Did You?

She didn’t take it well. Our breakup. It really got to her. She didn’t see it coming. I don’t know how. I’d wanted to break up with her for a quite a while now. But I always thought we should try harder. Besides, it had only been two months. And there was nothing wrong with her. But something was off. We weren’t gelling. Our jokes stopped being funny. Our conversations became stilted. And when I told her I was moving to Mumbai for work, and we shouldn’t see each other anymore, she begged me not to go. Or to take her with me.

 

“Sumi, I can’t. I don’t even know where I’m living. You don’t have a job there, and I can’t support you.”

 

“Sumi, I just don’t think long distance would work for us. I think it’s best if we let it go now.”

 

“No Sumi, I don’t think it’s going to work out in the future either. Just let it go.”

 

My reasons started becoming tenuous. My patience wore thin. But she persisted. Told me I was her everything. Told me that without me she’d be nothing. Like dust in the wind. Told me she’d give me everything she had, everything I wanted. And as she told me these things, I realized I was making the right decision. I couldn’t stay with someone who wanted me that intensely. I couldn’t handle it. I didn’t want her that intensely. There was nothing in my life I wanted as intensely as she wanted me. I didn’t want to see her again. I didn’t want to hear from her again. I told her these things. To hurt her. To push her away. Eventually, it worked.

 

And I was out.

 

I had spent two weeks in Mumbai when the first letter came. It came to my work address, and I instantly recognized her handwriting on the envelope – the sharp curves of the S, the confident flourish of the T’s. The envelope smelled of her. Sitting in my cubicle, about to go on my lunch break, I looked at the envelope. I didn’t want to open it. I didn’t want to see what was inside. But I opened it.

 

One page, single sided. It started off cordially, rambled for a bit about how well her life was going. But there was a hint of crazed desperation in the handwriting. The A’s that were marked by three strong lines at the beginning of the letter devolved into a large curve and an angry bisection. She didn’t like having to write my name. I read the letter and threw it away. I didn’t respond. I didn’t call. It was over.

 

There was another letter the next week. I didn’t read it. I didn’t even open the envelope. I threw it away. Then another one. Every week, one letter.

 

They got thicker. The tiny envelope holding one A4 sheet of paper had now become a manila folder. But I didn’t even look it over now. I saw her name on the return address, and threw it away.

 

Every week, like clockwork. By week 8, even the handwriting on the envelope was barely legible. The devolution was almost complete. Something had snapped. But I wasn’t going to find out.

 

By week 10, I’d started seeing someone. Nothing serious, just something casual. At least I thought it was casual. She was interesting, but who could really tell? I was taking it one day at a time. It didn’t really matter, did it?

 

The letters didn’t stop though. By week 12, even the office peon knew to throw the letter away. By week 13, I was single again. It didn’t work out. She wasn’t really my type. She wasn’t happy about it, but such is life.

 

The letter for week 14 was different. I could feel it in the peon’s eyes as he brought it to me. Like he wanted to throw up. He couldn’t possibly have read it. He wouldn’t dare to open a personal letter. In any case, I’m sure he couldn’t read. But…there was something. Unmistakable.

 

“Sir…” His mouth was dry, as he handed me the manila folder. This one felt different. Heavier. He’d felt it too. But what was inside wasn’t just paper. It was something else. Something squishy. Something…organic. The peon looked at me, half wanting to get the hell away, half wanting to see what it was. What do we do, Ram Singh, do we give in to my stubbornness or your curiosity? Ding ding ding! We have a winner!

 

For the first time in 13 weeks, I opened Sumi’s letter. Sure enough, it was just the one page, single-sided. But…there was something else inside. In the envelope. I put my hand inside to grab whatever it was, and something dry and squishy touched my fingers. I pulled my hand out like it’d been bitten by a piranha. Nope. Not doing that again.

 

I used my fingers to hold the envelope open and emptied it out onto my desk. Ram Singh watched with morbid curiosity, his eyes following my movements as if I was scratching the winning lottery ticket. The winning lottery ticket of gossip. He’d be a hero among all the peons if something interesting came out. He’d have the best ‘You wouldn’t believe what happened to my boss today’ story. Well, good luck to you, Ram Singh.

 

And sure enough, something plopped onto the table. It was round, and it stared back at me. I screamed. I consider myself a relatively macho guy. I love horror movies. I love haunted houses. I don’t scare easy.

 

But as Sumi’s disembodied eye stared back at me from my desk, I screamed. Ram Singh screamed too, so that was nice. Comforting, even.

 

An eye. It was an eye. An eye ball, to be precise.

 

I picked up my trash can and threw up in it.

 

I called the police from my desk and told them what had happened. That Sumi Manchanda, resident of Greater Kailash, New Delhi, had sent me an eye. In a manila folder. There was silence on the other side. They thought I was joking. Or insane. I registered my complaint anyway.

 

I decided to go home first, before I took the eye to the police station. If it had survived being delivered here, it could survive another few minutes. I needed some time alone.

 

As I climbed onto the lift to go up to my apartment, I realized the ridiculousness of having a woman’s eye in a manila folder in my hand. An eye. As another woman entered the lift, I wanted to tell her with a certain grotesque fascination that there were now five eye balls in the lift. But I didn’t.

 

I got off on my floor and went up to my apartment. I hadn’t even opened the door when I knew something was wrong. Something smelled off. Like something was stale. No… not that. Like something was extremely fresh. Living. Heavy in the air.

 

I opened the door and closed it behind me. Something was wrong. Someone was here. Or someone had been here. I could tell. I don’t know how, but I could tell.

 

I carefully, almost gingerly, walked up to the bedroom. I opened the door. And for the second time in the day, I screamed. Although this time it was more of a wail than a scream. It sounded more pathetic than terrified to me. But it was a scream.

 

Sumi turned her head to face me, without moving off the dressing table chair. She stared at me with one eye. She’d been combing her hair. Well, the hair on one side of her head. The other side was blood red. Her ear was gone. The floor beneath her was covered in hair and blood. She was holding the comb with her thumb and her index finger. All the other fingers were gone. Her other hand was just a paw. No fingers. That explained the bad handwriting. The empty eye socket drilled a hole through me. There were marks over her throat, like she’d unsuccessfully had a few goes at that too. She slowly got to her feet.

 

She pointed her finger at me. “I told you I’d give you everything. Did you open my letters? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you? Did you?”

 

I don’t even know when she put the comb down and picked up the knife. I don’t even know when she sliced my throat. But in my dying moments, her crazed, cacophonous voice rang in my ears. “Did you? DID YOU? DID YOU? DID YOU? DID YOU? DID YOU? DID YOU?