The woman on the balcony.

Year 1995. I was posted in Patna on behalf of Siemens Telecom Ltd. It took lot of painstaking effort to somehow manage a one room flat at Kankarbagh area which was one of the most crowded and busiest locality of the city. Those days it was next to impossible for a bachelor to manage a rented accomodation in the conservative societies of Patna. The houseowner Advocate Singhji was kind enough to allow me to stay at his one room accomodation on the mezzanine floor of his standalone building with a beautiful hanging balcony and a kitchen and washroom attached. 

Slowly I adapted to my new accomodation and developed a routine of sitting on the balcony till late night and enjoy the cool breeze with beautiful orangish full moon at the Patna sky. Suddenly I would wake up from my unexpected drowsiness and go back to sleep with the door of my room adjacent to the balcony remaining open althroughout the night. 

Just opposite to our building, there was an ageold two storied broken house with the exposed red bricks and broken blue doors with sunbleached looks and the window panes with rotting wood and faded blue paint. The house seemed to be haunted as I have never seen any sign of lives inside the house and the doors and the windows were mostly shut throughout the day except for a certain period of time in the night when I have noticed a young lady adorned in a white saree staring at my room and towards me. Initially I took her casually as I thought she must be someone like me enjoying the cool breeze of the late evenings of Patna. But gradually I discovered that every night between 12 am to 1 am, she continuously keeps staring at my room from her balcony and soon I started feeling a bit uneasy because of her mysterious glare. I could feel that there was something unusual happening and her presence every night at her balcony was carrying some elements of peculiarity.

Soon I developed a habit of searching her every night at her balcony and she would appear like a regular shining moon at the sky. And gradually I started enjoying her presence and her stare at me may be because I was young and alone in Patna and could not refrain myself from extracting every bit of romance out of it. And this became a regular affair and took away all my drowsiness between 12 am to 1 am as I energetically looked forward every night to watch her from my verandah. 

And then one day out of my extreme curiosity, I spoke to Singhji's son who was of almost my age and gave him the description of the lady whom I watch every night at the neighbouring balcony. After hearing complete description of the incident and the lady, Singhji's son was dumbstruck for a moment with big eyes and became voiceless for a while. According to him, the house is haunted since last 10 years and a lady staying alone in that house had committed suicide and hanged herself from the ceiling of the house after her parents died in an accident. And since then, no one ever stayed in that house and the house is haunted. And this very articulation propelled me towards a terrible state of shock as I became speechless for a while. Then who is the lady staring at me everynight from her balcony ?

For the next few weeks, I made myself strong enough to stop me from watching her and I started to lie on my bed early closing the door of the balcony so that by any chance if I wake up in the night, I don't see her standing and watching me. And this continued for one month. Inbetween, many a times I woke up around 12 am and tried to find her through the gap of my window panes, but surprisingly she never appeared any more. And slowly I started believeing that those were just the effects of my hallucination because of my lonely soul and soon I emerged with my old habit of laying down till late night on my open air balcony and avoided watching towards the balcony at the other end. But even if by mistake, I ever glanced at the house, I never saw that lady anymore and this produced a comfort to my confused and fear stricken soul until one night when I became witness to the most horrfying moment of my life and even today, whenever I remember that incident closing my eyes, I get goosebumps out of fear.

It was a stormy evening and was continuously raining in Patna. I slept a bit early than usual and I was in deep slumber until I found the door panes rattling and vibrating because of a strong gutsy wind and battering rain drops with frequent lightening and thunderbolts knocking over from the sky. I woke up from the bed and remained in a sitting posture for a while. Then gradually progressed towards my verandah to shut the doors. As soon as I stepped near the balcony, there was a huge streak of lightening and in that sudden flash of lightening, I saw her again, standing and watching me with a continuous supernatural fixed glare mixed with a cynical smile !!! I was so scared that somehow I shut the doors with a bang and sat on my bed and kept trembling in fear for a while. The flare of frequent lightening slipping through the slides of the window pain was electrifying my terror stricken heart. I switched on all the lights of my room and remained awoken for the whole night. 

Next day morning, I spoke to my agent for a new house and ofcourse not in the nearby vicinity of the same lane. For next six months I had to stay in the same house till I shifted to the new one , but never ever saw that woman anymore. 

On the day of shifting, while bidding a good bye to my houseowner, I surprisingly found the windows of the ground floor of that house open. Was it signifying something ? Was it a lonely soul bidding a last moment farewell to me ? I never found the answer.

But after so many years, even today, at times, I see her in my dream, trying to say something to me with her solemn eyes and tragic smile. She is still there in one corner of my soul and keeps guarding me perhaps every night. 

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