The Incarcerated

He always avoided wandering alone beneath the naked sky after sunset. But tonight was his judgment night. The big empty flat had gnawed his consciousness. Almost sedated, he came out of his apartment & went to the rooftop garden, succumbing himself to the scathing, piercing glance of Her. She was robbing him off his self respect. There was no miasma to veil him. And he knew he could not get back inside the apartment; it’ll not allow him to. It was a co-conspirator of this sinister plan.

That calypso had always tried to detain him, to seduce him through her amorous calligraphy inscribed in the ominous firmament. But he detested her splendour, feared her exquisiteness. Her magnificence beleaguered him. It made him sick; a dour liquid swiveled inside his stomach every time he looked at her. Funnily, she never afflicted him whenever anyone else was with him so he made it a point never to wander alone if she was anywhere near his archdiocese.

Consequently he almost forgot her. She was nowhere to be seen in his luminous city of skyscrapers. He was busy attending his college throughout the day and was immersed in gossiping with his flat mates and in notes during the nights. Today when all his friends went home he really didn’t mind being left alone. His practical exams were not yet over so he had to stay and besides he knew that She won’t be there to unnerve him with her monstrous golden rays, not in a new moon night like tonight!

But She was there, even though invisible in the ordinary mortal eyes. But he could see her; She had cursed him with a unique vision. He could feel the imperceptible moonlight burning his skin. But this burning had a entirely different sensation. Like a drunk he spread his arms and started dancing and his fear transformed into something else. He wondered if the hatred he felt towards her actually veiled some emotion of a different nature, some ardent, fanatical, obsessive yet helpless emotion. May be that fluid inside his stomach had a different nature altogether! Suddenly he craved to embrace her, to feel her with every nerve cells of his body and looked at her with an intensity with which he never looked at any girl.

Next afternoon, they found his corpse in that rooftop.

The police were at a loss to explain the cause of death. No external/ internal injury was found. His face looked jovial, his eyes were open. But their queer, fervent yearning gaze chilled the spine of anyone who looked at them.