher to my mother in a class painted with Capital Letters and Numbers on the walls. What a thing to remember I wonder as the dust resides in my lungs, fills my belly and drowns my senses. The blades of the fan swing crazily, the earthquake of demonic instruction taking yet another victim. I gasp and take in my last breath- breath tainted with abomination. No! screams my heart. No! My slender frame jerks and darkness forms bottomless whirlpools in my mind. Death drags my wavering mind and a loud noise permeates the macabre. It resonates and assimilates in the dying vestiges of sanity, bangs against the doors of light and yanks me through levels of hell towards destination unknown. I jerk upright and nearly fall off the bed. I grab my naked breasts, feel my midriff and look around wildly at the room that no longer offered sanctuary. Standing naked I take in deep breaths and stare at watch keening away the 5:30 alarm. A dream I tell myself. A nightmare. I correct myself. My knees tremble but I refuse to look at the bed, a place of revulsion and mental rape. Blindly I try to grab a robe that lay against the bed side table. My mind feels like a charred field devastated by an unseasonal fire and my heart pumps like an adrenaline junkie. The watch shifts the hand an inch towards 5:35. The slight mechanical twitch is perceived by my senses easily for the stillness of the night continues to remain and dawn a few more minutes away. Goosebumps travel through my frame and I shudder. I grab my belly and let out a scream that too goes unheard. It hadn’t ended. My frantic eyes focus on the fan where there is no soot and then at the dust drowned body lying on the bed in a twisted mass of poppy flower sheets.