Miss Me ?

Sitting in front of the beach, carelessly sipping my beer, enjoying the sunset, what a blissful time to be alive. I was in some next level of trance, everything seemed so surreal, so tranquilizing. The amber-colored sun like a big fireball slowly getting swallowed by the vastness of the sea. The sound of waves like some melodious music, the occasional chirping of the birds adding to the effect. The rising waves were touching my legs at a regular interval like some natural therapy. I was bothered about the fact that why none of my problems were bothering me, how come life was so peaceful suddenly, I did not have any idea how I reached this amazingly beautiful place. I was practicing mindfulness at its best, completely living in the present, no thoughts of past or present. Then I saw her outline darkened by the sun rays coming from the opposite side but her body, her hair, her hands, everything about her was so deeply engraved in my mind that I could recollect her from anywhere.

"She can’t be here, she is miles away from me, in a different city, happy with her husband", I told myself. 

"This person is someone else, my mind is hallucinating, my mind justifying the position of being my greatest enemy is playing a trick on me.  My mind who can’t stand me being happy even for some minutes, my jealous wicked evil mind who after failing to bring any regrets of past or any worries of future bringing the image of many of my sorrow in front of me to win this contest.", I started cursing my mind mentally. The figure started coming close, she was wearing the same shiny red dress she wore in the college farewell party. Crazy coincidence, after all that happened between us, the drama and the bitter parting away, no conversations not even the formal birthday wishes exchanged from last 10 years and yet I found her slowly approaching me in the same dress she looked the most spectacular once. A part of me who craved her so much was becoming heavy again, I forcefully brought all the negative thoughts back in mind to end this mental coup.

Life has changed so much since we last talked. From my menial job which was too small for us and from my unknown college, I got into a high paying job after doing my MBA from a fancy college. She got married in between, she didn’t invite me and I was glad I was not asked to come because had I gone there, either I would have surely created some drama to vent out my frustration or I would have gotten lost between the thoughts of self-pity and why life is so unfair to me. We were still friends on social media though, that is how I got to know about her marriage, I rarely talked to our common friends, I didn’t want even a shade of her involvement in my new life. A life I created for myself, where I am successful, powerful, and happy at least superficially and not the helpless me which she made me once. She was not very active on social media ever and after her marriage, she didn’t post anything. I didn’t care, though once in a while I did use to go to her profile to check if there is anything new.

But I sensed her presence that day. As they say, the world is a small place. That day was 31^st December and I was enjoying my vacations in Thailand, a popular tourist spot, many Indians go there these days. As they say, the ambitious middle class of India has shifted from Goa to Thailand. I thought maybe she had come here with her husband. A coincidence, a painful one. I didn’t know if there is an antonym of serendipity, but if there is one, I was going through it. Her outline was becoming clearer and clearer with every passing second. This was definitely her, I was convinced now. For countless times during my college, I had wondered at her physical beauty. The way her hair moved with a passing breeze amplifying her beauty so much that she looked almost like an angel who had come from some other world. How can anyone born on this planet be so beautiful?

As I was getting deeper and deeper into the thoughts with my past and present getting one again without any visible boundaries and I was losing sense and the memory of what all happened in the last 10 years, there was a sudden halt. I was suddenly brought back in the present. Do you remember when you are having a very clear dream and then someone wakes you and you get back to your senses pretty quickly while still retaining the thoughts of your dream? I suddenly remembered that it was 31^st December 2019, I was in Thailand and she was not here.

Was I hallucinating? But it felt so real.

I have always wondered whenever I read the stories of people going through schizophrenia and other mental condition, how it feels to imagine a person. I guess I experienced it that day. The subconscious mind is indeed a complicated yet magical thing, it can bring back someone in front of your eyes, someone of whom you rarely think about these days. I threw the remaining beer into the trash, maybe the nature vibes with the alcohol had made me lose touch with reality for a while.

The next 3 days were horrible, I was haunted by her thoughts again and again. As if I had never moved on as if I never accepted my fate. I went through a series of mental states. From self-pity to cursing her for my misery, from laughing at her new mediocre life to imagining the ‘what if…’ . I came back to Hyderabad on 4^th January and I felt relieved immediately. Although I hated my job and the fact that I put in 14-16 hours a day. I knew my job will be my savior now. I would get busy juggling stuff, firefighting , and bitching about the toxic work culture of my company. I would forget her soon. It happened exactly the way I thought. The villains of my present took the place of her thoughts and I forgot about her completely.

I woke up with a very dried throat, cold sweat coming from the side of my head and a mind spinning furiously. I had a terrible nightmare. I have had nightmares before. But none of them felt so real, and none of them had such lasting memory after waking up and none of them made me almost shit my pants while replaying them in my mind. I was back to the same beach, same setting, and the same scene. She was coming near me. I was having the same chain of thoughts like that day and a strong déjà vu. Like I was not sure whether this is real or not and if it is real, it felt like it is happening again. But this time she didn’t vanish, she keeps on coming close to me. She came almost at a 1 foot distance to me and then she asked:

“Miss me?”

