The Ghost Who Takes the Shape of a Human

   - Krisha Shastri

Part 1: The Beginning

 

One night, I traced myself to a bench in a park. It was late midnight, with a quite dark but somewhat pleasant atmosphere. On the right side of a bench there, there was a tree, a quite melancholic tree, as if to impersonate its bystanders at the moment. At the bench's left, there was an empty space, with quite nothing but the random movement of the bats there. Only one source of light was evident - the moon. I sat on the bench, relishing a feeling of staid.

 

To disturb me and disrupt my transcendence, the atmosphere decided to switch. O! How I appreciated my fate, for it's so considerate! The cool rustling wind turned to a storm of icy cold shivers. The quietude seemed to worsen and worsen, with the thumping of my heart at its fullest.

 

As in all the creepiest moments, I felt as if I was being watched. My presumption as always was correct. However, there wasn't some random ghost behind my back. There was... my mom.

Her glance as usual sucked my eyeballs out. Usually it's a prelude to a great war, however in this case, it appeared to be the soldier's fate during execution.

 

My mom looked as if she longed to wrap her arms around my neck. This was followed by my reverent screams as I rushed to the road; there was no one and I marched to the nearest place to shelter me.

 

I approached my steps prudently. About 10 mins later, I found myself tucked up in my bed, while a series of warm, intense drops slithered along my cheek.

 

As I looked around me, things were just as they had been before my nightmare, which improved my mood greatly. How brave I felt that night that I ceased my blanket over me. I wished to sleep beside my mom. However being 14 years old, this would be a blow to my prestige.

 

An abrupt thwack rattled through my ears. However, as time progressed, I learnt it was my mom in my kitchen, grabbing a glass of water.

 

"Hmm", I thought, "mom's usual teddy bear during her sleep is her water bottle, why does she feel the need to drink from a glass?"

 

These thoughts bored and bored my to my dreamless departure into a motionless state. In the morning, I inquired of my mom of why she'd moved to the kitchen.

"Darling, I didn't wake up that night. You must have heard your dad."

I proceeded to my asking my dad.

"Krisha, stop bugging me for useless reasons. If there had been a thief in the house, our camera would have captured him, or her, for that matter. I just saw your mom in the kitchen, and we know she's neither a thief nor a ghost, and between us, the second might be true." Saying this, he winked at me.

 

Part 2: Research

 

Despite the vehement effort of my daddy to enlighten my face, the joy of the joke subtly gave me the key to solving a problem – the answer. My mother, even with all her fits of rage and extreme bursts, would never have forgotten anything. This might mean that there was someone, or rather, something, impersonating her in the house.

All these cacophonies running in my mind like it was some kind of busy road led me to call my best friend. It is not in the DNA of humans to trust their teens. Hence, a teen alone can understand the other.

HEAD 1

“Hey Krisha, you know, I’ve experienced the same phenomenon, but in a theatre. I saw a man coming out of theatre hall 1 in blue clothing and the next second there was the same man in red clothing near my seat. There must be a thief resembling your mom - that can be the only explanation.”

“C’mon, what are the odds of that?”

“Well, I do believe in ghosts, because I might have seen one, but the rest of the humanity just doesn’t seem to listen to me.”

“Hmmm, can ghosts enter our dimension? I definitely saw a figure picking up a glass; can ghosts feel 3D objects?”

“If ghosts are shown to hurt humans, they might as well pick up a glass. Well, of course, barring the fact that ghosts can enter human bodies.”

“Are you finding pleasure in my fear??”

“Yep, a surge of joyfulness enters my body when the bully hides in a ball. Anyway, I am, after all, your sincere friend.”

I felt so annoyed by the fact that this human did not at all have faith in me. However, faith in oneself lies independent of others. Hence, with this in my arms, I proceeded my venture into the paranormal. Ghosts have always snatched my wits right out of me.

The next few days progressed quite peacefully. However, after a fortnight, I might have found the solution to who the figure was, or so I thought. Sometimes, my mother has the tendency to wade me away, by any means. Hence, she might have lied in order to avoid my resilient bugging.

