3hree Days

He stood there. He knew, a step backward meant a troubled ‘life’, a step ahead meant an unadorned leap to death. Suraj stood on the railing of his terrace, the sun drowning behind his back, the orange making way for black. Suicide, a cowardly act of bravery, Suraj’s heart thumped alternate beats of cowardice and bravery. Birds chirping, a surrounding which would make for a poetic dusk, he took the dreaded step forward and plunged to death; the orange of his life and the evening, gorily faded into lifeless black.

A day later, Akansha tried hard to feel sad for her colleague’s death, a death which fetched the employees of her new, small modest company a day off. Relieved that she finally got a day to rest, she tried to feel for the death of a colleague she hardly knew. She tried to paint Suraj’s face on her mind, making it a jig saw more than a clear painting. She couldn’t recollect any interaction with him except for the one time when he welcomed her with a brief smile into the lift. Anyway, she decided she shouldn’t spoil her mood with such depressing thoughts, so she picked up her bath towel and entered the bathroom. Thud!
A plain high pitched beep, an unbearable noise in her head she noticed as she gently tried to open her eyes. She found herself on the floor, the water from the shower washing off all the blood on those white floor tiles. With her blurred vision, she could see diluted red all over the floor, the hand shower thrown to one corner, and as she struggled to look up, she found a huge human figure with blurred drops of blood strewn on his black attire. Her state of complete inability for any kind of action, she only could stare at the huge human figure with blood and fear still gushing out of her veins. She faintly began to hear an echoed voice, a man’s voice she figured out. She could hear the giant man with an echoed voice better now – “You killed him, didn’t you?”

“Whom did I kill? Who …… are …. you?” she struggled.
The water from the shower still pouring on her feet, like music for terror and shock.

“Ah! Me? I’m someone everyone fears” he came closer to her face, “You want to take a guess?”

“Who are you?” she whispered. She raised her throttled voice- “Why are you doing this to me?”

“If you really want to know who I am, here it is.” He picked some diluted blood from the floor with his cupped fingers, stared into her eyes for a full minute, and poured it back on the floor- “I am ‘Death’.” He pulled up a stool, and settled with a smile- “Now tell me you don’t fear me.”

The noise in her head, the pain of injury and the mental shock didn’t help in trying to understand what this man was talking about. She held her stare trying to clear her vision.

“Let’s keep this simple. Do you want to die?” he sounded serious again.

“No.”

He laughed; laughed scarily – “You human beings are all the same. Boring.” He looked firmly into her eyes- “Here’s the deal. I will send you 3 days back in time from when your colleague died. Your job is to prevent him from suicide.” He bends, moves closer to her- “And what you get for doing this? Well, your ‘Life’” positioning himself under the stream of falling water from the shower, as he slowly faded out, he announced- “And what you lose if you fail to do it?” paused -“Your ‘Life’” vanished.

In the stark reality of the world, there she was in a ridiculous fictional development. Before she could even grow the thought of how this could be possible, there she was, opening her eyes, yet again, to a beautiful morning- Day 1 of the next three days of her life; Day 1 of the next three days to save her life; Day1 of probably the last three days of her life; maybe Day1 of the rest of her life.

(will be continued……)