Secrets Hidden In Time (Time #1)

11 | The Brochure At The Villa & The Bite At Night

The grime tickled my nose as I adjusted the mask on my face. The bed was not a box bed, so there were no chances of anything being left around in it. I still lifted up the mattress on the bed to check the matter beneath it but found nothing as expected.

Turning around, I made my way towards the almirah to examine its contents, only to find it vacant as well.

Heaving a sigh, I thoroughly scrutinized the other corners of the bedroom, but at the end, it all turned out to be useless again.

Just as I passed the forelegs of the bed, the flashlight of my phone fell on the corner of the hindlegs of the bed on the floor. My pupils constricted as something glossy flashed back on them.

Immediately, my senses went on alert as I crouched down to pick up what looked like a piece of paper.

I picked it up to find that the source of the gloss was a piece of enamel-coated A4-size sheet that looked like a real estate brochure.

A mix of curiosity and perplexity fogged up my mind, but wasting time on perusing the brochure felt like a stupid act, keeping the paucity of time I had in mind, so I wiped off the dirt on it with the sleeves of my hoodie, folded it, and shoved it into my backpack.

Quickly checking the downside of the bed one more time, I got out of the second bedroom and then fixated my eyes on my next destination, the last bedroom on the first floor.

I padded my way into the impounds of the third bedroom.

Taking a deep breath, I directed the flashlight of my phone carefully around the bedroom. My eyes automatically stared at the canopy bed in the middle of the bedroom.

From the size and shape of it, I could also make out that there was a photo frame hung up on the wall adjacent to the headboard of the bed.

I slowly trod towards it as my shaky hands instinctively channeled the course of the flashlight in the direction of the photo frame.

Affixed to the wall was a photograph of a young girl, with the backdrop of a large Gulmohar tree behind her.

She was all smiles. Her shiny obsidian swirls gleamed in innocence, and plump round cheeks sported a dimple each. Wavy black tresses cascading down till her shoulders were tied up in a pair of polka-dot scrunchies to form two tidy pigtails.

Yet, my heart, mind, and soul were not at peace.

I stared at her face. She stared back at me.

As if she were taunting me. Sneering at my poltroonish psyche.

But dead people don't stare, do they?

In the end, I just swallowed and took two steps forward. "Tell me, Kadambini, who killed you that night?" I coaxed her.

I mean, it would turn out to be a wonderful sight if she happened to talk back to me.

She didn't answer back, though.

Stubborn idiot, like always, after all.

But, then again, the dead don't speak. They just don't.

So, I smiled feebly as I tried once again. "Come on, tell me. What happened on that night, ten years ago?"

She didn't answer back again.

Suddenly, I felt like crying.

But I didn't cry. Just like she didn't reply back.

Equal-equal.

And then I harshly dug my incisors into my lower lip. Within seconds, a familiar kind of metallic taste took hold of the sensory buds on my tongue.