Hence, I confronted her, often like a warrior does to his fate. Might I ask what her response would be? Well, it appears she performed the tactic again, “Darling,” she started. I might have guessed she would attempt to scare me so that I would follow her ‘laws’ and she might witness her reign as Queen Kumabeth. However, her presumption of me as an ignorant doubleganger of a very senseless frog was incorrect. It turned out, I was quite shrewd, I could read her mind like a book, after all, it was pretty clear.

However, I still didn’t grasp the existence of the dream. That dream constituted of the wildest nightmares possible. The woman from my dream wasn’t my mother, for there’s a sign of ‘love for the stupid’ in my mom’s eyes. In the woman’s eyes was pure savagery, a desire to cease a knife and slide it right through my throat.

The next day, something quite extraordinary popped its way on my fate-line. It appears so that this ghost was just so adamant on harassing me. Well, that day, I had invited my best friend to my home-not-so-sweet (because of the ghost)-home. She is an excellent dancer, learning the classical arts, and performing with a grace beheld by humanity’s few elements. I had persuaded her to come over to my home for a sleepover, for I wished to talk and chat with her for hours. Well, that’s what I mentioned to her; between me and my soul, I had snatched her here so that I could investigate in the case.

During the night, I heard the dropping of a steel glass. The reverberations rung in my ears, reaching my ever-disobedient brain, and finally waking me up. This in turn, resulted into me shaking my best friend to alertness. How I underwent remorse waking her up at 3pm, for she appeared deeply asleep.

We crept up to the kitchen, and recorded a video of the silhouette of my mom. Water went into her throat peacefully and for a second or so I thought that it was my mom. An abrupt glance of my attentive friend resulted in me staring at a piece of screw on the ground. Just a second before I could have yelled at my mom to watch out, she stepped on the piece of metal, and walked on. She strolled through the house like a dancer, and I was gaping at the screw still stuck in her toe. She showed no sign of pain, or rather, agony. This creeped me and my friend.

We clicked a quick picture of her. Somehow, I longed to show the last time’s camera footage of my mom to her and then their trust on me would shine evident. However, my workaholic parents shan’t spare a minute for me (apart from my dad, who always chatted with me whenever I felt lonely and even when I didn’t.)

God save us from this terrible monster befallen upon us!

Continued next week…

Chapter 3: THE GHOST IN MY ROOM

In the morning, me and my bud slept till afternoon. When we woke, our heads were spinning around this case. Then, we decided to talk to my parents together, for they surely wouldn’t believe me single-handedly. Hence, if there were someone to second my opinion, the probability of them even listening to my words would increase considerably.

I went to my dad (for my mother would snap the moment I uttered a word) and spoke, “Daddy, the ghost is stalking us. See this video footage recorded by me and her. Just glance at the screw.”

My friend moved on to provide the phone where we had recorded our venture. Upon seeing how the figure didn’t react on being hurt by a screw, (if it even was hurt), there was an expression of pure fear in my dad’s eyes. However, he, I would say, was the bravest member of the house, apart from me, who was as courageous as him 😉.

Anyway, my dad advised to keep this a secret from my snappy mom and his short-tempered wife. My friend found this a way of adventure for our boring lives, hence made up her mind to stay with me till this ghost is captured.

The next night, we constituted to install some new cameras in our kitchen. We didn’t alter the positions of the glass or made any other change, for it would provide a clue to the ghost of its discovery. As for me, I was (and am) quite scared of female ghosts for some reason; this might be because I consider females to be extremely powerful.

Nevertheless, I longed to uncover the mysteries of this phenomenal creature. This soul was visualising the face of her mother when she revealed the ghost to her. “This is how you look when you snap at humanity,” I would say.

Regardless of the fact that I didn’t quite believe in my victory, I proceeded to sleeping till evening, for I had to be awake during night. My dad was free the next day (or night), since it was Sunday, although he had work on Sundays too. My friend was so excited that she was dancing in my room, from one corner to another. It was nice to watch her dance, for it surely meant she wasn’t afraid and neither was I.

