[This is her story, before it becomes yours, as you read it. We who bring it to you are simply the carriers - we carry stories from one person to another; you might even say we carry their stories for these people. But we'll talk about us later - let's hear the girl's story first.]

When she was about thirteen years old, the girl's parents both got employed by the company in the hills; they were allotted the old house at the foot of the hills, on the sprawling company campus, which they moved into, and where she was to spend the next few years of her youth. It was a really old colonial structure, typical of the hill-stations, maybe even a hundred years old - or so she was told by the mali, the gardener who doubled as caretaker of the house till they moved in. Its rambling, roomy architecture bespoke afterthought more than thought. In winter it was bitingly cold inside, and in summer the heavy stone walls trapped the heat in. It had termites and cockroaches and mice galore, and when it rained, the walls became damp and all the furniture felt like it was covered with a sticky, invisible moss. There were two not-too-small gardens outside, in front and back, thick with a forest of mango, neem, pine and other assorted trees that housed a rock-concert of squirrels, crows, kites, pigeons, parrots, the occasional peacock family, and innumerable tribes of marauding monkeys that constantly bickered and fought with each other. Occasionally, even a deer or two, curious but cautious, would come down to the back-garden fence, from the rolling hills that surrounded the campus.

The girl and her parents loved the house - partly because it was unlike anything they had lived in earlier, down below in the city, but partly also because of the army of stray dogs that lived in the area and befriended them. For some reason, almost all the dogs of the campus seemed to know that they would never be turned away by this small family, even if they were not always welcomed. So they turned up in large numbers and settled in; and although the family would feed them only once every two or three days, they were always happy to see any of the family, especially the girl, and would jump and frolic whenever they spotted them approaching. They knew the sound of her school bus, and would wait eagerly for her at the gate, every school day afternoon - a big crew of multicoloured canines that would lie around near the gate and begin yowling and yapping when they heard her bus approaching. The girl was not allowed to bring her four-legged friends into the house, but at night, she would fall asleep listening to their endless conversations - although on some nights it would be just one dog holding forth. She used to wonder what this meant - that on some days the dogs would all be chatting and on others there would only be one, lecturing away in small, sharp yaps, broken by the occasional, long, barking diatribe.

The girl had no other friends (besides the dogs) on that campus; most of the other company employees living there were very senior, either with children who had already left home, or who were much older than her. The only other person the girl could turn to as a human companion was the mali, an amiable old man close to retirement himself. The mali came every evening for a couple of hours to clean the garden and tend to the hedges and shrubs that would otherwise grow wild. The girl often spent time with him, asking him questions about the garden, the trees, his family, the programmes on TV, the films he had seen - to all of which the mali responded with learned nods and grunts, patiently doing his work while the girl rambled on by his side. As it turned out, the mali did not have a family in the city; they were in a village somewhere in the east (from the direction the mali pointed in), about two nights away by train, with a name that the girl forgot almost as soon as he heard it. But each time the girl would ask the name the mali would tell her as if she was asking for the first time, with a patience that only the truly old of soul can have.

Sometimes the mali would settle back on his haunches, pull out his beedis1 and light one, and regale the girl with some story or the other. As the girl grew older, she realised that many of the things the mali told her couldn't possibly be true, but the mali's stories never ceased to fascinate her. For instance, one day the girl's mother berated the mali that every other garden on the campus had flowering plants in full bloom in spring time, except theirs. She demanded that the mali get some flowering plants and make the garden blossom with them. The mali nodded his head sagely, and late that winter, he planted a bunch of flowering plants - roses, hyacinths, petunias, jasmines - so that they would all pop out in spring. Not one survived, despite his tender ministrations. The girl's mother berated the mali again, for not looking after the plants; but she knew full well he had tried all he could to keep them alive. The girl knew this too, and something in the mali's solemn, impassive expression as he was being berated told the girl that the mali had already known, beforehand, that the plants would not survive, let alone flower.

So the girl asked the mali how he knew they wouldn't survive; why he had planted them knowing they wouldn't survive in the first place; and why he had tended to them so lovingly despite knowing they would die. At first the mali simply laughed and said, Little One, this little army that you have (referring to the dogs), they just dig up everything and spoil all my work! - but the 'Little One' (who was pushing seventeen years of age by then) was having none of this fobbing off. She persisted, pointing out that the flower-beds had been cordoned off to prevent the dogs from digging around in the soft soil. Don't blame the dogs! she said sternly. So, gracefully accepting defeat at the hands of this undeniable logic, the mali sat back gravely on his haunches, lit his beedi and blew out the story in swirls of blue-grey smoke into the darkening twilight of the evening.

