BHUMI

Shobhita Thakur

The wheels of the stretcher rattle rapidly through the crowded hospital corridor, Bhumi lying on it in a fragile haze of near unconsciousness. Her super-thin, young body, barely eighteen, cannot yet comprehend what has just struck her world. Her hands and feet tremble uncontrollably, fingers and toes curled inward, seized by a chilling numbness. While she was in the shower, she suddenly collapsed onto the cold bathroom floor. It was the very first anxiety attack of her life. Her eyes and ears can barely register the chaos around her, one eye barely able to grasp only a blur of rushing, distorted images. She feels like the protagonist of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Lying on the stretcher in confusion, she imagines how he must have felt in that helpless state, unable to perceive reality except through a single eye. Her father is angry with her mother for not dressing Bhumi more appropriately. In the bathroom, she was found lying naked on the floor. In panic, the mother dressed her in a pale orange, thin, short dress with nothing underneath. The contours of her tiny breasts and crotch are starkly visible. Her father scolds the mother, saying, is this how girls from respectable households should be dressed? The mother has no answer; she remains silent. The father’s mood darkens further when the doctor suggests it could be the onset of extreme anxiety and panic attacks for Bhumi. As doctors attend to her in the ICU, the father furiously tells the mother outside in the waiting lounge that too much reading of English literature has corrupted her mind and all the daydreaming has driven her insane. He declares she is no good for the practical world. He blames the mother, saying it is all her doing. He accuses her of giving Bhumi too much freedom to do whatever she wants. He reminds her harshly, she is the mother and it is her sole responsibility to raise the girls the right way. The father storms out angrily into his chauffeur-driven car, too busy to deal with this mess. He leaves his assistant behind to handle everything at the hospital.

