Mortal Burden

Karthik woke up with the humming sound coming from the backyard. He remembers shutting down and parking his thunderbird correctly, last night despite having the torturous backache.

Coming out of bed was as difficult as climbing up to his room with this insufferable pain, none of the orthopedics could diagnose the reason for his acute pain. He ran from one hospital to another, consulted the best experts in the country, but all in vain.

The nagging humming sound stopped but a deep thud sound came from the attic. He started climbing the stairs while he reached the top flight, sudden realization struck – the back is not aching anymore. Stretching his torso at all directions it confirmed, ‘the pain was gone’, elated to dialed mom’s number.

‘Amma, it is gone. I don’t feel the pain at all,’ he said in a gleeful voice. But there was no answer from the other side.

Puzzled, he disconnected and called again, ‘Amma, can you hear me?’

Still no reply, he could hear the thud again from above. Confused he started climbing the attic, he could see Amma’s footwear on the floor, worried he entered to check what’s wrong with the mom.

Behind the fallen boxes, a woman was lying in the pool of blood, an invisible trail of bloody footsteps were coming toward him. Before he could realize whats happening he felt as if someone climbed on his back, and the ache was back again.

Unable to decipher what and how this has happened, Karthik glimpsed a dark shadow piggybacking on his back in the blood slattered on the floor.

Disclaimer

This is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise indicated, all the names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents in this post are either the product of the blogger’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

This post is part of Blogchatter Half Marathon Aug ’21

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