[The next few stories are in fact, the mali's, but just to be clear, they are not separate from, but integral, to the girl's story - as y'all will see, shortly. The mali actually has two stories to tell - rather like the 'Buy One, Get One Free' offers that are so obviously fake, yet so popular, especially in those temples of capitalism - the malls. And like all the varied (yet identical) goods you get there, we too, are varied (yet strangely identical), especially in size. Novels are the big brands of the capitalism of narratives; serialised novels, the mega-brands. Short stories are just the mom-and-pop stores round the corner; sometimes a little dhaba restaurant, maybe, or a barber's salon; but for the most part, they are just these mom-and-pop stores. This is no mall, however, and we are certainly no brands, big or mega. But we hope y'all will be capitalist enough to accept our 'Buy One, Get One Free' offer(ings) here.]

The mali began: Do you know why the monkeys who live on these trees keep fighting all the time?

The girl was rather nonplussed by this sudden change of topic (as it seemed). No, what's that got to do with the plants not flowering? Anyway, monkeys are monkeys! They're always fighting with each other.

The mali gazed at the girl briefly, as if assessing something. Then he said, Actually, monkeys usually fight only when they are pushed to it. They do a lot of mischief, and are full of bravado, but they rarely fight as viciously and persistently as they fight here, in your garden. And the reason for both, the monkeys fighting and the plants not flowering is the same: you have an infestation of ghosts here.

The girl stared at the mali's face, trying to see if he was trying to be funny, or scary, or both. But the mali just gazed back at her, impassive except for what was clearly some concern at how the girl would receive this revelation.

You're not joking? The girl asked after a pause. The mali shook his head gravely. I don't know why there's such a large number of them here, maybe because the house is so old. But they pit the monkeys against each other, just for fun, by carrying little provocative tales from one to the other, and monkeys, as you know, are very jealous! So they get provoked, and fight. As for the flowering plants, the ghosts can't stand to see their beauty, and so they tell them their sad, miserable stories, poisoning their sap with despair and grief so thoroughly that none of them flower. I try and counter the effect by tending the plants even more lovingly, and telling them stories of power and strength and hope and life - but I have yet to have any success.

The girl continued to stare at the mali, suspicion mixed with wonder. What nonsense! she snorted finally, Ghosts, he says! What do you think I am, 5 years old?!

The mali reached out suddenly and clutched the girl's arm with his big, thin hands. Are you scared of ghosts?

Of course not, you can't be scared of things that don't exist! And that's all you're trying to do, scare me, isn't it?

No, Little One, the Mali replied, and ghosts exist, whether you've seen one or not, and whether they scare you or not.

Have you seen one?

The mali puffed at the last bit of his beedi, stared thoughtfully at it, then ground its tip into the ground, small red sparks flying briefly into life around his hand.

I've seen many, he said finally, but none so many as in your garden. Tell me, he said abruptly turning to the girl again, Have you ever felt a deep sadness engulf you, without reason, perhaps even on an otherwise beautiful day, when there's cheer all around - but only you feel sad? Or have you ever felt bone-deep exhaustion, and thought that you would pass out the moment you hit the bed, but have then lain awake, body hurting with tiredness but mind racing, listening alertly to the noises of the night? Have these things ever happened to you?

The girl wondered where this was going - this was without doubt the strangest conversation she had had with the old mali. Of course I have, she replied, but that happens to everyone, so don't tell me that's because of ghosts! Sometimes people are moody - that's all there is to it.

Is it? the mali countered. Well, the next time something like that happens, try something. With all your mental strength, and with complete concentration, try to see what thoughts are your own, and what feel like strange, unfamiliar thoughts, in those 'moods' you talk about. Try it, and tell me, OK? I think you'll be surprised by what you find.

Oh come on, uncle, stop it already! Now you're just trying to mess with my head!

No, I'm not. Just try it. Or don't. But till you do, don't ask me about ghosts again.

Hey!! That's not fair! You can't say that you'll tell me about ghosts only if I also see one, that's ridiculous?.

The mali smiled. All I'm saying is that you've already had experiences with ghosts, you just didn't know it. And if you want to understand what I'm saying, you need to at least accept that as a possibility.

They sat in silence for a while, each with their own thoughts, as the warm summer night fell slowly around them, deepening to the point where they could barely see each other's silhouettes. After a brief while they heard the clacking of claws on stone, and then a hail of dogs was on them, panting and yapping, fur and dog-breath and wet tongues all over them. They laughed and played with the dogs, their shouts and barks kicking up such a ruckus that the girl's father came out to tell them to keep it down, he was trying to watch something on TV. Almost intuitively the dogs calmed down, and the mali prepared to leave for the night.