During night, I woke up earlier than usual. We were supposed to pop our eyes open at about 2 am, however, my disobedient eyeballs pounded on their lids at 12. For one hour I sat on my bed, writing a diary. Here’s what I wrote:

Sunday, 31^st May,

12 am,

 

Dear Diary,

How I long to convey my mind’s disobedience to you, for then I shall be disposed of all the worldly quarrels running in my brain. First things first, am I really prepared for encountering the ghost?  Well, I think so. My friend here sleeps till eternity drops slow. How I wish to wake her now, I feel so bored. I wish to hear Kenny G’s great songs; however, I fear that shall lead me into an illusion that things were fine. Well, they were. As long as there weren’t any restrictions on me or my marks-based pointless examinations, things were fine.

12:30 am,

Another half an hour, how time feels multiplied by 5, I feel so excited and bored at the same time. An artist is patient, an executioner is meditated and a teen is neither of the two. O! How I desired to make time move fast! Alas! Time shall never recede into the arms of a 14-year- old. It shall be the mighty Kronos himself, who shall come here to wade me away of this endless departure.

The God of sleep has decided to leave me some mercy. I am exhausted of staring at this static shadow in my room. This efficient brain dwells unable to prove its efficiency at the moment. And here this glass of water is provided by the shadow. I shall take it, embrace the holy sprit of this fine marriage of hydrogen and oxygen and let myself be flattened by a slumber.

 

Chapter 4: Leeha.

Being Krisha’s friend, I am pretty much unaware of the right perception of life. My radical friend here is so keen on living here life by developing a system of her own, and that is completely tolerable. However, what gets on my nerves is that she wills to impose this system on me.

She emerges in opposition to the system of work and reward and I might be one of the few thousand people aware of this. Regardless of all these, I am her great friend, and she sincerely reciprocates my feelings. I, on Saturday, slept at 6 in the evening so as to wake at 3 am.

However, fate, or rather this ghost, woke me up at 12:45 am. I heard a steel glass drop in my room. Suddenly, I sprang awake. What I saw was scarier than the scariest movie, for it was live. There was a misty shadow holding its arm above my friend’s head. The glass had dropped and there Krisha’s face was covered with water. I knew time was provided by the Titan King to this ghost and not me, for it would spot me the instant I moved.

Hence, I took only a few seconds to examine this creature. It was pure black, with white eyes. Now, I believed it seemed dark due to the absence of light in the room. As the moonlight from one of the windows fell on it, I was in awe as to see the long looming figure of Krisha’s mom.

I was left with absolutely no time. I screamed as hard I could. This awoke all the members of the family and Krisha as well. The ghost was left startled. Then it grinned at me with pure malice, mouthed, “The next is you”, and immaterialized.

Krisha’s mom arrived.

“What happened? Is there something? You both girls, say something?”

Krisha looked pretty confused. However, upon seeing the fallen glass, she seemed to comprehend things quickly.

‘Mamma, nothing. I just saw a big insect by the window. Don’t worry.”

“Please Krisha, let me sleep peacefully at least once in a lifetime. No insect will harm you the way lack of sleep can.”

Her dad also peeked at the glass from the door side, and he seemed to grow more and more alert second by second. After aunty left moaning, her husband spoke, “I understand the situation. Krisha, you keep an eye on the room and protect your friend. You’ve had an experience with combat, haven’t you, my bully?”

‘Well, yes, I suppose.”

 

Chapter 5: YET GHOSTS ARE MEAN

 

Ghosts, I would say, are not scary (well sometimes, yes), but mostly mean. Being full of vengeance, these creatures seek to impose the hardship faced by them on others who haven’t an idea of them. However, once the presence of the ghost is felt, it becomes quite cautious and seeks to fulfil its purpose of life (or death) in a planned manner.