I was startled by the question. It’s been 10 years, why did she want to have a confirmation on whether I still think about her or not. I made my mind that I will say very rudely that I neither miss her nor do I feel anything about her. She didn’t exist in my mental landscape anymore. I made eye contact. Her facial features were slowly changing. They were becoming very aggressive. The eyes were getting bigger, some lines coming at the temple, she stood so tall and her stance was so aggressive as if she was ready to attack me. Her face was slowly turning red, violent red as if reflecting some deep-buried anger.

Do you remember the scene from Bhool Bhulaiya where Vidya Balan argues with Akshay Kumar near a temple and Akshay notices her change of expression, I felt the same. Her pupil became enlarged and now all I can see was pitch black color. I was transfixed, I couldn't move, she was looking directly into my eyes and I couldn’t run. I couldn’t do anything. I was trembling. She put a hand on my shoulder, I had never felt an icy touch like that, then she came 2 inches away from my face, looked directly into my eyes, I was able to see my frightened face in the reflection of those dark voids, and then she asked again in a very disturbing high pitch echoed voice.

“Miss me”?

I woke up after this. The clock pronounced 3:03 AM, the hour of the devil as they say. It took me a while to become normal again. My heart was racing like an engine, my breaths were heavy, uneven, and very fast. The sweating never stopped. I went to the kitchen and had some water. During the whole journey from my bedroom to the kitchen, I felt like I was being watched, someone was there, lurking in the dark corners of my house. It is said that whenever we feel we are being watched, we are being watched, as evolution developed our senses to work effectively, especially in darkness to save us from any predator attack. I was not sure whether my senses are working overtime or my miserable life has finally broken my mental sanity and I was hallucinating a lot.

I discussed the dream the next day with my best friend. As expected, he laughed it off. He teased me saying that even after all these years, I was not able to move on from her. I searched for the meaning of the dream in google also. All I got was some random shit about unfulfilled needs and desires, blocked expectations and stress. In short, no solution at all. A part of me wanted to visit a counsellor or psychotherapist for some professional help. But then I thought maybe I was overthinking it. There was one random hallucination and then a random dream, maybe the former was the cause of the later, just a random emotional phase. I should not give much heed to this. I felt loneliness was getting to me now and I should think about getting married. For the first time in my life, I felt lonely and sad about me being lonely. For the first time in life, I craved for some companionship.

The next few days went normally. I usually sleep the entire noon on Sundays. My life has made me an introvert lately. I have stopped going out with people. I just don’t like being with others or maybe I interact so much with people during my work week, it’s better to stay alone on Sunday. I ordered a heavy brunch and then watched a movie and fell asleep. I woke up when it was late, it had become quite dark. There was no light turn on in the house and no light coming from outside also. Usually, my room is decently illuminated by the lights coming from outside. Perhaps a power cut I thought. It took some time for my eyes to get adjusted in the darkness and get some vision. Suddenly my mouth went dry and I got goosebumps all over my body as if electricity is flowing through my veins. In the dimly lit corner where some blue light was struggling for its existence. She was standing, in the same red dress and with the same dark black eyes watching me intently and angrily as if she was trying to pierce my whole body through her gaze.

Miss Me?

She asked again. My paralysis returned. It was real, it was happening, it was the reality, it was no dream. She started walking towards me while maintaining eye contact. She kept on asking “miss me” in a tone that was frightening. She came very close. I saw her illuminated by that blue light in the room. Her dress was tattered, her face was rough, dry, and splitting from many places developing cracks like dry clay. Her hairs were very dry and scattered everywhere. She had come to punish me. Punish me for no faults of mine, it was her decision to reject me, it was her decision to move on from me, it was her decision to kick me out of her life. What was she punishing me for?

“What do you want from me?” I screamed with all my might.

She touched her head with my head as we used to do during college. Then she smiled. It was a very creepy smile and then I had no memory. I opened my eyes and I was on my bed. I checked my phone, it was 9 PM. The room was well illuminated as always. I slept for like a good 7 hours. My whole body felt tired. Was it a dream again? It couldn’t be. It felt so real this time. I was pretty sure it happened but then I thought maybe my mind was playing games with me again? I was very confused. Should I discuss this with my mother, but then she will get unnecessarily worried. I thought of talking to her directly. That seemed to be the best solution. Thousands of thoughts were running parallelly in my mind.

“Just drop a hi, do a casual chat, nothing serious. This will calm my mind. Her ice-cold single word replies will convince my brain that she is alive and still the same. It will move on. These thoughts will go away.”

