Lurking shadows- 3

Read part 2 - here 

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The rains were reduced to a soft drizzle. The clouds were too spent to keep pouring and the humidity was clawing.

Mita kept thinking about the handprint on the wall.

It looked like someone had carelessly slapped the wall with a dirty hand and left the infuriating evidence to be celebrated.

That stain wasn’t on the wall when she’d seen the house first and now for it to suddenly reappear after Pink’s strange behaviour was abnormal. And what about the damp patch that was continuously moulding? It came out of nowhere too, didn’t it?

Mita shook her head to dislodge her thoughts. I’m not thinking straight.

She felt herself drifting to sleep yet her mind was too alert to the recent happenings in the house and it kept her limbs from completely relaxing.

Her calves were tense and the shoulders felt stiff. Her mind kept reverting back to the vision of the odd handprint on the wall.

She knew for a fact it didn’t exist until that moment.. until that stupid cat didn’t start staring at it.

‘There is something odd in this house isn’t it Pink?’ Mita whispered to the cat who sat with a patronizing air between a snoring Anek and herself.

Mita got up with a jerk. ‘I know what has to be done’ she declared to the humid air, the infuriating drizzle as her witness that night.

Walking out of the bedroom she grabbed a wad of makeup wipes from her bedside drawer and rubbed out the handprint.

The finger stains were replaced by an ugly blotch since the alcohol-infused wipes had sloughed off the paint on the wall and Mita was irrationally frantic in her endeavours as she realized once the yellowish paint began staining the damp wipe.

Well, at least the ghostly print is gone.

Mita felt content as she got back in bed and crawled back into a near sleep but that wasn’t meant to be. 

She woke up because Anek was touching her face.

It was a part of history the last time Mita felt any intimacy between them.

Ever since they moved into the new house, she’d stopped feeling him around her. They hardly exchanged words except acknowledging each others presence with a simple nod and Mita did not remember when last they’d kissed.

He tickled her cheek, brushing the tips of his finger on her mouth. Mita sighed and woke up to find the cat sitting close to her face, his fur sweeping her mouth.

‘Pink!’ she croaked sleepily and turned over to find Anek hovering over her face witlessly grinning, he licked his lips. ‘Good morning’ he said.

The pink coffee mug Mita found in the house sat silently on the table next morning.

Mita stood in a half frozen stance as one hand extended to pick up the mug but was interrupted because the owner of that arm yielded a piercing scream. Mita stood staring at the blotch on the wall through which peeked a handprint. Her mind raced trying to rationalize and reason.

‘l..l..last night I’d cleaned it. But maybe..uh..maybe I didn’t because it was dark I couldn’t see. But it should have been erased. Erased, erased if the paint came out’ Mita muttered in a frenzy half dazed trying to convince herself. She tried to make sense out of it but nothing stacked together like the boxes she’d recently unpacked.

A box labelled trash lay on the side. It was full of pots, cups, pans and bedsheets. Why was it labelled trash? 

Last night, yes, she remembered last night. Anek was staring at her face. What was he doing? 

She had woken up sweating, wanting to scream. Pinned on her bed she had been held down and someone was grabbing her throat.

This had happened before.

Mita raised her fingers to feel her neck and almost felt relieved to find it in place. It didn’t hurt as much as it did this morning. It was a dream. Anek had left for work and the fingerprint was back on the wall.

Pink was nowhere to be seen.

Mita picked up the coffee mug and sipped cold tea. She smiled and reasoned. ‘Of course, it was too dark last night and I didn’t wipe it properly.’ she spoke into the coffee mug. 

I’ll do it now, once I’ve unpacked.

She sat on the floor pulling out shiny brass pans and skillets out of the box. glossy cups, beautiful gossamer curtains with shimmering trimmings had been brutally clumped into a crumpled ball of fabric. White lacy runners and satin sheets were entwined in a messy knot.

‘What on earth is going on? was I about to throw all my lovely things?’ Mita raised a concerned eyebrow and kept pulling out one thing after another like a magician pulling out rabbits out of a hat. Important things had been scratched to trash on this cardboard box and she wondered why.

