by Nag Mani
BESTSELLER COLLECTION
NAG MANI
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be used, reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotation embodies in critical articled and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Published: March 2020.
© 2020 Nag Mani
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CONTENTS – THE GREEN ROOM
PROLOGUE
1. THE RESOURCE ROOM
2. THE PIANO
3. SOMEONE BY THE POOL
4. THE GREEN ROOM
5. THE BLAZER
6. IN THE WASHROOM
7. PAPER PLANES
8. SOMETHING
9. THE PLAN
10. UNDER THE MOON
11. THE PICNIC
12. THOSE ABANDONED BARRELS
13. THE HORIZON
PROLOGUE
March, 2008.
Shimla.
A soft drizzle fell that night. A dense mist crept down from the mountains to a village that seemed to stand brooding in the valley below. Gloomy dark trees surrounded it, fanning out into the thick forest that ran right up the mountains. A man walked briskly towards the village with a dog at his heels.
Ramesh kept his eyes on the path. Seventeen years had passed since she returned. And just when he had begun to assume that it was over, he saw it again.
A pug mark.
He had examined it, hoping it would be a real. He had searched around, praying that he would find a leopard ready to pounce on him. But deep in his heart, he knew that the pug mark was fake. There was no leopard. It was vague that it could correlate to his past - but then, the sudden summon to Nainital, a place he had promised himself never to visit again. It was from a stranger named Harry.
Something moved in the trees. The dog barked. Ramesh kept his eyes on the path.
Queen Victoria School, Nainital.
That was where it had begun. This time, he would put an end to it before the torment started, before she became powerful again. He thought of his wife, waiting for him not very far away, and his two-year-old daughter. He would not let them suffer for his sin. He felt the talisman tied firmly around his neck. It had worked for the past seventeen years and there was no reason it would fail now. He had decided - he would go to Nainital. He would help.
The barking became furious. Ramesh took the cue and looked up at the trees. There was nothing he could perceive in the dark foliage, yet he was sure that something lurked in there.
Monkeys?
The movement began to grow and he felt surrounded by it. If there were monkeys, there must be at least a thousand of them. He turned around. He could see the mud-path running between dark trees until it was swallowed by the night. High above, the tree-tops swayed gently in a breeze and a few stars peeped through the dark, tattered clouds. The dog barked again and leaped ahead.
“No! Come back!” he shouted and ran after it, but stopped dead when he saw what lay ahead. At first, he thought it was a wall, a massive white wall rising high above the forest canopy. Where on earth did it come from! His jaw dropped the moment he realised its true form. Not more than fifty metres away, a dense mist drifted towards him. It was vast and dark and formidable - an aggressive ocean of vapours that seemed to have materialised out of nowhere. He retreated in fright.
He called out to the dog again. But it ran into the mist and never returned. Cursing, Ramesh pulled out a torch and followed.
The trees began to buzz with life.
He looked up again and still saw nothing. The mist was almost on him. He paused, took a deep breath and boldly stepped into it, and his senses went numb. All he could see was ghastly grey vapours swirling around him. The forest went eerily quiet. He looked back, but the path was lost in the mist. He took another step; and he froze. He had seen something. He narrowed his eyes and looked again. In the storm of vapours, a dark figure stood silently, watching him. His legs jerked backwards, his hands began to tremble, yet he leaned forward for a better look… a girl, and he recognised her only too well. His face contorted into a silent scream.
She was back!
Warm blood rushed down his spine. She stood in front of him, blocking his path, staring through the veil of mist. With a surge of desperation, he turned around and ran. He had to get away from the mist, anyhow, so he ran, and kept running.
The movement in the trees followed.
He tried to call for help, but couldn’t summon the strength to shout. All that came out from his mouth were whimpers of helplessness. And then, he tripped over something and fell. He tried to get up, but fear had crippled him, and he fell again. He looked back. The mist inched closer. So he began to crawl.
The trees mocked.
He heard the dog bark. But the sound came from somewhere far away, maybe from a distant mountain or maybe from a different world. He tried to call for it, but only managed to splutter instead. Then, he saw it again, right in front of him. It was the second time since the phone-call. It couldn’t be a coincidence.
Another pug mark.
The past came swirling back. That cruel night. That dark cave. Those abandoned barrels.
Ramesh began to cry. His limbs felt numb with fear. He clutched his talisman and mustering all his courage and strength, got to his feet. And then, lightning struck, illuminating what lay hidden in the foliage.
His eyes saw them, his legs retreated from them, his hands shielded his face from them, yet his mind protested to acknowledge their existence.
Hundreds of men and women sat on the trees!
The lightning died and the trees went back into darkness. But the sight lingered. He could feel their ghostly eyes on him.
Then came a growl from the mist – a raspy, short growl, but cunningly long enough to confirm its existence and freeze his heart.