Three days in the hospital leave Bhumi hollowed out, withdrawn, steeped in a quiet, aching sadness. Being back in her room with her books steadies her a little, like familiar ground after a storm. As she lies in her bed, half asleep, clutching her most favourite book, Kissa Buratino ka by Alexi Tolstoy, her didi walks in carrying her medicine and a large cup of steaming hot chocolate. Didi (Older sister) gently takes away her hardbound, thick book filled with bright, colourful images and places it on the study table. She helps her sit up by carefully arranging a stack of pillows behind her back. She opens the large window to invite the balmy winter sun inside. Their bedroom window opens onto the side of their bungalow’s garden of chameli, mogra, and raat rani. Their room always breathes with a soft wind carrying sweet, drifting fragrances. They have been strictly instructed by their maali (gardener) to lock the windows after sunset. Snakes curl up under the raat rani every single night. Didi opens the window and settles into the wooden chair placed right beside it. The sweet winter shaft of light makes her chocolate-coloured skin glow softly. Her eyes are deep, wide, sharp in shape, resembling the Bengali goddess images seen every year in Durga Puja pandals. Looking at her beautiful face, Bhumi wonders why she once overheard a conversation at home about how only light-skinned girls can manage to secure a wealthy match. The rest of the girls, they said, should become doctors in order to live a respectable life. For some unknown reason, being a doctor was the only honourable profession for girls in their household. Didi has a very sweet voice, and her love for singing has always been forced into secrecy. Girls from respectable families don’t sing and dance, they keep telling them. As she sips her hot chocolate, Bhumi asks Didi to sing their favourite song, “Pyaar Hua Chupke Se” by Kavita Krishnamurthy. Didi refuses, worried—what if someone hears me sing, both of us will get punished. Bhumi insists, reminding her that it is afternoon, their mother is lost in her winter siesta and their father is away at work, and all the servants are basking in the winter sun in the rose garden of their bungalow, far away from their room. It is safe to steal a moment of fun. Their room has always been their secret den, where they hide their favourite novels—Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Sons and Lovers, Lolita, Kamasutra behind thick textbooks of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology. Nobody ever finds out because they never let the servants clean their room. Her mellifluous voice carries Bhumi back to the day of her twelfth birthday. The month of December has always meant celebration through winter food. Right after morning tea, Mummy had instructed the servants to peel and grind desi (local) red gaajar (carrot) for making gaajar ka halwa. Papa had planned a visit to the Kitaab Mela to get their yearly stock of books. Bhumi always wondered how her father could be so conservative and strict, yet every year, without fail, he took them to the Winter Kitaab Mela to buy hundreds of books meant to last the entire year, of course they were censored, the boxes never had any Lawrence or comic books, but they always carried Chekhov, Gorky, Tolstoy, Premchand, and many more. There was an abundance of Russian and Japanese literature translated into Hindi and English, published by a Russian press. Those huge boxes overflowing with books were Bhumi’s birthday present every year. After the Kitaab Mela, they were taken on an educational trip to the Udaygiri Caves, sixty kilometres away from Bhopal. The road to Vidisha was broken with potholes and choked with dust. The dry winter only made breathing more difficult. Their father kept firmly instructing the driver to drive carefully. Both the girls and their mother sat in the back seat, windows tightly rolled up. It took more than three hours for the car to crawl  through the dusty, broken road. It shuddered to a stop in a cloud of dust, beyond the brown clouds of dust a low ancient sandstone ridge lay under the soft winter sun, rocks are sun baked lined into bands of warm browns and dull ochres. A long row of cave-mouths cracked the hill open; too many to count at first glance. as if time itself had been carved and left behind. The place felt frozen in time, dry and breathless. Then, without knowing why, Bhumi’s eyes fixed on one cave. It seemed wider than the rest, darker. Something tugged at her from inside it, curious, unseen. The hill stood in perfect stillness. No birds called. No wind moved the trees. The dust seemed to hang in the air. Even her breath sounded too loud in her ears. The silence felt thick. It was not an empty quiet; it felt watchful, as if the place had been waiting for someone to speak first. Bhumi didn’t realise when her feet began to drift away from her parents. She just moved, slow and dreamlike, drawn toward the dark mouth of Cave five. She stood at the mouth of the cave as if sleepwalking. Inside, the darkness led her to a magnificent towering stone figure. A man with a powerful, sculpted body rose from the rock, his chest broad, his legs planted firm like pillars. Strangely the perfectly sculpted body did not end in a face at all, but in a mighty boar face with long tusks curving outward, heavy and sharp.

A tiny, beautiful goddess rested on those tusks, cradled high above the ground. Around them, rows of well carved figures watched from the walls, frozen in worship in a vast ocean. A single spear of golden sunlight broke through the stone ceiling. It illuminated him. In that light, he did not look like a statue anymore. He looked awake. Too large for the cave. Too alive for stone. Bhumi felt the air bend around him. Her breath slowed. Her feet would not move. She felt pulled toward his stillness, toward his power. On a small stone slab beside him, a single word was carved: Varaha. She did not know the name, yet it felt familiar. Then something very unexpected happened.  The small goddess, perched lightly on the curve of his tusks, was slowly lifted by his massive strong hands. He lowered her with great care and rested her gently in his palms. The enormous boar head moved, animated, turning toward her. His eyes found hers and held them. She froze…The cave sank into a deeper stillness, as if even the shadows had paused to watch.

Then the voice came—deep, slow, and close:
 You will be drawn to the lake. Do not go.
 Go back to where you came from.

Her mind went blank. A sudden chill ran through her, yet her body obeyed. Still dazed, she stepped backward, turned, and walked out. Minutes later, she was sitting quietly in the car, shivering. Her parents found her in quiet panic. Her mother touched her burning forehead and thought she had fallen ill. Bhumi never spoke of the cave. She locked it deep inside herself.

