Shakespeare had said “There is more things in heaven and earth than man can dream of.” Even Hamlet had been haunted by his father’s spirit persuading him to avenge upon his uncle, who had poisoned Hamlet’s father driving him to death. Ghosts have treaded upon this earth time and again with their messages. But what message my ghost wanted to impart, I have no iota.

       Here I go…. It was a cold December evening. Dusk had heavily shrouded the streets. Smog screened my vision as I stood in the balcony. Darkness was mitigated by the street lamps. My eyes could scan some silhouetted figures walking unobtrusively on the streets. Silence seemed to swallow up sundry noises – the honking of infrequent cars, the charring of the grasshoppers. I was feeling bored, being forlorn the lifelong day. My roommate was doing her night duty at a call centre. As you all know, winter evenings can be very depressing. It was too disturbing for me to be so much reticent.

      “How about a hot cup of coffee or a hot chocolate?” I thought to myself. To execute my thought, I busied myself in the kitchen to prepare a stimulating beverage.

        Let me tell you readers that the house I was leaving in was on rent. Me and my roommate had residing there since seven months. There was one more family, renting the back wing of the house. We became quite friendly. We often shared late nights carousing. Among many stories also cropped up creepy ghost stories, some were friendly ghosts, some malicious.

      Now, coming to the present evening when my story started…..  I felt someone tinkering with the utensils just behind me. Impulsively, I turned round and what I saw left me shaken, shivering and gaping. It was an elderly woman standing just behind me, staring at me with a furtive smile on her lips. Her eyes did not contract along with her smile, rather they looked so deadly cold. She wasn’t a shadow but areal flesh and blood woman, staring into my eyes and making my blood freeze. I was tongue-tied. In a glimpse the stranger blended into the mist. The experience was incredible. I was pinching myself and saying, “No! I’m awake, it wasn’t a dream.”

    On the following day when my roommate returned I related to her the incident and that how I spent the entire night with the other tenant. When one of them asked me, “What’s up? Why have taken such a rash decision to vacate?”

I was evasive at first, But then I narrated to them  the ectoplasm

 in my room. They assured me, “The lady was the same who used to live here and breathed her last in this house.”

I had never known this before so I couldn’t possibly hallucinate. The apparition was real. It made it`s presence felt  to me as perhaps she wanted my help or wanted to convey some message through me. Whatever, I did not have the heart to take it. It`s been years now but I still have the creepy feeling that I`m been watched. Those pair of eyes, that evasive smile, I shall never forget.