The Spellbinders : Chapter 1 – Room number 4

Team – The Spellbinders 

We are a team called the Spellbinders.  We are collaborating and writing a story for the Blogadda challenge “Game of Blogs”.  The team is diverse, and we are having fun interacting with each other creatively.  To know about us, join us here

Chapter 1
Room number 4

11th April

“She can’t be Roohi!” Shekhar screamed “She is not my Roohi.” His screams and anguish went unheard in the God forsaken secluded warehouse. Another shrill cry of a child stirred the beast in him, he ran frantically towards the sound. His bloodshot eyes filled with rage adjusting through his thin silver specs to the dark disgusting room barely lit by street lights filtering in through broken window panes, and searched the scattered wooden boxes.

“Where are you?” He softened his voice trying not to scare away the child, and then he saw twin tiny pools filled with fear, her eyes he thought “I won’t hurt you.” He tried to coax her out of her hiding place “Come to Daddy, daddy won’t hurt you.” He continued in a sing song voice and felt a strong blow against his jaw, so hard that it rattled all his teeth. He pulled out his knife in fury and started slashing the thin air and froze when he saw blood, thick crimson splashed across his face, splattered on the floor, blood on his hands and the lifeless body of the child, its cold eyes staring deep into his soul as if to ask “Why?”. He squeezed his eyes shut and covered his ear with his bloody hands but the loud blaring of sirens wouldn’t stop. “I said stop. Stop. Stop.” He kept screaming, hot tears on his red cheeks “Stop you spawn of Satan!” he howled not realizing he was Satan himself. The door flew open with a loud thud and he knew it was the police.  His whole body trembled and he sat upright on the battered hard stone bed, his eyes open now and his body on high alert, but his mind still in the hazy arena between nightmare and wakefulness, the iron bars of his cell mocked him.

“Bad dream?” his cell-mate smirked.

He shook his head averting his eyes; he could not say that he desperately wished it was a just a nightmare, not his reality that came back each night to haunt him. All these days in prison he never tried to exchange words with his cell-mate who probably was here for a gruesome crime like murder or rape, but was he any different?

Shekhar wore his thin specs and took out his diary to scribble; scribbling helped in keeping his sanity intact, whatever was left of it. But today he was not going to scribble but sketch the details of the room; something was amiss that he was sure of. He dimly recalled reading something on the wall covered with layers of grime collected over the years; obscured with  spider webs and filth. He dug deeper in his mind but all he could remember was the storage room number written in bright bloody red, which was 4.

“Do you have a child?” his cell-mate asked again breaking his concentration, his voice inviting confidences. He laughed out loud as the irony wasn’t lost to him.

“Child you say…” Shekhar looked at him clearly for the first time; he had a bushy beard and long hair so different from him. Shekhar was bald and had an overgrown French bread. His cell-mate was in his late twenties.  When Shekhar was of his age almost nine years ago, he was filled with joy of being a father, he always wanted a boy and when his wife Tara told him she was pregnant, his happiness didn’t have any bounds. He used all his life savings to buy a flat in Malad, Mumbai so that he could bring his baby boy to his own house. He bought a bat-ball set, small toy cars, toy guns and much more. He even planned out the baby’s whole life. Tara thought he was crazy, Tara wanted a girl and Shekhar loathed her for her thinking; he believed girls to be a burden, brats that created nuisance. He knew in his heart that he could father a boy, never a girl.

“Dear, did you complete your story?” Tara had asked him nonchalantly; her almost nine-month old baby bump huge.
“Not yet.” Shekhar sighed, he wanted to be a nationwide bestselling author but the failure of his first novel hit him hard. Romance was not his genre, he knew it. So now he was trying his hands on a story revolving around spies and serial killers.

“Takes a psychopath to understand one.” His wife joked all the time but he knew it was not all jest. He did not let her gibes get to him.

One fine morning when he got a call from the hospital that his wife was in labour, he came rushing straight from a meeting with his publishers, with flowers in one hand, sweets in another and a big infectious smile on his fair innocent face.  He entered the hospital room number 4 where his wife was resting, her cheeks rosy; she looks exhausted and exhilarated at the same time, her eyes focused at the corner where a nurse was standing with his child. He stopped in his tracks at the sight of a baby girl. Flowers and sweets fell on the floor with a loud thud as he snatched the baby from the nurse in rage.

“Stop Shekhar, you are hurting her.” Tara screamed in despair.

“Sir, stop, hand her to me” Nurse tried to take the baby back but Shekhar was far lost to hear their frantic plea.

***

Team  members :

Ritu Lalit, Farida Rizwan, Sunita Rajwade, Bhavya, Bushra M, Ryan Fernandes, Kunal Borah, Ankit Mahato, Deepa Dutta and me (Ankita Singhal)

Writer’s note :

This is the chapter 1 from team The Spellbinders in contribution to the “Game of Blogs”

To know more about all the Authors of this story & for suggestions , Join us here

Update
Read chapter 2 – Table number 4 by Bushra M (Published on 13th Sept, 2014)

Me and my team are participating in ‘Game Of Blogs’ at BlogAdda.com. #CelebrateBlogging with us.