Who am I to comment? Well, I am a soul having 14 days of experience of wheeling and dealing with ghosts. I bargained, and I backed off, however, it is the one destined by fate to be the victor, that is who? Well, we shall know eventually.

(By the way, I’m Krisha, if you are one of the few latecomers who haven’t read chapters 1 to 4. If you want to read things in continuation, check out ‘The Ghost Who Takes the Shape of a Human’ from the Story-pages and click it. Otherwise, check out the page link ‘Ghost Stories’ or the label ‘Ghost Stories’ and voila! Posts are swimming round the pool!)

After the starring stage-entry of mom’s ghost aka ‘The Doppelganger’ or ‘The Ghost Who Takes the Shape of a Human’, as me and my friend Leeha would like to call, in my room, my friend has been scared to death. Personally, I think she is quite courageous. As it is said, ‘There’s a thin line between courage and recklessness’, my risk-free perfectionist pin-point pal never wishes to cross this limit.

Hence, she returned to her home with a ton of sweating and sighing. However, I was left with no alternative but to ask my parents to move out of this haunted place.

“Krisha, study! There is no ghost in the house, can’t you understand! Marks are what makes your life worth living. I don’t have time for your cribbing, if you see a ghost, you must have looked at your laptop. STUDY! Don’t waste my time. Ugh!” – That’s what my mom said (or shouted).

Apart from the regular construction noises, two of the things bugging me to death are – my mother’s voice and more construction noises. Hence, suggesting to move was a prompting offer for me and my dad. However, the quite polite souls as you may know to refuse this offer were my mom and, of course, her Doppelganger.

I carried on, keeping my mind pure and stable day by day. It was quite a torment, when you know you are at risk somewhere but you can’t move from there.

The next day, that would be a Tuesday, Leeha phoned me.

“Krisha! You must come here. I suggest DO NOT MOVE anywhere. Today, I saw my mom coming from the washroom and the next second, she was calling me from a store.”

“You mean the Doppleganger masqueraded into your mother?”

“That’s right. When I screamed, she mouthed, ‘The next is you’ and that was it. Well, what exactly is this creature calculating for? What is the motive of this vengeance?”

“Isn’t vengeance a motive?”

“Well, that might be. So what do we do now??”

“If you stay at my house, the ghost shall return to its shelter. You stay right there.”

“Your dad asked you to protect me.”

“Well yes, but he also asked me to protect me as well.”

“Well good job, nice plan. Let the ghost torment me here, I will die and you shall arrange a nice funeral for me.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll explain you my strategy. Then will the world and its laws dawn on your brain. See, you shall stay there just till sun sets. After it does, I shall be there at your home, and this time I shall bring my parents and some other ghost-experts there.”

“Do you know any ghost-experts?”

“Not now, but I shall find someone today on the net, though. See, don’t be afraid, I’m there for ya. That’s what friends are for.”

“Thanks bud. I’ll talk to my mom right now, she came.”

“Wait, Leeha, I didn’t understand one thing. Why does the ghost appear as a doppelganger of moms??”

“Um, however, I saw a doppelganger of the man at the theatre, right?”

“Um… yeah, sort of. That might be his twin or something, though. Twins are generally born with different personalities, hence the different movies watched by them.”

After this episode of say-and-reply, we managed to find no solution to the problem, hence no relief. However, I would go so long to say, Leeha mentioned something about the unusual behaviour of doppelgangers. Well, her mom appeared in front of her when she was alone in the house. She just grinned at her, and never hurt her. Then, the impersonator moved to the kitchen, where she grabbed a glass of water and drank it.

This reminded me of its obsession with water-glasses. Why does it require to fuel itself by means of water? How can the mild friendship of hydrogen and oxygen suffice the thirst of this creature?

 

CHAPTER 6: The Confrontation

 

As I searched on the net, I found names of certain ghost-hunters. Their names would be, ‘Crestilia Sarastrolope’, ‘The Cremation Master’ and ‘Backyard Cemetery’. From the traditional method of ‘reading the book by its cover’, I presumed the second and third were just some random teenagers trying to seek fame.

