Helen Goes for Mr. Sunday

The Evening That Changed Everything: Part 1

A dead body, wrapped up to the neck in an orange sheet, lay on a mat on the ground. Near the body's head burned an oil lamp, an incense stick, and pieces of wood placed inside a mud pot, filling up the already stuffy and acrid air inside the chamber. A woman in her early twenties wearing a green forest-fairy dress with a short green and purple tutu and a pair of silver and green sparkly wings poured ghee and sprinkled water on the dead body. Then she walked behind a priest who chanted mantras in ominous discordance with the hum of the chamber, while walking around the dead body. The young woman then broke an earthen vessel she carried by dropping it on the ground near the head of the dead body.

After a signal from a large woman wearing a prominent red bindi on her forehead, a couple of attendants lifted the mat and slid the dead body inside the incinerator. The young woman stood expressionless, clutching into her sides, looking in the direction of the incinerator, as the dead body started burning.

A tall turbaned man, who carried a few long, thick ropes, and a muscular bald woman tiptoed behind the young woman. The bald woman ripped off her wings, while the turbaned man gripped and gagged her. The young woman struggled violently, throwing her body weight around but the bald woman and turbaned man overpowered her, tied her hands and feet, and laid her on another mat.

"Use her as the kin," the large woman wearing the bindi said to the priest, pointing in the direction of the bald woman. "And perform the same rituals again."

The priest's eyes filled with horror.

The young woman writhed around, making loud, muffled noises, trying to break out of the hogtie.

"But this one is alive!" protested the priest.

The young woman managed to roll off the mat.

"You can add that as a new skill to your resume," said the large woman wearing the bindi as she walked up to the young woman and landed a massive kick in her stomach.

The priest looked on in disbelief.

"Do as I say, or you will be in her place," the woman wearing the bindi warned the priest.

The priest shifted his gaze to the crematorium attendants. They nervously began wrapping an orange sheet around the young woman, who continued writhing with all her might.

"Hold her still!" thundered the woman wearing the bindi. An attendant gripped the young woman's shoulders, while another grabbed her feet.

The priest repeated the last rites, with the bald woman performing the same rituals on the young woman that the young woman had just performed on the dead body. The young woman twisted around agonizingly, appearing to gradually lose strength.

"Throw her into the incinerator adjacent to the earlier one," said the woman wearing the bindi to the attendants.

The attendants picked up the young woman.

The young woman twisted fiercely.

The attendants lost their grip on her, and she dropped to the floor with a loud thump. They picked her up again.

The door of the incinerator opened.

As the attendants started sliding the young woman inside, she let out a series of loud whines.

THREE HOURS EARLIER

A young woman alighted from a public-transport bus. She wore a black off-shoulder tank top that narrowed down exaggeratedly to segue into her slender waist, which in turn broadened out to segue into the light-blue jeans that had taken the shape of her proportionately full lower body. She wore her hair down, and a large black purse hung from her right shoulder. She surveyed the scene in front of her for a few moments.