The Midnight Chaos
Sohum was deeply in love with his wife Ratna. Ratna was born and raised in a small town. Sohum had gone there once to visit his uncle and aunty. Ratna lived in the neighbouring house. The moment he saw Ratna, he fell for her simplicity. With jet black, long, curly hair, which she always ties into a neat bun, and small yet twinkling eyes, Ratna looked adorable. Her spotless dusky skin and sharp nose along with her kind nature, stole Sohum’s heart.
After he came back to his city life, he longed for Ratna’s presence amidst his hectic work schedule. His best friend Sumit was a solace when it came to some wonderful and funny company, but then he missed Ratna.
After couple of months, Sohum decided he had to marry Ratna. He called up his parents, told them all about Ratna and in couple of months Sohum and Ratna got married.
Ratna loved Sohum and loved the city life too. She enjoyed every bit of it. Sohum gifted her a smart phone and taught her how to use it. She downloaded all the shopping apps, video apps and so on and so forth. After Sohum went to work, Ratna would quickly finish her household chores and watch some videos and then go about exploring the shopping apps. Sohum never questioned Ratna about the credit card bills. Ratna never exploited Sohum, but she did buy some things which were not exorbitant.
Life was going on happily. Today morning Sohum told Ratna that he will be late from office as he, Sumit and some other colleagues would be going for a movie after office.
Ratna was happy because that way she could have more ‘me’ time. After Sohum left, Ratna quickly cleaned the house. She did not have to cook today because Sohum would have his dinner and come. As for her, yesterday’s leftover food was there. Ratna felt good. She said to herself, ‘Great! No cooking today. Yay.’ Ratna then spent a lot of time with herself. The day flew by. At midnight,Sohum rang the doorbell. Ratna opened the door and then she smiled widely at Sohum. At that very moment, something strange happened. Sohum started breathing heavily, then he slowly turned around and ran. Ratna yelled , ‘Wha…. What happened???? Waittttttttt…..’ . Ratna ran behind Sohum but Sohum quickly got into his car and drove fast. Ratna did not know what to do. She called up Sumit and cried, ‘I don’t know where Sohum went. He just drove away. What happened to him? Help me Sumit Bhaiyya.’ Ratna used to address Sumit as Sumit Bhaiyya because Sumit treated her like his little sister. ‘Help me’, she said and cried bitterly. Sumit tried to calm Ratna and said, ‘Let me call him Ratna. You calm down. I will call you back.’ The moment Sumit hung up, the doorbell at Sumit’s home rang. It was Sohum. Sumit was shocked on seeing Sohum’s condition. He asked Sohum, ‘What the hell happened? What’s wrong???’. Sohum was quiet. His petrified eyes stood still. Sumit ran and got a glass of water. Sohum was shivering. He was in a state of shock and trauma. Sumit immediately called up Ratna and said Sohum was safe but was in a state of trauma. The moment Sohum heard Sumit saying ‘Ratna’, he shivered more.
Couple of days passed and Sohum was in the same state. Sumit asked Ratna not to come and meet Sohum till Sumit knew what was the reason behind Sohum’s weird behaviour. Why was he scared? What had happened? Why was Sohum not willing to hear Ratna’s name?
After a week, Sumit somehow convinced Sohum to go to a psychologist. Sohum agreed. Sumit knew that only a psychologist could understand what was the reason behind Sohum’s weird behaviour. After one hour, the psychologist called Sumit and informed him about all the things Sohum shared. The psychologist told Sumit to share all the details with Sohum’s wife. He also said that everything will be fine and Sohum will come back to his original happy self. It’s just that Ratna must understand some things.
Sumit met Ratna and told her everything. Ratna sobbed with remorse. She did not know about this past of Sohum. She promised herself that this will never happen and she will ensure that Sohum will always be happy. Ratna brought Sohum home. Surprisingly, the doctor was right. The medicines worked and Ratna too adhered to what the doctor had advised. Sohum felt much better now. Ratna followed everything the doctor had suggested and things became happy for Ratna and Sohum.
Well there is a story behind Sohum’s strange behavior . Apparently, when Sohum was a child, in mysterious circumstances, he had come across a spirit. Well, no one knows whether it was a real spirit or a child’s hallucination. Nevertheless, the fear still lurked in Sohum’s subconscious mind. Sohum usually refrains from watching horror movies. However, the other day Sumit and his colleagues forced him to watch a horror movie. After watching the movie when he came home and saw Ratna, his fear of ghosts came back. How and Why? Well Ratna had bought a lot of stuff for make up from an online shopping app. With the help of makeup tutorial videos, that day, she had tried a lot of new make up art. She had applied thick kohl/kajal, mascara on her eyes to make them look bright and big. She was fascinated by a a dark purple lipstick and she wore that too. She left her hair untied with the makeup on to look different. An artist as she was, she drew a nice peacock art on her eyelids with white, purple and black eyeshadows and eye pencils. Sohum had never seen her in this avataar. He somehow mistook her for the ghost he had seen in the movie in the movie theatre. The trauma was painful for him. After that Ratna only wore light make up or make up that suited her personality rather than trying random makeup styles through tutorials. Moreover, she was very beautiful the way she was and Sohum found her very pretty that way. She did not need artificial things to enhance her beauty.