I didn’t have her phone number. We didn’t have any common WhatsApp groups also. So the only place of communicating was Facebook, the medium where our love story started, it felt like a poetic justice that I was to reach out to her on Facebook for a much-needed closure. It is true I hated her for a while. Who wouldn’t? After all those tall claims of how much she wanted me and needed me in her life, after those flirting, after spending so much time together, after expressing our feelings for each other, after so much future planning, being kicked out unceremoniously like that.

I had hard feelings for a long time but then I moved on. I had bigger and better villains in my life to give me a hard time and I forgot about her. She became a blurry image in my head till that unfortunate day of 31^st December 2019. I opened my Facebook and surprisingly she was online. Generally, she keeps her messenger offline. I opened the window. I thought on what I would write. I never used to write ‘HI’ to her before, so it would be really awkward to write it now. Suddenly the window flashed that she is typing. Again, too many coincidences for a day.

“What she has to say to me?” My mind created 100s of scenarios.

“But at least, she is here, she is real, she is alive, there will be a normal conversation and this ordeal will end. Maybe I will share the dream with her and we can have a good laugh on that, like the old days. We can have normal conversations, we don’t despise each other anymore.”

It seemed like she was typing a really long paragraph, no message came even after 5 minutes yet it kept on displaying the typing message. I became frustrated after a while. Maybe it’s a technical glitch, they used to happen a lot during early 2010 but haven’t seen anything like that lately. I visited her profile. She had last put a post 5 years back. She was not tagged in any photo for the last 3 years. I kept on browsing her older post and saw a message she had shared. I knew that post was about me when she had put it. It was a subtle jibe, aimed at me, where she portrayed me as a villain, as a sadist, as a jealous and immature person who ruined our relation. My mind filled with rage. I closed my laptop. I didn’t care what she was typing or what she wanted to say. I even forgot my own purpose of talking to her. I felt intense anger. I punched the wall with all my mind and felt the sharp pain on my knuckles. Self-destruction is not always rewarding.

It felt like the real her was as evil as that hallucinating haunting version of her. After all, what she did to me, she still considered me as the villain. I suffered daily because of her and now I was the oppressor and she was the victim. It took me a while to calm down. I took some deep breathes. I opened my Jack Daniels and gulped it down neat like they show in the movies. It burnt my throat, but I felt better after a while. I made a civilized peg after that, then one more peg and then again. I played some old melancholy music. I didn’t know when I passed out into deep sleep fully drunk and out of senses. When I woke up, my laptop was on and a song was being played. It was her favorite song. Youtube was also playing games now I thought. I reached the laptop to shut it, I saw the screen, Facebook was still open, and her chat window was also open with 2 words written after our last chat there 10 years back.

“Miss me?”

I had reached a stage beyond fear now. Partly because I was not sure whether it was a dream or it was another of hallucination and party I was curious now what is happening. I replied this time with a rude block lettered NO. As soon I entered the text, I received a video call from her. I turned it on. I saw not her pretty face but the same disfigured haunted face. She tilted her neck, took a breath, and then she said something that made shook me so much that I dropped my laptop from my hand.

She said, “I will make sure, you will miss me”!

It was 3 Am in the night. I was so scared, I just left my home. I went to a nearby 24*7 café just because I wanted to be surrounded by people. Whether I should visit a psychiatrist or a priest I was not sure now. I needed to talk to people about this. I stayed away even from my mobile because I was scared she will contact me from there. I had 4 coffees in the café and I stayed there till 6 AM. I put my usual “not feeling well, can’t come to the office” message to my boss. I started scrolling my contact list to find the best person to talk to. My fingers stopped at the name of a common friend. She might still be in touch with her. I had no idea what to say to her also. She also used to be a good friend but we hadn’t talked for the last 4 years except exchanging likes on social media posts. Should I discuss the events with her? Should I ask her to do a conference call to resolve everything? I had no idea what I will achieve from this call, but I felt a great instinct to call her.

I checked my Facebook on my mobile. There were no conversations of last night. It just displayed our old messages years ago. A part of me was expecting this.

I called the common friend immediately knowing she would be asleep at this time. She was not a morning person. She responded after a long time still very deep in the sleep. I hadn’t even thought of a good excuse by that time on why I was calling her so early. But she sensed the trembling of my voice and asked me what is wrong. She was always a sweetheart when it comes to helping people. I explained to her what I was going through in a single breath. There was a long pause afterward, I thought the phone is disconnected.

She said my name in such a grave tone that it shook me. She then asked me the date of my first such a bizarre experience. I told her that it was 31^st Dec 2019. She paused again but I could hear her breathing. She told me that my ex-girlfriend died on the same day in a car accident. The moment she uttered those word, I got a FB messenger notification from her account with the same 2 dreaded words.

“Miss Me”