Against Maali’s instructions, Bhumi keeps her bedroom window open, watching the sun sink behind the massive banyan tree in the distance. Mogra, chameli, and raat rani seem to melt into the orange glow of the setting sun. The banyan tree resembles the Tree of Life from The Fountain. The setting sun aligns perfectly as it descends behind the massive banyan tree. Two rows of tall eucalyptus trees on either side of the road appear to drip and dissolve in the molten orange light. The banyan tree stands at the T-point, connected by a narrow road to the massive main gate of their British-style bungalow. The sweet fragrance mingling with dusk stirs her memories of meeting Varaha. Her mind cannot escape his deep words. The anxiety tugs at her, pulling her toward that mysterious encounter. As the sun vanishes into the falling night, the sounds of crickets and katydids turn rhythmic. Standing at the open window, immersed in the deep poetry of the visuals, she watches the snakes slowly curl beneath the raat rani. She is deeply moved by the mingling of her memories with the imagery of the setting sun. A sudden resolve rises within her. Since her twelfth birthday, a voice inside her has been urging her to return to Cave Number Five. She can no longer ignore her inner voice.

Varaha’s vivid images kept her awake through the night, circling endlessly in her mind. She felt a strange, unfamiliar emotional connection to him, one she could not name. For a brief moment, she wondered why her own mind was playing tricks on her. Her emotions were pushing her soul to search for a deep mysterious bond that had broken because of her fear. If only that day she had not frozen, or turned away. Then she would have known what that mysterious moment truly meant. The tangled knots of her memories now pressed hard to be undone. Once again, she felt the same dreamlike, restless, intoxicating pull toward the caves. With the very first light of the sun, she was possessed by a quiet, urgent desire to escape. Without any plan, she stepped onto the path that led to Vidhisha. She walked through the small jungle that connected their bungalow to the bus stand. She had never before traveled alone in public transport. Her confusion and discomfort made her look clearly out of place. Dressed in her deep pink tee, light blue jeans, and floaters, she looked far younger than eighteen. The bus was stuffed with all sorts of people—sweaty, musty, noisy, packed tight with bodies and smells. The air inside was heavy and stale, an environment she had never experienced before. It felt like a sudden, brutal shift from her protected life. The bus conductor asked her with concern if she was lost. She said no. Quickly, she made up a story about going to her grandmother’s place in Vidhisha because of an emergency. The conductor offered her a front seat to keep her safe. Unlike their luxury car, this journey was quietly trying. The glass panes of the bus were broken and could not be closed. Dust rushed into the bus freely mixed with freezing cold, like it owned the air. In a rush she forgot to wear a jacket. There was hardly any suspension in the ramshackle vehicle. Every pothole jolted her with a sharp, bone-deep ache.

