It's Killing Time

Tick

Tick

Tick

Tick

Tick

... (Silence)

The clock, the old wooden coo-coo clock, stopped ticking any further. The hands of the clock, hour, minute, second, all frozen. The time didn’t go beyond 3:13 in night.

The lady of the house realized this - and knew what was coming. She sat up while her husband was asleep, gave herself a shake out of the sleep and sighed with disappointment. It was only her in the whole house who always knows whenever the clock stops - it like a thousand bells start ringing in her mind. And she was also the only one who knew what was to be done next.

She slowly got out of the bed, tiptoeing - making sure she didn’t wake up her husband - put on the robe and after washing her face in the kitchen basin and making herself completely awake, she first checked if her daughter was asleep or not, as teenagers now days have a habit of staying awake till late in night, and finding her asleep she headed straight to the store room and got out with a rose-red candle with eerie designs, a match box, and a little pocket diary, which appeared rather old with yellow pages and worn out leather cover. She went to the clock, lighted the candle and placed it on the mantelpiece that stood on the floor under it. She tore a page from the diary, folded it smaller and pushed it in through the little door from where the coo-coo pops out at the end of an hour. She held her hand tight to her chest and said like a whisper, “The livings take the name no more”. And then the coo-coo bird popped out, but didn’t make a sound as it does. And between its beaks was the piece of paper, folded. She pulled it out with trembling hand, fear and sweat on her face, ready to be shocked- it scared her even if she has done it many times. She unfolded it, and, as she quite expected, there was a name on it - which, of course, neither she wrote nor she knew. It said, “Anurag Sharma”

That’s the game. She will put the paper in and it will come out with a name on it. What was the name for? You will know.

She sighed, but she knew she had no other choice. The coo-coo bird got in, and she extinguished the candle fire, placed the candle and the diary back it store room at the place where it had been, went upstairs back to her bedroom- the paper crushed in her hand clenched tight with fear – though not the fear of uncertainty; she knew what she was doing and what she would do and what it will result in, but the task itself require great amount of courage, even if you are doing it the 100th time.

She again tip-toed to her bed, lied down slowly, took the blankets on, and then placed the piece of paper in her mouth and closed it. She took in a deep breath – sweating profusely (as i said, it was always a pain no matter how many times you do it) - and closed her eyes.

When she opened her eyes, she was not her. She felt completely different – not a woman of 50 anymore. She looked around – the room had changed entirely, all the furniture, wall-painting, and everything. She was alone on the bed, no husband on her side. She was wearing a different dress, pajamas, and with changed body structure and face-cut, she was a male now. But all these didn’t confuse or bewilder her as they might be doing to you, that this was expected and was the part of the ritual. She knew that her real body was back at on the bed at her house and she was in the body of a different man, and you guessed it right – the body of Anurag Sharma.

 But this was not where it ends. Wasting no time, she (let’s call her she even if it looked like a he) got off the water-bed which felt very squishy and comfortable. She could barely see in the dark, but running her hands through the walls she soon found the switches and turned on the lights.

The room shined blindingly bright, and she had to shield her eyes with her hands (which were strangely muscular for her now) and after her eyes adjusted, she removed her hands and took a look throughout the room.

I was one of the most royal rooms she had ever seen. Rich and expensive furniture – be it the bed, tables, drawers, anything – gold and diamond studded showpiece, royal and elegant interior decorations and a huge painting of the man. But she wasted no time admiring the room – she had seen more royal rooms throughout her life doing this ritual – and set out to work.

She ran her eyes around the room, her vision a bit blur (this man had a weak eyesight) and finally got what she was searching for. There was a glass slide-door beyond which was the balcony.

Sliding the glass-door, she got on the balcony which stretched long and wide. The wind was rushing through her face and the whole town was visible shining with light which looked tiny from that height- though she couldn’t identify the map of the town and this was obvious – this man didn’t belong to her town or her city (else she might have identified him) – she might even be in a completely different state of India! But that was normal; she has traveled almost every city and state in India doing this, but it never took her out of India.

“This cannot be less that the 16th floor” she thought, “very perfect. This will be easy”

 And then, she went to the railings of the balcony, and stood there for a moment – she knew i would pain terrible, it always does. She tried to comfort herself with the thought that she has seen and felt worse.

“God, forgive me” she said with finality. She raised her feet to the railing and then, taking a deep breath, pushed hard and jumped off it - and fell straight down.

For a few seconds, she could feel the heavy wind through her face and closed eyes and then there was a sudden hit of piercing pain and was gone as soon as it came - and then there was a ringing silence.

The next second, she felt back in her body and realized she was standing no more, but was on her bed as she had left herself – though she was panting with heartbeats to the full, and had thrown the blanket to the floor. She gave a huge sigh of relief – finally... it was over.

She sat up and just remained so for few moments, sweating and breathing heavily. Then, as she always does after the task is completed, she grabbed the bottle of water on the table beside her and took few sips, relaxing herself. Then she placed back the bottle and grabbed her mobile which was lying just beside it. She lit the screen and it said the date and time – 7/6/2019, 3:16am. She clicked on Google and going to incognito mode, searched the name “Anurag Sharma”

“Hope i find this one” she thought – and luckily, she found. The person was a famous one – his name was clearly written with the photos of his face – which, of course, was the same face that she possessed not many minutes ago. She read the short paragraph which told about him –

“Anurag Sharma was a Maharashtra based millionaire who was the second chair person of Sharma Jewelries Pvt.Ltd. founded by his father Ajay Sharma. It is one of the leading Gold and diamond Jewellery makers in Maharashtra with more than 200 branches....”

“Oh, so he was a famous one” thought she, but she was not interested in who he was (a jewellery maker is nothing in front of many of the people she had dealt with in past) but her main interest was the date on which he died – and as she scrolled down, she found what she was searching for – at the end of the paragraph, it was written –

“.... The recent chairperson of the company is Niraj Sharma, successor of Anurag Sharma. Anurag Sharma committed suicide by jumping from the 17th floor of his building for an unknown reason, on 7 June 1997”

“So it was 22 years ago.... hmm” she said calmly, this wasn’t shocking for her. And then, tuning off the phone and placing it back on the table, she picked up the blanket from the floor, laid with her back on the bed, drew the blanket to her head – and closed her eyes.

That how the killing clock, something she has inherited from her fore-mothers, worked. This had been there in her maternal bloodline for generations and she dared not disobey the clock when it calls – or, as she had been told, misery will fall on her. She wasn’t a killer; all the people, varying in ages, genders, status and eras they lived, were already dead. She just became the reason of their death, when they died.

The ticking will stop again when it will be the time to kill.