Seventeen years, and he still recognised it. It still chilled his blood. He backed away from the mist; he backed away from the trees. His knees could no longer support him and he fell off the path and rolled down the slope into the forest. The talisman fell from his grasp as he landed into a pool of wet mud. Spitting out bits of grass and twigs, he scrambled on his fours. A few feet away the land fell down to his village and then to a vast valley beyond. He saw lights flickering in the centre of the village - the temple. Towards the east, there was a lone bulb at the edge of the market - his house. He cried for help, but his throat was dry. The village didn’t hear his silent moans, but the people in the trees did. The black canopy of trees burst into whispers. He saw hundreds of faces peeping through them. He tried to crawl out of the mud, muttering prayers to every deity he worshipped.
A pair of yellow eyes appeared from behind a tree trunk. They watched him for a moment and vanished.
The whispers grew into an excited chatter.
The eyes appeared again, this time closer.
He flailed his hands madly to crawl away, tears washing away the dirt on his face.
The eyes circled him, coming closer every time they appeared. Something growled, and Ramesh collapsed with fright. Something moved. For the briefest moment, he saw black spots on a yellow coat. He reached for his amulet, but it was gone. A deep ringing jangled in his ears.
Something came closer.
Something crouched.
Something bared its fangs.
Something pounced.
With a yelp, he tried to shield himself
with his hands but they were no protection; with a crack they gave away under the immense weight of something. He felt rough fur on his face. He saw anger in those yellow eyes. Then, he felt burning pain as fangs ripped open his body. His insides lay scattered around him. The world began to fade. The trees began to disappear. He knew he was dying. Then why were those faces becoming clearer? And there she stood by a ghastly trunk, watching him…
1. THE RESOURCE ROOM
September, 2008.
Queen Victoria School, Nainital.
It was a starry night. A sweet breeze came through the window as Rohan Agarwal watched the front quadrangle from the Class XI’s dormitory. He had been on the watch for over two hours and could now safely assume that the night guards had retired to their rooms. There was no time to waste. He had to go down, break into the Warden’s Office and search for the question papers of the Unit Tests starting in two days.
He picked up a book, put on a woollen cap and went down to the first floor. At the end of a dimly lit corridor lined with wooden panels, he saw two students studying under a light. Somewhere, a clock chimed three.
One of them came forward. He was tall and shabby, and like Rohan, he was still in uniform. His blue and black stripped tie of Edward House hung loose about his neck. “The warden is asleep!” said Ayush Roy. “Or watching porn. But either way, he is busy in his house!”
“What’s with the guards?” asked Manav Singh. He was in Leopold House and was currently wearing a navy blue jersey to conceal his night-suit in case someone spotted them.
Rohan just nodded. In front of him, a door led to the landing of a staircase which went down to the classrooms and offices. He stood on the landing and studied another door to his right. It was white with the word ‘WARDEN’ embedded on it. He stood listening for some time. A clock ticked continuously beyond. Slowly and carefully, he walked to the door and latched it.
“Damn it! You’ll wake him up!” Rohan whispered as the wooden staircase groaned under the weight of the three boys. But there was nothing they could do to keep that ancient staircase from complaining, so they ran down as swiftly as possible and stepped out into a lobby. Rohan held his breath and listened. He heard footsteps from the dormitories above. They were moving away from them and died eventually. Ayush looked at him, his round face gleaming with excitement. Rohan nodded in return.
Ayush and Manav began strolling up and down a deserted corridor between classrooms, immersed in the books they had been carrying. Though nobody usually took to the corridors at 3:00 AM to study, as leaving the dormitory was prohibited after 11:00 PM, it would not have been much of an issue if they were seen. They were just three studious kids working hard to get good grades.
Rohan went out to the quadrangle and observed a small room at the end of the outer corridor. There was no movement inside. He coughed deliberately. Still nothing. He peeped through a window and saw two men in uniform wrapped in blankets, and he smiled. He latched the door from outside and returned to his friends.
The question papers were usually typed and formatted by some staff in the Warden’s Office, which was practically a small cubicle next to the reception of the Principal’s Office. Earlier that day, Rohan had walked into the suite when the reception was empty, on the pretext of meeting the warden. The door to his office was dark and old, with a heavy lock dangling from it. There was no point trying to break through as the lock was impossible to pick. He was about to give up and return when he noticed a window behind the chairs in the visitors’ lounge. It would certainly be closed at night, but he had worked a way in.
Manav took out a torch and pointed it at a polished black door with the word ‘PRINCIPAL’ embossed across it in golden. Next to the door was the reception counter and behind it was the door to the Warden’s Office. “Here!” Rohan led them across the lounge to the window. Ayush pulled out a small screw-driver, picked from the carpenter’s room earlier that day, and began scraping hardened clay off the window-pane. The glass came out within minutes. Rohan put his hands in, unbolted the window and scrambled inside.
The office was small and congested. He looked around. There were more chairs than it could accommodate. An old computer sat beside the door. He listened for any sound from outside. Everything was quiet. He could almost hear his heartbeat. “The drawer…” he whispered to Ayush, glad to have broken the deepening silence. He himself began searching through innumerable files on a desk. There were articles for the school magazine, applications, bills, forms and few photographs of students; but no question paper. Manav was busy searching another desk behind him.