The bus drops Bhumi at a remote bus stop that has nothing but a lonely pole with a rusted sign announcing it as a stop. Not a single soul gets down from the bus except her. Deep jungle surrounds her on all sides, with faint glimpses of faraway hills dissolving into the haze. The driver barely slows down, eager to make a quick drop, and the bus swishes past her. The conductor leans out and asks, will you know the way to your grandmother’s place, will you be fine? She nods yes. Leaving behind a massive cloud of dust, the bus disappears down the road. The stone signboard reads Udaygiri Caves, 6 kilometres away. Bhumi has no choice but to walk. Her long, dark, open hair, kohled eyes, and chocolate skin feel the sharp sting of the winter sun. Her post-illness, frail body struggles with every step, yet she is possessed by a burning desire to uncover the unknown. She completely forgets that she hasn’t eaten anything since last night. Struggling forward, breath by breath, she somehow manages to reach the caves. She pauses in front of them, hoping to feel that familiar pull again, but there is nothing yet. Nothing has changed since her twelfth birthday; everything seems frozen in time. The moment she places her foot on the brown, worn-out stone step leading toward Cave Number 05, a sudden whirlpool of dust rises from nowhere, as if the land itself is trying to stop her from going further. The dust storm nearly lifts her off the ground, her vision blurs, her body grows weightless as she is seized by the storm. Suddenly, out of the darkness, a golden light bursts forth from inside Cave Number 05, and from within it, an unusually large albino deer appears as if by magic, its antlers wide and majestic, its hair silver, its eyes like glowing pomegranates. The deer rushes toward her in a glorious charge, lifts her gently in its mouth, digs its hooves deep into the mud to steady itself against the storm, and Bhumi clutches tightly around its neck. The deer carries her into Cave Number 05 and then vanishes into the very walls of the cave. The golden glow fades, and the cave sinks into darkness. Today, there is no shaft of light falling on Varaha. Everything feels hollow and empty. Bhumi looks at Varaha, but he is silent, lifeless. Overcome with emotion, she barely whispers to him, why aren’t you talking today? Why did you ask me not to go towards the lake? I know I have grown up, maybe you don’t recognize me anymore. I am the same Bhumi who came here six years ago, don’t you remember that? There is no reply, he is stone cold today. A dark sense of mourning sinks into her, as if her connection with him has snapped. Tears roll down her cheeks. Bhumi sits dejected on the large stone slab inside the dark cave. She feels so tired and heartbroken that she eventually falls asleep. In the middle of her sleep, a strong and powerful gust of wind enters her body, taking over her senses. She wakes in a trance, guided by that heavy, dense wind, she walks barefoot toward the lake. At the edge of the water, she stands staring at her own reflection. The wind gently leads her forward, as her feet step into the water, her reflection shatters into ripples. Waves of wind and water pull her onward until there is no ground left beneath her. She slips softly and begins to float on the water like Millais’s Ophelia. Floating on the surface, her eyes remain open in a trance, tears spilling quietly from the corners of her eyes. As her body becomes soaked, the weight of the wind drags her downward into the depths of the lake. As she is pulled under, her eyes finally close and she surrenders to the unknown power of the wind. On the far edge of the lake, the albino deer appears. A strong, tall, powerful man of about thirty walks toward the water it seems he is the master of the deer. He looks as if he does not belong to this time at all, his aura mythic and ancient. Without hesitation, he dives straight into the lake, slicing through the water like a bullet. Deep inside the lake, the wind rises again, trying to push him back, twisting violently around his chiselled body, but he is too powerful and too majestic to be defeated; he fights against the raging force of the wind and keeps moving forward. At last, he reaches Bhumi, gathers her frail body into his strong arms, and battles the pull of the depths until he finally brings her upward, fighting the wind and the water, drawing her back from the depths of dark waters.

Bhumi opens her eyes inside a wooden cottage tucked deep within the heart of the jungle. She is being watched over at the bedside by the same large albino deer, its pale presence unnervingly close. The sight of the albino deer feels surreal to her, a dream spilling into waking life, so impossibly near. Still lying in bed, wrapped tightly in a thick blanket, she slowly extends her hand to pet the deer, a silent gesture of gratitude.

The deer bends its neck toward her and gently strokes her hand with its muzzle. A strange sense of familiarity ripples through her at the touch of the deer. The strong, tall man who saved her is seated on a large vintage tub sofa with worn-out thick cushions beside the fireplace, carefully tending the flames as he feeds it pieces of wood. From the large Victorian bed, ancient and crumbling, only his profile is visible to her. It strikes her then that he is the living reflection of Varaha, the same sculpted physique, those powerful legs and chiseled arms once carved in stone now breathing with life. Strangely, he now bears a strikingly handsome human face. He looks as though he has stepped out of a forgotten mythic age, nothing about his presence belonging to the ordinary world.

Sensing her lingering gaze, the man turns his face toward her; those are the same eyes, she realizes. Eyes that seem to carry unsaid words, a tide of emotions swelling within them while the lips remain tightly sealed. His eyes betray what his armoured silence guards. Their gazes lock into a deep, unbroken stare; it is a quiet, meditative, beautiful moment of soul-deep connection. They cannot yet fully recognize each other, yet an undeniable pull of familiarity hums between them. Without breaking eye contact, Bhumi attempts to rise from the bed, but her strength fails her. He immediately rises from the sofa to help her.

