reflection

"person you are trying to reach is not answering." a voice came back as I dialled my wife's number and with a beep, it had been disconnected. I was sitting in my car which is parked at a corner of the petrol pump.

"She again didn't pick up," with a sigh I placed my elbow on the car's window, rested my forehead on my palm, and stared long at my reflection on one of the side mirrors when my eyes caught a black figure with a hoodie. He was standing alone on the dark side at one of the corners with his head lying low, his pelvis resting against the wall, and both hands were in his pocket. Through the light, people were just passing across him.

Looking at him, my guts started digging into my insights. I was lost inside of my own mind when suddenly, he lifted his head, and his half-visible eyes glanced at me. A sense of fear bolted through my heart, and I drove away as immediately as possible.

**

"A killer is on the loose, roaming around t..." I turned off the radio to have a peaceful drive.

Through my way, I kept thinking about the person. His piercing glance kept flashing in my mind, but his loneliness kept my kind side turned towards him. 

Suddenly a beep came from my mobile, I looked at the phone as there is no response from my wife till this time. The flashbacks of her change in attitude towards me in the last couple of days occupied my mind. I grunted and smashed my mobile on the dashboard. 

To deal with all this turmoil, I stopped by a small box-shaped desi shop, to have some cigarettes. While holding them some thoughts occupied my head that she will scold me, also my doctor told me to avoid it and cope with my own in these kinds of depressing situations, but my hand clutched it tight in between my fingers.

I lighted the cigarettes and through the white smoke, the same black figure was standing by a tree as if he was staking me till here, looking straight at my side. shaking from the inside, I immediately reached out to my car's door, hop onto my car's seat, and immediately started the engine. 

As the trees were moving backwards, my palms were becoming sweaty. I raced my car faster and faster while continuously oscillating my eyes at the back mirror. that figure was frozen there without moving an inch. His glance disappeared along with the street.

**

I reached home and climbed up the stairs in a hope that he might not be following me, and it had to be my imagination. But a sensation that someone was behind me was with me all the time.

 Going across the empty corridors was increasing my fear. As I passed some floors, a hand reached out to my shoulder. I froze there at the moment and my head denied to look back.

"Sahb, your lunch box." a voice came from behind. I sighed for a moment and ran my hand over my face, it was my building's watchman.

"Memsaab gave me to have a meal and told me to return it to you whenever you came back." he omitted.

"Where is she then, did she tell you anything?" I asked.

" Memsaab told me that she will be out for some time, she had an urgent work." he replied. I shook my head upside-down in response.

After some conversations, I climbed up to my apartment. Thoughts of the black figure were gone but she was roaming inside of me.

" Where did she go at this time of hours? " " did she make an excuse? "

"Why didn't she pick up my phone? "

" Why didn't she reply even after a long time had passed? " all these weird thoughts were clouding my mind.

I unlocked the door and rested my head on the sofa . My eyes spotted a photo of my wife on the table creating a fiery inside me. Her wicked smile always indicated her hatred toward me.

My eyes oscillated at the middle where my tia, my daughter, was staring at me. Her smile reminded me of the time when she took my tia away from me when I accidentally hurt her. 

My veins popped up as my anger took over my calmness, and with my trembling hand I ran through the pocket for my pills but I halted my movement and my consciousness denied it.

" No I don't need these, I am not crazy .she thinks I am crazy but she is wrong " I mumbled to myself and shove them back inside.

"Then prove her wrong." With an unknown interruption, I lifted my frozen head slowly. My eyes were opened wide while running from top to bottom in his black attire. Gulping my fear I looked at his face, my face went pale. "It's me, it's my face," a voice shouted inside of me.

***

• Present day

"....and I stabbed her many times. I asked her many questions but she blamed all things on me. I am the one who put my daughter in danger."

 " She is wrong, she is evil. I gave her what an evil deserves.",

 " I did nothing wrong."

" I did nothing wrong."

I told those policemen many times but they just stared at me for a moment, their looks were creeping me out. One of the policemen tilted his head while looking at each other and walked out of the room.

" I did nothing wrong," I repeated many times to  myself.