When Death Came Stalking

On a dreary afternoon on a listless day, I got this call from an unknown number. It looked like a non-commercial number, and I picked up the call. The male voice asked if it was Mr. Raju speaking, and I said yes. The man introduced himself as Saranathan, and he said he had read my poem “What is your story” in the portal, and he contacted the portal and got my number. He further mentioned that he liked my poem and wanted to share his story with me. I was pleasantly surprised to hear this and readily agreed. We then decided to meet at a coffee day shop, one kilometer away from my residence the next day morning at nine am.

The next day at the appointed hour, I was there at the coffee day shop with a black scribbling book and soon entered a man young enough to be my son. He said Howdy Mr. Raju in the latest greeting fashion, and I too repeated with a Howdy Mr. Saranathan, and we shook our hands and sat down. The waitress girl hovered over us, and I ordered a south Indian filter coffee for me, and he too repeated the order and asked for some cookies also. There was silence until the girl came with our coffee and cookies. I didn’t want to break the silence as I thought he wanted to gather his thoughts.

With a clearance of his throat, he narrated the following story.

I am a serial entrepreneur now. My recent venture is an app-based ride application called Fastride where a customer can hail a car driven by owners who are on the way to their office or so. The customer has to pay usually 2-3 times the bus fare for a comfortable ride, and for the owner, the monthly income can easily cover the cost of petrol, maintenance, and depreciation value of the car. This is not the story I wanted to tell you but about the death of my dad when I was young.

I was a single child to a middle- class couple in Kerala.

Our home was in a village called Moovattupuzha, one hour drive from the city of Kochi. We had a typical farmstead house wherein the house got built within our cultivated fields. My dad worked as a school headmaster, and mom looked after the fields and home front. There was paddy, coconut, banana, some rubber trees, jack fruit, mango, lemon, curry leaves and mom used to grow vegetables in some patches. Mother brought up a few chickens, a cow, some goats for both milk, meat, and the occasional sale. All our food requirements got met with what we produced. I studied at a nearby school, about a kilometer from my home, and I walked daily.

I must have been six years or so when the dream or the nightmare started. Right in the middle of my sleep, I got awakened by the vision. The dream was about a moving car where I was sitting at the back. Slowly the dream expanded to include a monstrous figure rushing in from the opposite direction. It was when the dream developed into a situation when the monster swallowed the car in which I was traveling I screamed for the first time. The dream kept repeating night after night, and my sleep got affected along with my health. My parents were concerned and asked me about the dream and tried to comfort me, saying it was just a dream and there is no such monster. However, another episode got added to the dream when the monster swallowed the car. I saw that my dad died in the dream. I didn’t know it was an omen.

It was then my parents, being religious, decided to meet the priest at a nearby temple to offer a prayer. The temple hosted my family deity, and the idea was to appease the goddess there to stop my dreams. On an auspicious evening, my dad had decided to take us all there for the pooja. The temple was about 10—12 kilometers from my home and involved a journey through a winding hill road for about 8-9 kilometers, and then one had to take a deviation for another 3-4 kilometers to reach the temple. My dad had invited my grandpa and my younger uncle’s family, who stayed separately to come as well. They were supposed to travel by themselves and arrive at the temple.

I was seated at the back seat with my mom in the front seat. I was restless and very apprehensive of the journey to the temple because of the dream. As if to sense my mood, the sky suddenly turned overcast, and dark clouds had also gathered. We hurried in the car to beat the expected rain. My dad noticed a block on one side of the road and took the extreme right when the road too curved. What can one say about the fact that he didn’t slow down or perhaps not anticipated a lorry rushing down from the opposite side? The dream where I saw the monster swallowing the car happened in front of my eyes, and I must have lost consciousness.

There was a silence, and we both took a sip from our coffee. Once again, Saranathan cleared his throat and continued but with a slightly choking voice. He said the following part was told to him by his mother as he had lost consciousness due to the concussion.

The car got thrown apart from the road and somersaulted and rested against a big tree. My dad died instantly. My mother luckily escaped with some minor injuries, and after a momentary loss of consciousness came to senses and realized that my dad had died, and I too looked dead. She heard some commotion outside made by the local people who had gathered at the site. Somebody helped and pulled out my mom and me. My mom was all dizzy with the pain and the realization of the accident.

Soon my uncle reached the accident site as they were also to arrive at the temple. They, too, got down since the traffic was blocked. My grandpa saw my mom bleeding and dizzied condition and understood what had happened instantly. He came running towards my mom, crying out ‘Saranatha’ and collapsed and never got up. He was later declared dead due to a severe cardiac arrest.

I found Saranathan sniffing, and I reached out and held his hand. He gathered himself after a few minutes while I finished the rest of my coffee. He continued the story.

My mother being a strong lady, recovered from the gruesome episode rather quickly while I took a long time to recover. For many years I never rode a car after the accident. A week or two later, my mother and my uncle did a prayer at the temple to propitiate the god. I never understood what was that my dad and my grandpa had done to deserve such a tragic ending. I had stopped praying once I grew up. My mother managed the homestead farm, which was enough for the two of us and my studies. Until now, I had never told this story to anyone. Somehow reading your poem made me call you and talk about the accident. I feel relieved now.

“Someone had said that there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you,” I quipped back. Saranathan nodded.

When we walked out, he gently hugged me and said my dad would have been like you had he lived. I saw him pull out his bike and hit the road. I walked back home heavy in the heart.