Sleep Well Fighter

Chapter 10: The day of Reckoning

Just before I get near him, he turns towards me and to my surprise I see Mr. Chopra standing there and I falter a little before landing the punch. He catches hold of my hand firmly and asks me calmly "Did you come alone? Does anyone know?"

Seeing him act coolly pissed me even more, "WHY DOES IT MATTER IF I COME ALONE, I AM GOING TO BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF YOU FUCKER!" I roared and kick him with my left leg.

He stops my kick with the other hand and pushes me on to the ground.

When I try to get back on my feet, he kicks me on the head and twists my arm behind my back, and locks me "Not so fast kid, I don't know why you kids keep secrets to yourselves and confront alone, even Riya did the same thing and look where she is now, don't worry you will meet her soon, since you are so eager"

I feel a sharp pain near my hip, and I feel as if my whole body is becoming numb and slowly everything turns black.

I hear lots of muffled voices, I hear someone shouting my name and tapping my face, I slowly come into senses. I then hear Akash's voice clearly "Thank God you are awake, I already lost Riya and I can't afford to lose you too idiot" he hugs me and starts crying.

Whoa this is the first time I have seen him cry, he acts so strong and apathetic, but he was really scared all along. "I am fine stupid; I am safe as long as you are out there alive." I grin.

Seems like the people of the town have arrived and tied up Mr. Chopra and they are waiting for the police to arrive.

"Alright everyone, now that Rahul is awake, I am going to explain the events that lead to this horrific incident as you all requested, sit tight as this will be a long story.

"A long time ago, when Mrs. Chopra was sane, Riya's parents really loved each other and somehow convinced their parents and got married and then Riya was born. But unexpectedly due to the ignorance of doctors or some complications, Mrs. Chopra gets a mental illness, and she isn't the same as before. Her dad tries everything to make her sane for years, but all the medicines do is just to keep her from going overboard. The rest of the time she just acts like a bitch questioning everything. Mr. Chopra developed a void in his heart, and he kept overworking to numb the pain of loss.

"Meanwhile Mrs. Chopra started abusing Riya as she misses her husband and predominantly it's because she has a mental illness. This went on for many years until one day Riya resembled just like her mom, they literally look identical. She was like the younger version of Mrs. Chopra with whom her dad fell in love. So, he starts raping her idealising his wife.

"Riya with all the wounds was avoided at her school. Since she didn't have any friends, she was never able to tell anyone about her newfound torture. She even mentioned to her boyfriend recently that she hates her dad more than her mom, which I found weird at that time. Anyways, coming to the present, she understood why her dad is assaulting her, so she changes her whole style, she cuts her hair off, dresses like a tomboy (which was also to hide her wounds because of her mom) to turn off her dad. But her dad instead buys a wig and put on her before assaulting her. After making friends with us and also having a boyfriend she kind of started to get bolder and bolder but still, that trauma didn't make her open up to us. Since her boyfriend is a delinquent and also adventurous, she pressurizes him so that they could elope together. If you have observed she had been more persistent about it in the last 10 days because her dad had just returned from the city and she didn't want to be assaulted again.

"But something unexpected happens, our loser Dad hears this plan as usual because he is used to spying on her. So, he schemes premeditatively to murder her in case she plans on revealing his secret. He starts by stealing a fuel can from her boyfriend's house and buys kerosene wearing a cap identical to her boyfriend's and since he is also short, he might even be mistaken for a guy in his twenties.

"So my guess is, on the day fateful day she must have written two letters one stating to her dad that she is gonna elope and if he tries to search for her she would expose his secret and another one was addressed to us. Infuriated at her letter, he follows her, and at somewhere around 12:35 am he finds her arguing with her boyfriend and finds out that their plan was aborted. So ultimately, this was the chance to kill her and shut her up for good. He then strangles her with a wire, then pours kerosene on her. Then puts a candle on top of the tree horizontally, so that when it melts a little, it falls down due to an imbalance of weight, which gave him enough time to escape before people notice the fire.

"It did surprise me, why did he have to go to such lengths of burning her when he was the first to identify her. There are two major reasons for his actions, one was, people in this town are deep asleep by 9 pm which gives him enough time to escape before the fire is noticed and the second reason was if we notice a fire the whole town rushes to rescue, thereby obstructing the evidence which was footprints, so he has got alibi and evidence being destroyed in one shot. Later after a day or two, he goes back and puts the fuel can back in her boyfriend's house, it's funny that even Mrs. Chopra recognised the same can lying in their house. He planned everything to the last details.

"But the wig in Riya's room gave him off. I suppose he must have removed the wig, but the one we found was the old one she had. She lied to her dad that she destroyed the wig so that it would keep him away. But he buys a new one, which he must have either destroyed or stored somewhere in the house. Today to lure him out, I just sent a message saying, "I know you rape your daughter, come to the crime scene at 7:30". Then he comes here as I expected to create a suicide scene using Rahul as a scapegoat, but I didn't expect the taser.

"I told you not to run off," he says turning towards me

"Bastard you knew I would run off at him, don't act all innocent" I flash his phone "You even put a phone here to record everything"

Just when he was apologizing, the police arrive and arrest Mr. Chopra.

While he is being taken away, he requests permission to talk with Akash for one last time. So here is the conversation between them, which I couldn't hear at that time-

"I am surprised that you solved this case. I think Riya sent a message to you asking for help before she died, but you didn't save her?" he asks Akash

"Don't try to guilt-trip me, bastard, you sent the message from her phone through WhatsApp, so that you can frame me as the culprit and make it look if I was the first one to be discovered at the site.

"When I saw the message, I thought it was a prank, but still tried to visit your house. Then when I saw the fire, I understood that I was too late to save her, and someone was intently framing me. That's why I was really scared to even find the culprit at the beginning because you were way too clever. Fortunately, the police were only able to trace the text messages and calls from the records but not WhatsApp messages because her phone was burnt"

"Pfft I like you kid; you are really brilliant. I'll give you a small present, go to my office, in the ceiling fan's cup, I've hidden the letters which Riya addressed to you guys and me. I did tear off the end of your letter to use it as my evidence.

"Bye kid" he shouts as he is taken into the police car.

My friend shows a middle finger at him in return. And there goes that scum of the earth