"Salam, Bari Baji, The delivery boy is outside. Here's the bill." He handed Mama the bill, the pizza and the fries. She was, obviously, stunned. So was I. I think the heavy, 15 kg chandelier in the hallway was also stunned. Along with every piece of furniture, the bricks, the paint, the world. The dead man that we had tried to hide, brutally and mercilessly, was in front of us. Healthy and alive.
I didn't know how to feel. Should I be relieved? Or should I be scared? Was this a ghost or are we all hallucinating? Or is it only me who is hallucinating? How does one confirm whether they are hallucinating or not?
I have always seen characters on television pinch themselves to confirm whether they are dreaming or not. But does the same work for hallucinations?
My mind felt foggy, confused and delirious. I pinched my right arm "Ow," It was more painful than I thought it would be.
Mama robotically handed him the money. Both of us continued standing there even after the guard had left and the door was shut. We didn't know what to say or even think. All of sudden Mama started running down the hallway.
"What is about to happen, now? Should I go after her? What if it is her turn to go on a Man-eating murder spree? What if she feeds me to Ali to satiate his cannibalic desires? After all, he is her favourite kid. What if she---"
"Ali. Asia. Come to the kitchen." Mama's loud screams broke my train of thoughts.
Apprehensively, I trudged towards the kitchen, silently wishing to not be the next victim in the freezer.
Mama was standing with freezer's door wide open.
"The body is gone. I just opened the freezer's lock. It's gone." Her lips were quivering, her pupils were dilated and her face was pale as ash. It felt as if she had seen a ghost. Maybe she had. Or maybe both of us had.
Ali and I both looked inside the freezer at the same time. She was right. The dead body was no longer there.
My head started hurting, my skull felt like a soda bottle which had been shaken violently multiple times.
"Did anybody take him? Does anybody know? Oh my God, what will happen now? The police will be here soon." Ali started blabbering frantically.
"Nobody took him. He gave us the food." I told Ali.
"WHAAT?" Ali's eyes started looking like tennis balls, ready to pop out of his skull.
"Mama, what does all of this mean?"
"I don't know what to say? All of us were probably stressed about what happened to you with 'the hitting yourself thing'. It was probably that stress." She rubbed the freezer's handle, distractedly.
"That doesn't make any sense. By the way, Mama, I remember everything now. Somebody, who looked like you, came to my room in the middle of the night and forced me to drink water. That water had a snake in it and it caught my tongue and my mind went numb. Even Ali saw the same thing in his dream. He dreamt as if he was me."
"What is happening in this house?" said Mama grabbing her head with both her hands. "Let's focus on the good thing. There is no longer a dead, chopped up man in our freezer. We can be happy again. Whatever this stress is it will go away. We should all sleep in one room and close the door from inside. Then we will just throw the key out of the window or somewhere. So we can only get out of the room when Rani comes home." She rubbed her shoulders, smiling weakly. She looked at Ali with so much love in her eyes, it made me a little jealous. It was clear that she felt guilty for blaming him. I felt a little bad for him since we were blaming him for something that hadn't even happened let alone something that he didn't commit. Something that our mind had cooked up all on its own...Wait a minute how did all of us think the same thing at the same time. Was all of our stress so well co-ordinated with each other that all of us imagined the same thing at the same time? There was something deeply wrong with our brain's wiring. Was it because of the movie we saw? But it didn't have any cannibalism in it. But Solo was killed by his son. Maybe it effected us.
None of this makes any sense but I need to push away these thoughts so nothing stress-inducing happens again.
"Let's sleep in the guest room, shall we?" Said Mama while hugging Ali sideways. "I am sorry, honey, I mistrusted you. It is true that sometimes what you see is not the truth."
"Mama, I don't know what happened that night. And why were you guys blaming me? Please tell me."
"Honey, if you don't remember it then don't try to overthink about it, whatever it was is gone. And more importantly, it didn't even happen. We had all just simultaneously imagined it. Also, I don't want to talk about it because I do not want to trigger the vicious cycle which is going round and round in our brains. Let's eat and talk about the good things in life. Let's plan what we will do with our housing scheme money."
"I thought that nobody would buy a plot on our land after yesterday's event. But strangely yesterday's event just didn't happen." I smiled, thinking about all the birkins I was gonna buy.
We went to sleep after talking about our future plans, beaming and satisfied. Ali then tossed the keys under the guest bed in the guest bedroom, which all of us were sleeping in.
Thankfully, I woke up to the sound of my Alarm and the birds' chirping. I was the first one to get up. I got the keys from under the bed by aiming and hitting the keys with Ali's slippers. The keys, blissfully, managed to come out but unfortunately, Ali's slipper couldn't make it. They were under the bed now, like I care.
I left the room and started getting ready for the day ahead. I am gonna dress up really fancy today because I feel pretty good. I'm gonna dress like a billion dollars. Everybody in my university envies me for my dress sense, my style, my elegance, my money, my grades. I am the 'WHOLE PACKAGE'. Everybody is jealous of me. Boohoo.
I took my black midi length, silk shantung, Dior dress. It was cinched at the waist, with a front opening and a classic collar. I think it will look great with my Fendi black nylon tights and Giuseppe Zanotti black chilli pepper heels. Those are one of my favourite heels ever. The front has the cutest little leather braid detailing and the covered heel has a beautiful animal print.
I plopped all of them on the bed and went to the bathroom to take a nice shower.
But I had no idea that inside my bathroom lied my worst nightmare. It was me. In the bathtub. The bathtub was filled with jet black shiny snakes, exactly six of them. The snakes seemed to be at least 7 feet long and they were thick like anacondas. They were rolling around my body which seemed to be crushing under there forceful compressions, clearly trying to break my bones slowly and painfully. I was wearing the same attire that I had planned. From the dress to the shoe. I was staring at this horrific scene, motionless and numb when one of the snakes which was shinier and thicker than the other snakes turned his head towards me. I felt my blood curdle and soul waiver. His eyes were strikingly golden. His stare pierced right through the darkness of my soul. He then decided to hiss before jumping at me, the real me that was outside the tub staring at them.