Haunting

"The aura of this place enrapture me, it feels so quite and peaceful here" I smiled, keeping my eyes closed, sitting on the shore of brook surrounded by the beauty of nature.

2 or 3 months back, while unwittingly roaming around on my cycle, I found this place few miles away from the rush and noise of the city. Till then whenever I feel anxious and distracted by several thoughts, I prefer to spend some time here. Enjoying the pleasure of peace and lost in my own thoughts I didn't pay attention that one and half hour has passed. Meanwhile, I heard something behind the bushes and found it weird. I turned back, but there was nothing. 

I noticed that the Sun had almost disappeared, the sky became a little darkle. "It is too late, I should go now," I thought. I stood up and wiped the sand from my cloth. I felt someone's eye on my back, I peeked from the corner of my eyes, again there was nothing but the bushes shaking. A feeling of something bad might happen pullulated in my mind. I began to walk quickly taking long steps. I sensed that someone was following me. The evening was becoming darker so I couldn't recognise. It seemed ..... like shadow of someone, maybe more than one. But the sound of footsteps were clearly audible which came closer every bit of the second. I started running as fast as I could. After running for some distance I recognised that in fear and nervousness, unconsciously I propelled on wrong path, opposite to the way to my home. I was totally stuck at that moment. As far as I saw, an unpleasant silence spread all over. The shadow was still following me so inspite of sweating profusely & gasping I had to continue running . Fortunately, at some distance I saw a rusted gate of a house near a lamp post. "Just few steps to get inside the gate....... the only assurity of my safety" I signed. 

About to enter the gate, exactly at that moment, I felt a firm hold on my leg, preventing me to enter. I turned and jerked my leg out, trying to free myself. Turning back what I found was very strange, there were about 4-5 monstrous street dogs having ugly and very frightening appearance with sharp pointed teeth. 2-3 of them were barking at me, one of them clutched a side of my kurti and the other two grasped my jeans from their strong and sharp teeth and pulled me away from the gate. Because of a strong force I fell down on the ground. I was totally blank.

With all my strength I tried to rescue myself, pulling my leg out of their grasp. In middle of all these scuffle, they tore my clothes, scrabbled my hands and legs. One of them was about to jump over me. My heart was beating so fast that I was able to feel it thumping. In that state of confusion, anxiety, fear and pain my nerves seemed to explode. It felt so suffocated that I thought I might ...... and I woke up.

 Sweating and gasping, I found myself on the bed in my room. " It was a dream" I sighed. "What kind of dream it was? And why was it so?" I asked myself, wiping out the sweat of my face. "Maybe it was the effect of the news that has been broadcasting in news channel from the last two days. That a lady was raped and murdered late night while returning home from work.

This type of incidents create a fear towards our safety. Many question arise in our mind. Later we try to avoid it thinking that " how much and how long we'll think about it when it is obvious that this problem has not any permanent solution. We have a lot more things to think about, to focus on." 

But the truth is these scary news hides in our mind subconsciously, haunting us continuously, no matter where we are.