The first, however, seemed a person of value. I called the person, and found she was a lady. Yes, ‘she’ was a ‘lady’, you could have guessed when I just said ‘she’. I know.

Anyway, I called her and she muttered to herself, “O crap! That poor girl must be in danger.” Well, I thought about her words for a second. That lady muttered at the exact decibel just enough for me to deduce her words.

Well, I realized this could be a trick of hers to acquire money. Hence, I asked, “Do you take any money?”

“Depends on the ghost. Most of the times, in return, we just take the ghosts as payment.”

This scared my wits out, and as I would like to say, ‘My heart was in my throat’. I mentioned the case to this woman, and she said she’ll only take a fine sum of money, which might just mean the price or one or two burgers. I gladly accepted the offer and with the consultation of my dad, I asked if the woman could come during the evening today. She answered she could, and how elation squeezed us into a void of no caution. This means, we forgot to set an alarm, and ended up getting late for the venture.

As I drank water from my glass, I realized I was being watched. My head ached with all the figures of this possible doppelganger manifesting into a spirited ghost-ey atmosphere.

As I noticed from the corner of my eye, a dark figure loomed beside my bedroom door. It stared at the glass from which I had sipped water. I dropped the vessel as I realized it was the same one wherefrom the ghost had received the liquid. The steel exhibited its sonority with no sense of what was happening at all.

The figure quietly clung to the door and watched me leave the room.

I reached Leeha’s house. There, me, my mom, my dad, Leeha, her mom and her dad marched into her bedroom, which had quite a view of the kitchen. In the kitchen was a steel glass at the centre, which was suspected to have hosted the water drank by the doppelganger.

We carefully watched all night as time went by, with no sign of the impersonator. My heart did beat indeed, very vehemently, and I realized it was informing me of the figure seen by me in my kitchen in the evening. Then, it stopped beating when it was sure I got its message.

With the exception of me, only Leeha thought this an adventure. She somehow grinned at the glass, which was odd. I kept glancing at her from time to time, and her gaze on the vessel didn’t flinch a bit. On the other hand, the parents were quite dazzled from the behaviour of the ghost.

Abruptly, however silently, I noticed a piece of screw stuck on Leeha’s foot. I went cold; shivers surged through me. A heart which was once enthusiastic turned to a piece of ice. I grabbed my dad’s arm and motioned to Leeha’s hurt foot. His eyes reflected pure dread from this. And the next move of Leeha was,

 

CHAPTER 7: The Truth

And the next move of Leeha was - staring at the glass more. 😂Just Kidding. Leeha, with an unusual tone of admiration, spoke, “Mamma, there’s no sign of the ghost. Can I eat some cookies?”

“No, this creature arrives to drink from a glass. Hence, keep your imprudence to yourself.”

Soon, the ghost hunter arrived and we motioned her towards Leeha’s foot. She murmured, “Ah, there’s the ‘pain of death’. Ghosts don’t feel pain from anything with the exception, of course, of the holy objects. However, these undead die with contact with these. We don’t address to kill it; we do to capture it.”

‘So how do we do that then?” my dad asked.

“Well, its simple, isn’t it? Just grab her.”

Me and my dad mentioned, with utter shock, to Leeha’s mother, “Leeha is somewhere else. Look at the screw stuck in her foot. The Doppelganger has impersonated Leeha!”

“Then where is my daughter?”

“We shall find her once we capture the ghost.”

Hence, as time progressed, the mother mustered the courage to aim a grip on her daughter. She shouted, ‘Where is my daughter, you freak!”

Leeha (or rather her doppelganger) screamed with a tone way shriller than her actual one. The frequency might have reached the max a human can hear, or rather, about 19, 999 Hz.

As things calmed down a bit, Crestilia (the ghost-hunter) moved forward, gripped the ghost, and asked with strict firmness, “Transfer into your original form.”

“What form? I’m Leeha!”