The instant his broad, strong, pale-veined hands touch hers, a shock of icy lightning races across her skin. She pulls her hands away at once, reflexively, as if shielding herself from the jolt. She looks at him in confusion and asks why his hands are so frozen. He remains silent, his stillness faintly tinged with embarrassment. She asks him to offer his hands again, and this time she touches him with just one finger, the way one tests the temperature of bathwater before stepping in. Again, the same his hands are unmistakably icy. In disbelief she touches her own hands, checking if fever from drowning in the lake has burned her senses dull. But nothing changes. His hands are truly frozen. A deeper curiosity stirs in her as she asks again why his hands are stone cold. Cornered by the question, he finally responds. Reluctantly, he admits that his hands have always been this way and that he cannot remember them ever being warm. Her expression reveals her yearning to know more about him, but he swiftly shifts the conversation by asking her to sit on the vintage tub sofa where he had been sitting. The instant she sits onto the sofa, something entirely unfamiliar surges through her body. A thick, consuming warmth wraps around her like an invisible embrace. Her tiny breasts are softly caressed by the lingering, balmy heat left behind on the cushions. Her entire body floods with sensation, as if touched by warmth in this way for the very first time. Desire rises gently within her chest, and her body shyly surrenders to the intensity of the experience. It takes only a moment for her to realize that this warmth is the echo of his body that had unknowingly embraced her. She has never known a passion like this before, a passion so tender, yet sharp enough to pierce straight through her heart and body. The contradiction startles her, how can a man whose body radiates such warmth possess hands as cold as if they had just emerged from Antarctic frost? While she drifts in this strange, beautiful sensation of being embraced for the first time, the man brings her a steaming cup of tea. She sits transfixed, tongue-tied, staring at him taking the cup. He lifts a shawl, spreads his arms around her, and gently wraps her in its folds. The warmth of his body intoxicates her once more, and she steals a brief glance at his strong, bare chest glowing with quiet heat. For reasons she cannot name, the moment strikes her as déjà vu. She feels she knows his body, as though she has stood here before, as though she has known him across lifetimes. Unable to resist, she finally asks him where he comes from. He answers that he does not remember, that perhaps he is an eternal wanderer. She then asks him his name. He resists the question. After a pause, he admits that he does not know his name and that he is nameless. A flicker of irritation stirs within her at his vague, elusive answers. She questions whether it is even possible to have no name or no memory of one’s origins. He grows uneasy. He looks deeply into her eyes, blank yet firm, silently asking her not to continue. His mood darkens into quiet broodiness. He gently adjusts the fire to keep her warm, then steps outside, walking toward the lake with his deer following closely behind.

After a while, Bhumi realizes she may have hurt him without meaning to.
 She walks out and quietly sits beside him on the raised stone next to the vast still lake.  Softly, she says, Thank you for saving my life. He answers with only a faint smile, meeting her eyes for a fleeting second before turning away toward the water. After a pause, she says, I think I don’t understand where you come from, or who you really are.  She searches his face and adds gently, Yet you feel strangely familiar to me.  Then, with a quiet steadiness in her voice, she says, I will wait for the day when you remember your story, until then, I won’t ask you anything more. For a fleeting moment, love fills his eyes for her; the next, he retreats behind his armour, sealing the door she almost entered. As the lake glimmers with the last trembling light and the crimson breath of the setting sun, her heart makes a vow far deeper than words to wait for him across lifetimes. A love takes root within her for this strange yet familiar man, a love both aching and luminous, carrying the sweetness of joy and the sharp sting of sorrow in the same breath. Her heart overwhelmed with emotions, she looks into the water at their reflection; the emotions carried inside her spill softly across the surface, as though their mirrored shapes have merged with their unspoken feelings. They both witness a quiet miracle; their reflection in the water slowly transforms into an ancient wooden cottage hidden deep within the jungles of a Himalayan mountain, serene and breathing love as it overlooks snow-capped peaks. The cottage has many wide windows and is wrapped in creepers heavy with blooming flowers. The reflection stirs something buried inside them, binding them with a tender, wordless love. They feel as though they have become one. The quiet soul of the nameless man feels, for the first time, a sudden sense of home, so deep that he forgets he is a wanderer. Both their souls find a language of their own in the reflection, speaking through a memory that perhaps belongs to another lifetime.

