Vaibhav
“Look. I tried to have a look into this, but it made reality bend around me. It felt like literal hallucinations”, I said to Kriti, my voice too steady for how unsteady I felt. I turned my wrist so she could see the faint blue line still ghosting beneath the old bandage. The pill-shaped lump of cotton stuck to the crease above my thumb looks totally ridiculous under the lamp, but it was the only proof that I trusted at the moment.
Kriti leaned forward without hesitating. Her eyes brightening and in all business, she said, “Show me,”. Her fingers were warm when she brushed the my bandage aside to examine the cut at my wrist. She didn’t flinch at the dried out smears of blood around it. She only hummed, thoughtfully. “It looks like an electrical burn or something, Vaibhav”, she muttered. “Or… something that messed with your skin’s surface. Have you felt weird after… touching the stone? Like… time slipping or something?” Her voice softened on the last word, careful. And not in a mocking-way.
I gulped. “Yes.. I mean… Yeah. Like five minutes disappear. Or I’ll blink and be somewhere else by accident. My phone clock jumps. Once my reflection in the screen moved half a second late. It’s like the world is being edited right in front of me…” I tried to make it sound as sane as possible. It really did felt absurd saying it out loud, felt absurd that she was the person I wanted to say it to.
Kriti’s face started tightening. Maybe due to concern, and something close to excitement fighting each other simultaneously. “Weird…”, she said. “Very weird, but um…” She straightened, being decisive. “Well, we’ll treat this like a puzzle. One piece at a time. First, let’s clean it properly. Okay? Second, let’s document everything you feel or have felt. And third. Vaibhav, don’t touch it alone.” Her ‘don’t’ was gentle but firm. It really sounded more like a promise than an order.
I let her tidy the wound, her hands were competent and gentle. Tugging at lint with tweezers, swabbing antiseptic, wrapping the bandage very neatly. Up close, I could.. smell the lemon soap and the faint perfume she always wore. Her hair always had that comforting scent; it stedied me. She hummed a nonsense tune as she worked through the old wound. A little defiant smile tugging at the corner of her mouth when I tried to joke about my dramatic near-death. “You dramatic”, she said, flicking my forehead lightly while she was very close to me. “Bas, bas, don’t scare me. Tum bhi ajeeb ho, Vaibhav.” I could hear her breathing.
When the bandage was secure, she sat back on her heels and watched me. The small domesticity of it. Getting patched in the dim light of a park bench. It felt like a bridge. Bridge between me and Kriti’s mind and the way she showered her care to me. Between the stone’s impossible physics and ordinary life. Between the part of me that was terrified and the part that wanted to keep running toward answers.
“You told me about the attacker?”, she probed, but not aggressively. Just because it needed confirming.
I nodded. “Someone.. grabbed me. Strong hands. I should’ve been more careful, Kriti.” I hated how small the sentence felt when the memory was massive. Hands closing on my throat, fireflies of light in my vision, that voice in the dark. It was easier to put it into a clipped line and let it rest sit in my skull rike a massive rock.
Kriti’s expression went very soft. “You did the right thing coming to me,” she said. “Not the other way around.” For a second, her fingers brushed my wrist. It was almost accidental, almost casual. Then she withdrew them as if she’d stepped into something warm. The contact left a small trail of calm that I knew was mostly in my head, but it was real. I liked it.
For a minute, everything from that day after the attack happened to me, flashbacked all infront of my mind. I couldn’t help but think how careful she was to me. Her eyes and how she teared up infront of me.
We sat there in a companionable silence while the park breathed around us. Some distant laughter, the muffled thump of a distant bus and a hawker calling out a last-minute snack. The world felt so ordinary for a handful of memories like this. I almost let myself believe it would stay that way. I really wanted it to if I’m being honest.
My phone buzzed in my pocket and the ordinary vanished. Right infront of my eyes.
A Telegram notification. One line. Anonymous and very sinister profile with no picture.
Unknown: We warned you. Stay away.
The message blinked in the dim screen like a dropped knife. I read it twice, thinking maybe, just maybe my eyes were playing tricks to me. My thumb hovered over my screen, but I didn’t reply. I felt Kriti’s whole posture change before she said anything. She’d seen enough crime dramas to instantly go into problem-solving mode, but there was fear there too. So real, and so quiet.
“Did you open the handle?”, she asked.
I thumbed open the chat. The profile has literally zero information. No traceable number, and the message timestamp was eight minutes ago. I tried to press the profile information, to block, to trace, but Telegram showed absolutely nothing. It was like a face in a fog: present, then gone away instantly.
“Some is definately watching, Vaibhav…”, Kriti said in a tensed voice. She didn’t try to sound brave, she simply stated the fact and folder it into the room like a new piece of furniture. “We’ll take screenshots. We’ll report it, Okay? We’ll…” she stopped, frowning at me. “Did you… tell anyone else? Your parents? Anyone?”
“No,” I admitted. “Who do I even tell? That my very own reflection lagged by half a second and an anonymous chat told me to run? Come on, Kriti. People will think I’m an absolute maniac.”
Kriti gave that little laugh she does. Soft, incredulous. “Hmm. Weird flex.” Then she grew serious again instantly. “Vaibhav, listen. You don’t have to go through this alone. Okay? I’ll help. If it’s digital, we can trace the meta-data. If it’s physical, we can set up… precautions. Or.. or or maybe even plan something. Maybe even set up a … kill box if we have to.”
“No. Kriti. This is insane. Setting up a kill box? Imagine what we would have to go through. The consequences of it.” I said.
“I understand. The point is, I’m not leaving you in this.”, she replied. “I don’t want to drag you into this, I don’t want you to get hurt.” I exclaimed.
She rolled her eyes, but there was warmth in it. “You’re thinking that I’m a superman? No way. I’m just a girl who doesn’t abandon people who ask for help. That’s it. End of story. I want in.”
We paused, and for teh space of a heartbeat or a blink of an eye, there was no other noise but the distant city and the throb of my heart. My hands already cold, my phone buzzed dagain. A second anonymous message from the same handle: You were warned.
I felt the air go thin. Kritin’s hand found mine… and squeezed. Hard enough to be felt. “We start tonight, okay? No more delays. Let’s get this done and get out of this mess and live our lives, she said. “We map everything, document everything, no solo searches from now. Promise?”, she whispered the word Promise near my ears with a mix of tension and a frown.
I nodded. “Promise.”
Kriti clasped and intertwined her fingers around mine’s.
…
…
The stone in my bag throbbed fainly against my thigh as if it had something to say about… promises.