A ray of hope

A Story by Deepshikha De

She stood on the terrace, looking at the view beneath. On the road below, many cars passed and their headlights seemed like blurs of traffic. Soon the signal turned red, and all the cars halted. She could see the traffic police in white attire, giving a signal to the cars on the opposite road to move. Shalini had been standing here for the past two hours, trying to contemplate, how long it would take her to die if she jumped. She was not scared of death, but she was scared of pain. She imagined a crowd forming around her when her body hit the asphalt road, there would be blood and hopefully some kind soul would take her to the hospital after checking her pulse. Shalini did this very often; she imagined scenarios that would take place in the future.

Shalini had been born in a quaint little town in West Bengal. Her parents were members of the lower middle class. They could never indulge in the extravagances of life, but they always had enough to get by. When Shalini was three years old, her mother became pregnant again. The boy was a blue baby, he died within one hour of being born. Her parents were disappointed, they had expected a son. Though living in the 21^st century, Indian society always favoured boys. As a child Shalini’s mother made her feel, that it would have been better, if there was a male child in her place. However her liberal father supported her, he sent her to a boarding school in Kolkata to get educated.

Now she had a job in Kolkata, she had worked as a radio jockey for the past two years. However since childhood, her dream had been to write. Being a disappointment to her mother, her broken marriage, the job for which she had to fake a cheery smile every morning; she wanted to release all her pain on a sheet of paper. However her suicide note was very short; it read “I don’t want to cause anyone pain. Please don’t feel guilty, this was my choice.”

The traffic had decreased, Shalini’s watch read 2:00 a.m. She did not know how time had passed, she had been trying to recollect all the memories in her life, she wanted to remember them one last time before she waved them Good Bye.

Suddenly she saw a shooting star passing through the horizon of the sky. She remembered her father telling her “Whenever life gets tough, think of a shooting star. Let it light up your life , and think of it as a ray of hope.”

Suddenly, in a gust of wind, her suicide note flew away, and she did not bother to run after it.

Tomorrow would be another day, she decided.

© 2014 Deepshikha De

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Reviews

Hell_Girl_Rei

This feels like Gone With the Wind! The last line is perfect.

Posted 10 Years Ago

Bee C.

This is a short piece, but very expressive and emotive. It's really well written. You may need to touch up your grammar a little bit in a few places, in that you sometimes use commas that aren't necessary, but that's just me nitpicking really. You did a good job with this. Keep on writing and you'll continue to improve. :)