Slowly packing his tools into his cloth bag, he smiled up at the girl, So you're not going to believe me if I tell you that these dogs are probably the only reason you and your family have not been affected by this infestation of ghosts?

What do you mean?

You hear these dogs barking all night, don't you?

Yes, so?

They're barking at the ghosts. They can see them, unlike us, and they hate them. Now cats, on the other hand, tend to be nicer to ghosts - but not dogs. More importantly, there is something in a dog's bark that is very disturbing for ghosts, they don't like to be near barking dogs. Then, he added, before the girl could respond, On other nights, you may hear only one dog, isn't it?

Again, the girl's dumbstruck nod was more sensed than seen by the mali. That one dog, he continued, is negotiating with the ghosts. When ghosts are drawn to one particular place, they are almost completely unable to go anywhere else. That's why, when the dogs make it so difficult for them to stay, they start going a little crazy, because they can't leave either. Then they come to negotiate with the dogs, to give them at least one night of silence.

What do they have to negotiate with, that the dogs might want in return?

They teach the dogs to sing - or so they tell them. Dogs love to sing, and will do anything to learn how to sing better. So in return for one night of silence, ghosts teach the dogs how to sing - and that's why, if you've ever noticed, whenever you have a night when the dogs are howling, it is always followed by one night of complete silence.

The girl was speechless; a part of her was still wondering if the old man was having her on, or was seriously sharing his beliefs. Finally, she asked the obvious question: How do you know all this?

Because, said the other, without any hesitation, the ghosts themselves told me this!

What?!

Yes. And they'd be happy to talk to you too, you just have to learn to listen to them, in the way I told you to. Imagine you're tired yet unable to sleep on some night; focus on what you're thinking, and see what's familiar and what's not. That's when you'll start hearing them. And then, after a while, you'll be hearing them even without deep sorrow or insomnia?. You'll hear them all the time, even in your sleep, in your dreams, sharing their stories, thousands upon thousands of them?.

After a moment, he continued: Think about what I said. And remember, saying 'I believe in ghosts', or 'I don't believe in ghosts', is a bit like saying, 'I believe in the wind' - you don't have to see it to know it's there. It's not about belief, it's about knowledge. On that cryptic note the mali fell silent, and continued packing his things.

After a short pause, the girl said, Anyway, whether its knowing or believing, I have neither, as far as ghosts are concerned!

The girl couldn't read the mali's face in the dark, in the silence that followed, filled only by the mali's tools clinking as they were tossed, one by one, into the bag. He stood up with the bag on his shoulder, and the girl sensed more than saw the man turn to her:

Have you heard the story of the person who lived here, in this house, before you? The story of T-saab?

The girl thought for a moment. Wasn't he that very high-profile trainer or manager or some such, who died of cancer or something? I didn't know he had lived here!

Not only did he live here, he also died here - but not from cancer. He hung himself from the ceiling fan in your drawing room.

What rubbish! I know he died, but I'm quite sure he didn't die here! Now you really are trying to scare me! I heard that he had developed some kind of brain tumour and died from that, in the hospital. Don't talk nonsense now, just to try and get me to believe your rubbish?.

But Little One, why should you be scared? You don't believe in ghosts! The mali laughed.

I don't?. But that doesn't mean you should think you can fool me, retorted the girl, a little flame of anger leaping up in her. Besides, it's a startling, even shocking thing to say, so obviously I reacted like that!

The mali was silent for a moment, then said, Don't get upset with me, Little One, I'm not trying to scare you or tease you. I know that's what everyone was told. And yes, he was taken to the hospital, but he didn't last long. The doctors said he was already brain-dead even when they brought him in, and that it was only to satisfy the family that they continued to treat him and keep his body alive for as long as they could. I know, because I was there with the family. T-saab and I, we knew each other very well. We were from the same village, back east. In fact, I used to work for him for quite some time before - well, before, one fine day, he just told me to stop coming to work. Actually, I had a feeling it was coming ever since his wife took his two kids and left him - he became completely reclusive, and even his few friends stopped coming for some reason. I barely saw him after that, except for glimpses of him roaming around the house talking to himself. Sure enough, barely two weeks later, he fired me. But he himself never gave me a reason, never explained anything, just said, Don't come to work from tomorrow. I obviously protested, but he was adamant. I felt very bad about that whole thing for quite a long time.