“Well, then, you must have the touch of a holy object for clarification.”

Abruptly, the doppelganger wasn’t a doppelganger anymore. She transformed into an extremely beautiful woman. Her sharp features astonished the ghost hunter. She murmured, “It can’t be, it can’t be.” On her face was a deep sorrow, one that arrives at the departure of someone close to the heart. As her eyebrows flinched a bit, I noticed a subtle change in emotion. This sweet sorrow turned to a cascade of quiet rage.

“Who killed you, my dear? Speak, Cremetia!”

‘Apparently’, I thought, ‘This ghost might be a relative of the hunter, or a precious ghost-ey-friend of hers.” Despite my anxiety, I chose to let the tête-à-tête continue.

“Mom” spoke Cremetia to the ghost-hunter.

I froze. Did she just say ‘mom’? I couldn’t encounter the shock I felt at the moment. My dad was aghast. My mom – indifferent as usual. She thought of it as some drama presented by me and Leeha. Apparently, her eyes chose not to observe a quiet transformation of a 14-year-old to a 25-year-old.

And as for Leeha’s mom and dad, they couldn’t fathom they’d been raising an adult for a day. The thoughts of Leeha growing up, moving to a college, probably far apart from her home, and then graduating, manifested in their eyes. A parental emotion of sorrowful love morphed into tears and flowed through their cheeks.

My parents embarrassingly joined this conjugation of adults crying over their teens’ futures. These middle-aged adults nodded at each other, as if aware of each other’s plight.

However, one question remains unsolved – Where is Leeha? I inquired of the ghost hunter of her daughter’s existence and death.

Apparently, Crestilia Sarastrolope had a daughter, named Crematia. She had died of poisoning. It was so that her enemies had erupted of their envy. They had been in awe of Crematia’s magnificence as well as high intelligence.

Those vile creatures had dipped some poison in her glass of water, which she drank without any notice. This caused her to tremble in agony, shorty before her death-day. However, this didn’t terminate her contact with the living world. Crematia believed that the spirit of vengeance prevailed in every being – from saints to demons. She chose her afterlife as preventing any live creature from being poisoned, hence her craze for glasses.

However, if she were a good ghost, then, in my dream, what had been grinning at me so darkly? I asked,

“Crematia, how many forms did you change into?”

“Well, during this month, three. One as a man at the theatre, when the man’s friend attempted to food-poison him. That’s where I found your bestie. Second, your mother, to keep an eye on you. And third, Leeha, your bestie to see how you could have caught me. Anyway, Leeha is in her room, deeply asleep and she is alright. You need not worry.”

These words had me a sigh of relief. I could no longer worry for my dearest friend, who, as always, is ever-so-disobedient. However, I didn’t quite understand one thing – who transformed into Leeha’s mom? Crematia told she’d impersonated my mom, the man from the theatre and Leeha.

Despite these cacophonies in my mind, I decided to forget about it. God blessed me with a good spirit and I shall have her take care of me. I shall put an end to this mystery which I presumed was everlasting, till eternity drops slow. However, eternity might have engulphed some vitamin tables this time (cause it didn’t drop so slow).

 

AFTERMATH – AUDIO-RECORDING BY LEEHA

I am so glad that when I had dozed off, 4 adults and 1 to-be adult solved the case. My phone is ringing. Its from mom, I am choosing not to pick it up this time. It rings and rings. These sounds disturb me. Let me pick it up.

“Hey mom”

“Hi Leeha, I am at the mall with your dad. Study and practice your dance, dear. What do you prefer doing now?”

“Watching TV without answering any phone calls.”

“Ok Ok, I will end the call. Bye, love u dear.”

“Love you too mom.”

And then I watch horror movies. A sudden scream emerges from the stairs of my home. It is of my mom! Let me check if she is alright.

I go to the staircase and I see my mom fainting on the bottommost stair. I usher myself towards her and I see a terrible face with yellow teeth and red eyes.  She is looking like my mom but surely isn’t. She grabs a knife and.