It happened to me

A ride to remember

                                       It was one fine evening. Me, Eva, and Rao were working on a large scale painting, as the deadline was nearing. The initial sketch was done a few days back by our friends from college. There was going to be an Art exhibition in our college, and our Professor had suggested that the class as a whole could paint a Big Picture.The Big Picture's painting took place in  Rao's house.

Our other friends used to come there everyday and paint with us till evening, whereas Eva and me stayed there at times and pulled all-nighters , in order to finish the big picture. But mostly we ended up staying up all night, eating lays, drinking coke, re-watching movies, joking and laughing till our stomach hurt, and drinking coffee when we felt sleepy. We also painted a few hours while repeatedly listening to Imagine Dragons and Ed Sheeran . This was almost everything that we had in common.

That day after working from noon till sunset, our other college friends left,and we three got exhausted and decided to roam around the city, finish our dinner somewhere,get some art supplies, have coffee together and be back.But we felt lazy and decided to do all these a bit later. The sun had set, and it was almost seven in the evening and so we got ready and came out of the house.Eva started her Dio (fondly called Wilda) and we climbed in the back.We went for a short ride, then had Paani puri, after that went inside Dominos to have some pizza,and we also got something new, called the Crunchy Strips with a cheesy dip. When we tasted it,We felt nothing but instant regret for having chosen the worst crunchy snack possible.

Later we left Dominos and grabbed the paints required to finish a part of the big picture. It was almost nine p.m , so we took off quickly from the paint store. While returning I started driving. The other two started joking about my driving skills and mentioned that I was a bumpy rider.

Since I didn't get my license back then, and riding with two people in the back increased our chances of getting caught by the traffic police, we decided to take a long way back home via deserted streets, and unused roads.I took a left turn and entered a less busy road. We three were chatting and laughing all the way. Because of that I missed a right turn that I should've taken and even failed to notice that the lights had gone out in that area. Just when I realized all that,and alerted the other two behind, we were in an utterly dark street. The only noise in that area was that of crickets and our dear Wilda. To add to the fear which was filling me, somewhere near there was fire in a garbage dump, and so the atmosphere around us felt hazy and foggy. It was me who was scared to hell by the eeriness of that area.

Ironically Rao and Eva seemed to have fun and didn't take part in my fear and panic.

When a thought of something bad happening came to my mind, I was scared for two reasons. The first one was, driving the two behind me back home safely and the second one was the thought of ghosts coming and grabbing all of us.

Though the rational part of my mind screamed that the latter wasn't possible at all, the absurd, half - witted part of my brain denied all that and focused on panicking me.

Within seconds I asked Rao to take a knife from my left pocket (I carry a small foldable knife around just in case).But she was searching in my right pocket, and then when I mentioned the mixup, the two started laughing while they should've been worrying. After Rao picked the knife, another mishap hit us, Rao was unable to open the knife.

It was a new knife, and so the joint was a bit tough, so pulling the blade from the guard was tough. Even I was not used to that, so I could understand Rao's trouble in opening Sharpo (The knife's name). Since I was already terrified, I screamed at Rao to open the knife faster and be ready for any danger that might befall us.

 Again both of them were laughing over my misfortune of not being able to be sane. Bounded with fear, I didn't notice a barricade that was ahead.There was also a scary looking Peepal tree near the barricade. I applied the brakes so damn fast and  Wilda skidded to a halt. Only then I came back to my senses and tried to turn the vehicle back. With two of them in the back it was tough to turn the vehicle back that fast and take off. I couldn't cope up with the adrenaline rush, yet somehow I managed to turn back.While leaving I managed to gather my gut and looked back at the Peepal tree and when I was sure nothing was chasing us, I sped away. My heart was still pounding hard. With all the courage and strength I could gather, I was driving focusing on nothing but the street and the traffic there. This whole thing felt like a nightmare to me, while Rao and Eva were giggling behind my back (literally!) about my fear of Ghosts. Later when I calmed down and when we came to a well lit and well known street, I started narrating my turmoil of the last few minutes to the two, they started howling with laughter. But all I was grateful for was getting out of that situation safe, sound and most importantly, Alive.

Now when we talk about this, I crack up hard along with them thinking about my silly behaviour.

SARAYU :)