Rikara Short Stories Collection

Haunted House : Part One

"Gauri!" Madhavi and Inder runs to her in fear.

"What happened, Gauri?" Inder asks her worried.

"Papa..." Gauri gulps as she looked at him wondering how to explain to him about the weird sensation.

Seeing the switch on, Madhavi turns to Gauri in anger, "How many times I have told you to turn off the switch when you work with electricity?"

"Electric shock?" Inder asks her as he switched off the TV. "You go sit, I'll do this."

Gauri nods and gets up.

By next evening, Gauri was convinced that the weird feeling she had was because of lack of rest as it was hectic packing up from their old house and shifting to the new place, and also because of the ghost talk they had. Gauri had started feeling so stupid for her moment of "stupidity" that she was even embarrassed to tell her father about it. Gauri realized that she was under too much stress when she started misplacing things. So she decided to stay in that night instead of going for a relative's wedding for the much needed rest. That night Gauri was in the kitchen doing the dishes when she felt someone walking towards her from behind. Assuming it is her mother, Gauri continues to do the dishes when she suddenly feels a tingle at the back of her neck. Realizing that her parents were still not back from the wedding Gauri stops in shock then she felt a chill at her back. Gauri starts trembling as the chill spread out through her. Tears starts flowing from her eyes as the fear gripped her temporarily paralyzing her. Then she feels a breathing sensation near her ears breaking her out of her paralysis and dropping the dishes, Gauri runs out of the kitchen.

Gauri comes running out of the kitchen panicking on where to go or where to hide as the fear set in, her breath fell short and soon she was gasping for air. Hearing the doorbell ring, Gauri runs to open the door as she gasped for her breath.

"GAURI!" Madhavi shouts out in fear seeing Gauri gasping.

"Where is your inhaler?" Inder asks her frantically as he made her sit while Madhavi started helping her.

"Ba...g." Gauri gasps out and Inder runs to her room to get her inhaler.

"Are you fine now?" Madhavi asks her as she gently rubbed her back.

Gauri nods in reply tiredly as she hugged her mother for comfort.

"It's okay, Gauri. Nothing happened. You are fine now." Inder tells her as he tried to calm her down.

"Can I sleep with you two?" Gauri asks them worried.

"Yes, Gauri." Inder tells her as he kissed her forehead.

Three days later, Gauri was getting ready for bed. As she pulled up the blanket over her and turned off the lights she felt a chill next to her. Gauri turns to the empty spot next to her on the bed and she could feel someone breathing onto her face. Gauri gulps in fear as she gripped the blanket closer to her. As the chill kept increasing, her breath started falling short. She was about to get up from her bed and run to her parents room when she felt someone hold her hand. Gauri opens her mouth to shriek but due to fear her voice betrayed her. Soon she was gasping for her breath. She struggled to breath and find her inhaler at the same time, she slips and falls down. Gauri struggles to get up when she felt the chill again next to her, so close that she started shivering due to the cold. Then the chill was gone and a second later she hears the door closing loudly.

Hearing the commotion Inder wakes up to check and he sees Gauri's door closing and opening loudly. He hurries to her room to check on her and finds her on the floor. He quickly grabs her inhaler and runs to her.

"You alright, Gauri?" Inder asks her as he helped her up. "What happened?"

"Papa... there is a ghost here." Gauri whispers to him in fear.