“Maybe the papers haven’t been printed yet,” Ayush whispered.
“Maybe,” Rohan pointed towards the computer. “Switch it on.”
“They usually have a password.” Ayush looked at him indecisively.
“Boot it in ‘Safe-Mode’,” Manav instructed. “Use admin or administrator for used-id and leave the password blank. If it runs on XP, you will be able to browse files at least.”
Ayush didn’t seem convinced, yet he switched it on and pressed F8. “Admin” he spoke out as he typed and pressed Enter. The welcome screen of Windows XP appeared and filled the room with blue light. He raised his hands and screamed silently in triumph; and then came forth the start-up tune like thunder.
Ayush froze, his hands still held high. Rohan could now see blue LEDs of a music-system under the computer. He listened intently, expecting knocks from the guard-room. They had locked the guards and the warden, yet they had done nothing about the Principal’s Office, which was actually an extension of his house and could be locked only from inside. Minutes passed and all he heard was the slow breathing of his friends. The office was heavily carpeted and so packed that it swallowed any disturbance from outside. Rohan had an unsettling feeling about it all. If someone came to check, they wouldn’t have heard. He quickly ran to the corridor and ducked in front of the guard-room and listened. He could hear their faint snoring.
Just as he turned to leave, his eyes caught a movement across the quadrangle. He had been squatting under a bulb, clearly visible to anyone. He stepped away from the light and scanned the area. If someone had seen him, there was no point running. But he had to make sure he did not lead anyone to his friends. The quadrangle was bounded by a parapet on its front and the Chapel on its right. Before the entrance to the Chapel stood the Chapel-Bell and it was there he had seen someone. A tree grew on the other side of the Chapel and stooped over it to cast its branches over the Bell. All he saw was the branches swaying in a breeze. A trick of shadows!
Rohan returned to the office. Ayush had been typing in keywords in the search box, but nothing relevant was found.
“Guys, look!” Manav whispered and held out a few bundles of coupons, which circulated around the school in place of cash.
“How many are there?” Ayush asked, a wicked smile spreading over his face.
“About fifteen. They were just lying under these files.”
“So?” They looked at each other.
“That should be five bundles each,” Ayush announced.
“Five hundred bucks!” Manav exclaimed. One hundred was their weekly pocket-money.
“Yup! Baby, you’re a rich man!” Ayush winked as Manav stuffed the bundles into his pockets.
Rohan could not help but smile. The venture was not an utter disappointment after all. And with a penny more luck, they could even find the question papers.
They didn’t.
Half-an-hour later they jumped out of the window. Rohan put the glass back in place and sealed it with fresh clay, which again had disappeared from the carpenter’s room. Then, making sure they had left no trace of their break-in, they pulled the curtains back and left. Rohan unlatched the guard-room and then the warden’s house on their way back. There was huge disappointment for anyone who had stayed up for them. Rohan immediately went to his bed to avoid being questioned. They didn’t find the papers, but on the other hand, they were lucky enough to not have been s
een doing so.
A man stood smoking by the Chapel Bell. He was gazing at the distant chain of dark mountains, lost deep in thought. And how surprised he was to see a student walk right out into the quadrangle and boldly latch the guard-room!
*
There was a lot of excitement in the class the following morning, catalysed by Manav’s girlfriend, Nisha Gupta, who made him narrate every minor detail again and again to make sure other girls envied her. They had Maths test the next day and most of the teachers had given free classes to support them in their preparations, but Rohan spent the time trying to catch a nap, which only proved futile. After lunch, he headed straight to the dormitory. The Head-Boy, Hemant Sharma, had announced a Dramatics Society meeting after lunch and since he was a member, it meant he would be losing another precious hour. He thought it was better to utilise the time sleeping. But the pressure of test was mounting and sleep did not come.
It was evening and Rohan sat on a concrete bench behind the Library trying to study. He desperately needed some sleep. His plan to leak the papers had backfired. Not only did he have tons of chapters to study by morning, his weary mind rendered all his efforts fruitless. He had almost given up hope when Varun Kumar, his classmate, strolled in. He was in Alfred House, or A.F., and had a square face and short hair. “Hey!” he beamed at Rohan. “Why weren’t you at the meeting?”
“What meeting?” Rohan asked. And then he remembered.
“The Dramatics Society. And guess what?” Varun said, his smile getting wider under his crooked nose. Rohan replied with an uninterested look. “This December, we are going to perform a play in Delhi!”
“Wow! That’s cool!” Rohan now knew what he had been beaming about. Varun had been performing on stage since Junior School, and if the school was planning another play, he would certainly be given a role. And considering that this time the play was to be performed outside, with probably hundreds of important personnel and alumni in the audience, Varun was doing a good job keeping his excitement just to a smile. “So, when exactly is this play?” Rohan asked, genuinely interested.