The fire continues to burn late into the night, its warmth holding the room together. One corner glows softly, while the rest dissolves into darkness, touched only by a faint, diffused light. It is past midnight. Bhumi sleeps deeply.  The nameless man sits beside her bed, watching over her. Nearby, the albino deer sleeps curled close to the fire. His gaze keeps returning to her calm, resting face. Her eyes are bold, almond-shaped even in sleep and seem alive. There is something sharp and profound in them, an emotion so familiar it aches. He knows these eyes. The thought stirs within him, though his memory fails him, leaving only a quiet echo behind. In her sleep, Bhumi senses his unrest, the weight of his unspoken question. Slowly, she wakes. Caught in the act of watching her, the nameless man feels a sudden embarrassment. He turns away at once, rises, and moves to sit beside the fire. Still lying on the bed, Bhumi reaches out and holds his arm, careful not to touch his frozen hands. With a gentle pull, she guides him back toward her. He sits beside her on the bed. She shifts her pillow and pushes herself upright. The sudden closeness unsettles him. Afraid of intruding, he instinctively draws back a little, even as he remains seated, careful not to make her uncomfortable. Yet this small bridging of distance traps their eyes together as though they have waited lifetimes for this silence, for this closeness. Bhumi’s lips tremble. He sees the faint quiver, feels it without touching. Desire rises within him, filling his chest, yet something unnamed holds him still, restrains him. Bhumi reaches for the shawl lying near her pillow and gently wraps it around both his hands, holding its edges so that it forms a crescent, a soft half-circle. Like a rope, she lifts it over her head and moves into the space it creates. She comes closer, breathing softly against his broad, veined neck. Her lips rest there as she nestles her head between his neck and shoulder, pressing her breasts against his chest, wrapping her arms around him.

She feels his heart racing beneath her. He draws her closer, pressing her tiny waist gently with his cold hands, still wrapped in the shawl. She lifts her head a little and looks directly into his eyes. Her eyes are moist, overwhelmed in emotion mingled with her longing for his warmth. Her lips tremble again, now so close to his mouth. He brushes his lips lightly against hers. She leans in. The air between them grows heavy, charged, alive. The kiss is unhurried. It stretches time itself. Slow, tender. All the waiting, all the silence, dissolves into this one trembling kiss. Bhumi feels that if only time would stop now, if the wheel of it would freeze, they could love each other beyond time, truly, eternally, held in an endless embrace.

They remain wrapped around each other, lost in the depth of that kiss. Yet something within the nameless man resists moving further. Though he craves her body, he does not act on it. Instead, he draws her into a tight, safe, protective embrace. They lie together, their bodies entwined, sharing warmth. Her face rests against his cheek. She feels a moist droplet fall onto the tip of her nose. She lifts herself slightly to look at him. Tears are gently rolling down his face. She catches his tears with her lips as they brush along his cheeks, until her mouth finds his lips again. It is not just a kiss, but an understanding. Two souls pausing in the same breath, silently knowing they are seen, accepted, and home. She longs for him, yet she accepts his struggle and his inability to give himself to her fully. Their lips remain locked in passion, their eyes filled with tears. They fall asleep like this, entwined in each other’s arms, breathing as one until the night fades.

