I don’t know how many of the people reading this, have an idea about this strange disease that I go through. A lot of people call it an illusion or a superstition but I know better. If I tell you that this actually happened to me, you may not believe it, so let’s just say that this is a long lost legacy.
So, this thing is called, ‘the cry of the cat’. It basically just means that if you were born at the time that a cat cried you are a victim of this disease: As long as the newborn hears the cry, so it has to be somewhere near. This is the story of a girl, let’s name her Rhea. It is a story set in a village so the delivery happened at home. Rhea was born very unusually, because unlike most children she did not cry when she was born. In fact people actually doubted whether she survived. Some claimed to hear a sort of a faint wail or a mew, but they just thought it was their illusion. Rhea had a few really funny things about her when she was young. For example, her nails grew longer and faster than any child’s nails possibly could. At first her parents ignored these things but it was the one incident that happened when she was five, that changed their minds and made them visit a doctor.
When Rhea was five, she was playing in her toy room with her dolls and her mother was in the kitchen. After some time, her mother thought she could smell something foul from Rhea’s room and she went to check. Rhea’s room seemed unusually quiet and her mother actually thought twice before going inside. When she opened the door, she saw her daughter had blood on her hand and mouth. At first, she was scared for Rhea as she thought that Rhea had hurt herself but then she saw a mouse in the corner which had been killed in the most evil ways possible. Also, some flesh of the mouse seemed missing. It was all that her mother could bear to watch before she threw up. Later when she was fine, she washed Rhea and took her to the doctor and the doctor told her mother that Rhea probably was showing symptoms of this disease called Cry of the Cat.
The doctor told Rhea’s parents that she had to be taken extra care of and that she should not be able to meet a single cat in her life. Rhea’s parents took so much care of her that they wouldn’t let her go out of their sight. They even home schooled her so that she wouldn’t go out. If it wasn’t for Rhea who insisted on going to a college her parents never would have even let her go there. Rhea went to her college knowing nothing about her disease. Rhea was fine till the time she was invited to one of her friend’s house. After a lot of pleading, Rhea’s parents let her go there only after confirming that Rhea’s friend did not keep cats at home.
Rhea went to her friend’s house and they sat in her house watching television for a while till her friend told her that they should go out for a walk and breathe some fresh air. Rhea seemed unsure as she had never gone for a walk alone but since her friend insisted, she agreed. They went to the lane outside her house and they started walking and Rhea almost seemed to be enjoying herself till the time they took a turn and they went to a lane that seemed to smell really foul to Rhea. Rhea’s friend told her that there was nothing as such and they kept walking. As they were walking suddenly Rhea’s arms started to itch and she felt that something or someone was following her and when she turned back, for the first time in her life she saw three stray cats staring at her with their glassy eyes.
(TO BE CONTINUED...)