She had forgotten about the handprint on the wall, the humid stench was a prosaic routine and complaining about it felt counter productive now and didn’t seem as bothersome and the damp stain on the wall that collected mould was just there. 

What could be done about it? She was engrossed in unpacking once again.

Mita heard a distant mewing of the cat. Pink was somewhere around the house and the bell rang.

This was the first time in probably a week since she moved here that she heard the doorbell.

Mita realized she still wore the stained unwashed nightshirt which she had apparently thrown into the washer yesterday as she got up to open the door. 

Two serious looking men with an unsmiling but well meaning face stood at the door.

A sudden breath of fresh air outside the house made her realize the dank fug she’d been breathing. It troubled her to know that an oppressing stench enveloped her and felt embarrassed to think that she was probably stinking of it.

That she emanated the same mouldy stench wasn’t something the men’s expressions betrayed and slowly an understanding dawned upon Mita that the two men dressed in similar uniforms might be policeman.

The shorter of the two men was waving an ID at her, while trying to generate a pleasing smile.

Mita wasn’t averse in social graces which involved greeting policemen and so she just stood looking blank-faced.

The two policemen probably used to similar receptions didn’t much waste time before coming right to the point.

‘How long since you moved here?’ asked the shorter policeman now pocketing his ID.

‘About a week’ Mita’s trembling voice barely made it to their ears.

This time the taller policeman spoke, understanding Mita’s consternation. ‘ma’am please do not be alarmed. We are here to ask some questions regarding the previous tenant.’ he ended the sentence with a bland smile.

‘Oh,’ Mita blinked. ‘I’m afraid I do not know the previous tenant.’ she mumbled. ‘I..uh..I just moved in a week ago’ 

The policemen looked to be already appraised of the information. The shorted one nodded. ‘Yes,’ he interjected calmly. ‘we’ve already had a word with your landlord. He told us about your moving in. Just that sometimes renters know each other, specifically women. Often times they refer houses to their friends .’ he paused to exhale. ‘Your landlord doesn’t know much about her either, the previous renter I mean.’ He produced a small photograph out of his pocket. ‘Her name is Liyah’ the policeman gave the photo over to Mita for inspection. 

Her uninformed expression upon glancing at the picture was closely scrutinized by the two men. ‘Seems she has disappeared’ he said at length, taking back the photograph from her.

‘Disappeared?’ Mita looked puzzled.

The taller policeman shifted weight on his leg to observe the living room behind the pale woman who by all appearances looked like she had been dragged through life.

Her clothes needed a wash as did she. He caught a brief glimpse of the house behind her and it looked almost as dilapidated as its occupant.

‘yes’ his friend was still talking. 

The taller policeman who at this point was trying to conjure a personality profile of the woman stepped back at the sudden smell of soggy wind that seemed to blow out of the house.

How was his friend tolerating it?

‘She had paid her rent and moved out by all accounts’ the shorter policeman was talking ‘but her mother recently lodged a missing persons report.’ he inhaled sharply and invisibly recoiled at the musty stink coming from the house but betrayed no expressions of revulsion.

Mita was far too confused to express worry but her tone enunciated concern. ‘Oh!’ she said again. ‘I do not know anything about it whatsoever’ she sounded sincere.

The policemen were nodding in unison. ‘well..um.. you’ve just moved in and if there’s anything you find, anything that you think could be of help, please do let us know.’ the taller policeman unassumingly observed everything he saw inside the house while his colleague fished out a card from his pocket.

‘Please call us if you know anything’ he said bringing up a smile through the now very obvious fetid damp odour. 

MIta nodded and shut the door.

‘Phew,’ the two men audibly exhaled. ‘What was that?’ they were asking each other. ‘It smelled like the house is rotting’ said the taller one laughing. ‘Not sure it’s only the house.’ the shorter one concluded. 

Mita’s cheeks burned with tears as she listened to the two men make fun of her through the door. 

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cont.