Just as dawn is about to arrive, the lake shudders under a sudden, violent gust of wind as if something sinister has crossed into the world. In her sleep, Bhumi feels the force of it, the wind pressing against her body, unmistakably familiar. It is the same wind from her childhood, the wind that once lifted her off her feet when she was twelve, standing near the caves, the wind that pushed her into the lake. The room grows dense, heavy, filled with an unseen pressure. When she opens her eyes in fear, what she sees is beyond comprehension. Her bedside is empty. The nameless man is no longer beside her. He is kneeling on the floor, head bowed, before a tall, towering woman of terrifying beauty. She stands magnificent and unmoving, dressed in gold and blood red robe that flows violently in the wind. There is an aura around her, her presence bends the air itself. Her skin glows fiercely, surrounded by a bright halo. Her body is luminous, curvaceous, commanding, carrying a dominance that demands obedience. Her long golden hair flows freely down her back, glowing as if it has absorbed the first light of dawn. It falls in soft waves, warm and alive, the tips burning brighter, as they brush against her waist, each strand seeming to pulse with light. She is celestial. A goddess. But her eyes burn with fire. As Bhumi focuses on her face, she realizes the goddess is filled with rage, her expression cruel and unkind. The nameless man’s bent knee makes it clear he is her slave, her possession. She seems like a woman who could raise an army of men with a single command. In her fury, she speaks to him, her voice roaring through the room.

“It is your destiny to save this girl in every lifetime. But it was your choice to let her seduce you. Have you forgotten? This mortal world abandoned you, limited you, carved you in stone to leave you alone in oblivion. It was I who gave you a new life. A new purpose. I gave you this handsome face. And in return, I demanded only one thing: your absolute loyalty.”

The nameless man listens in silence, head still lowered.

“You surrendered the warmth of your hands to me as a token of gratitude and loyalty,” she continues. “How could you forget? I own you. You have no free will.”

Her voice hardens. “For betraying me, you deserve a punishment so great that you will never again be capable of betrayal.”

She bends down. The blinding glow from her body engulfs him completely. She kisses him violently. The moment her lips touch his, the light drains from his body. His skin turns pale. A violent shiver runs through him. He collapses onto the floor, trembling with cold. The woman disappears. The room is left hollow, emptied, as if the air itself has been sucked away. Dawn arrives quietly. Bhumi, frozen in shock and awe, runs to him. The instant she touches his body, a freezing shock shoots through her. He felt like the iceberg that sank the titanic. All warmth has vanished from him. She grabs a blanket and wraps it around him, tries to hold him, to bring him close but he pushes her away. When he looks at her, his eyes are blank. Empty. They terrify her. The love, the recognition, the emotion everything has evaporated. He does not know her. It is as if she is invisible to him, like lovers in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind after their memory is erased. Bhumi’s heart sinks. She doesn’t know how to help him. He is clearly in pain, yet he treats her like a stranger. Slowly, deliberately, he builds an armour around himself, cold, impenetrable and shuts her out. He stands up, steady now, and walks away. His albino deer follows him silently. Bhumi watches as he disappears into the jungle, walking deeper and deeper, fading into green shadows. He never turns back. Tears fill her eyes. She stands alone, unable to understand what has just been taken from her.

Bhumi’s eyes are closed. A female hand rests briefly on her shoulder, firm yet careful, nudging her awake. “Bhumi,” a voice says softly, trained to sound calm. She opens her eyes to harsh white light and the low, mechanical breathing of machines. She is in a hospital bed, in an ICU. The nurse leans in to tell her, almost routinely, that a psychiatrist will be coming shortly to examine her. Bhumi turns her head, confused, her mind struggling to catch up with her body. There are no windows. The room is sealed, without a sense of time. Only then does she realise she is in a Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit. Panic stirs in her chest, slow and heavy. She craves to be near a window, to feel some air, to let sunlight touch her face even for a moment. Several ECG leads cling to her bare skin, round white stickers pressed against her chest, their thin cables looping and gathering into a monitor beside the bed. Green lines rise and fall relentlessly, each sharp spike translating her heartbeat into signals. A pulse oximeter grips her fingertip, its light blinking steadily. From her arm, an IV disappears beneath transparent tape; clear tubing climbs upward into hanging fluid bags. She feels frightened, hollowed out, exhausted. She tries to remember how she came here, but there is a gap, an abrupt tear in time. One moment she was elsewhere, and now she is here, wired and watched. When the psychiatrist arrives and pulls a chair close to her bed, Bhumi’s unease deepens. He introduces himself, his voice gentle, practiced, neutral. He asks her if she knows where she is. If she remembers what happened. His assistants’ pen hovers patiently above a file. Bhumi turns to the doctor with urgency. She asks for help. She tells him about the nameless man. How he was hurt by the goddess, how he might still need her. Her voice trembles, not with confusion, but with conviction. The psychiatrist listens without interrupting. Then he asks, carefully, whether she is certain these events really happened. Whether they could have been imagined or she is confused. Bhumi answers without hesitation. She says she spent that day with the nameless man. That it was real. All of it. He asks her if she remembers the lake. “Yes,” she says emphatically. She tells him she was possessed by the wind, how it entered her body, how her feet carried her forward and into the water. The psychiatrist nods slowly, as though acknowledging her words without accepting them. He asks her to try to relax. He tells her not to worry about the nameless man. He gently probes. Was it possible that she slipped? That she entered the lake by accident? Or perhaps by choice? Bhumi shakes her head in irritation. She tells him he does not understand. She insists she encountered Varaha, the nameless man, the albino deer, the violent goddess. She says it again and again, as if repetition might make him believe her.

Days pass inside the Psychiatric ICU. Time becomes viscous, measured only by medication rounds and observation notes. Bhumi does not forget. Her story does not loosen its grip. Each telling sounds the same. Each certainty alarms them more. The doctors begin to exchange looks. They write longer notes. They speak to her family in hushed voices. They decide it is unsafe, dangerous, even to take her home. Her family talks of social stigma, of risk, of unpredictability. Bhumi hears fragments of these conversations, enough to understand she is being discussed as a problem, not a person. Under this weight, her anxiety worsens. Panic attacks arrive unannounced, stealing her breath, her voice, her footing in reality. She grows restless, then withdrawn. The more her narrative is questioned, the more desperately she clings to it. Eventually, the decision is made. The doctors agree it would be best to transfer her to a mental asylum for long-term observation and treatment. Bhumi is not asked what she wants. What remains of her firm belief is now officially named delusion and a girl who knows what she experienced, standing alone against a world that has decided she is insane.

Bhumi’s Didi is instructed to keep all her books ready. Her father calls a raddiwala. The man arrives with a sack and a weighing scale, indifferent to titles. For him, paper is only paper. Didi breaks down as she sorts through the piles. Her hands tremble when she recognises a few books Bhumi was reading before she left for Udaygiri Alice in Wonderland, Varaha: The Third Avatar, Hayavadana. She presses them briefly to her chest, as if holding onto Bhumi herself, before placing them back on the stack. In the bungalow garden, hundreds of books are lined up in uneven rows, their spines faded, their pages swollen with age and love. This was Bhumi’s inner world, now laid out in the open. One by one, her most prized possessions are weighed and sold. By evening, the shelves inside the house stand empty. A silence settles in her room. Bhumi’s presence is erased from the home she grew up in, as if she had only passed through it briefly.

In time, she turns into a cautionary tale of a girl who read too much, who  lived in a fantasy world of her own imagination and let herself drift too far. Believed the dreams and memories are real and magic does exist in this mundane world.

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Bio: Shobhita Thakur is an alumna of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, where she completed a three-year course in Film Editing. Her journey in the film industry began with working alongside National Award–winning director Rajan Khosa as a Director’s Assistant, an experience that shaped her understanding of storytelling. She later assisted Anurag Basu on advertising films, where she developed a nuanced sense of visual narrative.

Most recently, Shobhita worked as a freelance Editorial Creative with Netflix, contributing to projects that pushed creative boundaries. She has also collaborated with several renowned advertising film production houses as an Assistant Director. With her debut short film Khilawadi, she continues to nurture her interest in creating meaningful, socially relevant, and cinematically engaging narratives.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shobhita-thakur-0ba8783b/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lilyshobhita/

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Setu, December 2025