He paused for a moment, then continued: then, the evening before he hung himself, it was a Friday evening, he called me on my mobile phone and asked me to come and meet him immediately. He said he wanted to me to come and take something from him, a notebook, and asked me to never ever give it back to him. I can't trust anyone else with this task, he said. I don't care what you do with it, destroy it if you have no other use for it, but don't give it back to me or show it to anyone else. Just come right away and take it.

I asked him the obvious question: Sir, why don't you destroy it yourself? I'm not able to! he shouted, Can't you understand that!? That's why I'm giving it to you, because I can't destroy it myself. Please, take it away and don't tell me what you did with it, just come and take it and go, before I change my mind.

He sounded really upset, almost like a mad man, so I told him that he ought to rethink this. I told him that he clearly wasn't sure whether he wanted the book destroyed or not, and that I would give him a couple of days to really think about this. I told him I'd go over on Monday and take it, if he still wanted me to. He pleaded with me, threatened me, tried everything he could to make me go over and take the book, but I refused. If you ask me why, I can't really say - maybe I just had a feeling that I would get stuck in something I didn't want, if I went over; anyway, I didn't go.

He was silent for a moment, then the girl heard what sounded like something between a sigh and a grunt. Then the mali's voice floated out again in the dark: sometimes I think he could have been still alive today, if I'd taken the book that night.

After a moment's silence, the girl asked, So what happened to that book?

It's with me, said the mali. Through the next day, I felt increasingly bad about being suspicious about something as innocuous as picking up a book - I thought I should at least go see what all the hullabaloo was about. So the next evening I came over here, to this house, to meet him.

When I reached here, the door was lying open. It was usually like that, so I didn't think anything of it, and walked into the house. When I entered the drawing room, I saw him hanging from the ceiling. I shouted for help and quickly picked up the stool that he had kicked away from under him, stood on it, and took his weight on my shoulder, till the neighbour's son came and helped me bring him down. His face had gone swollen and dark, and although we couldn't tell if he was breathing, we could hear a faint heartbeat. We rushed him to the hospital - and the rest you know. His family didn't want it public that he had voluntarily committed suicide, so they made up this story of a brain tumour that had begun to seriously affect his thinking, so he was bound to die from it sooner or later - and that's what, they said, had happened. And that's the story that stuck.

After admitting him in the hospital, and informing the company authorities, his wife asked me to return to the house to lock it up. So I came back and did a quick tour of the house, checking to see if everything was alright - and that's when I saw the notebook lying on the desk in his study. Don't ask me how I knew it was the one he had been talking about - somehow, I knew; maybe the fact that it was the only one of his otherwise carefully maintained papers and books that looked mauled and torn, like it had been wrestled with by an angry cat! Anyway, I took it and kept it with me ever since - I don't know what made me do it, but I did it. I remembered him telling me not to show the book to anyone else, so I didn't even mention it to his wife. And then I forgot I even had it - in the rush of the next few days, what with his death and funeral and his inconsolable family, I lost track of it. But I know it's in my house somewhere.

Did you open it to see what it was about?

No, I'm telling you, I lost track of it! The girl felt a sudden sharpness, a vehemence in his voice, which disappeared as suddenly when he continued. I know that whatever was written in it was written by him, it was his handwriting. But it was written in English, which I can barely make out - as you know, I can't read it. So in any case I would not have been able to understand it, even if I had struggled to read it.

Well, can you find it?, the girl asked impatiently.

Why, do you want to see it? Fine, he laughed, I'll look for it, and bring it as soon as possible - tomorrow itself, if I find it. But now, child, I have to go, otherwise I will get very late reaching home.

His smile shone briefly in the dark; the girl sensed more than saw him wave his hand and then he was off into the night. Shortly after, her father called her to watch the finals of the cricket world cup, in the excitement of which she soon forgot the mali's stories.

[Everything was promptly forgotten, because cricket, the three hundred thirty million and one-th god of our land, can exorcise anything - or so it would seem. But can it? What happens when, as some great writer once wrote, the spirit that is to be exorcised is the very same spirit that possesses the exorcist's mantra? Can it exorcise itself? Or is it more accurate to say that cricket does not exorcise, it merely distracts this massive, possessed populace from the enormous, monumental need for a universe-sized exorcism? An exorcism that rids the world of hypocrisy and dishonesty and lies and falsehoods and deceptions and fictions and...us? Disposable; ultimately we are none of us indispensable?.]

The mali did not come to work for a couple of days after this. But the first thing he did when he returned and saw the girl was hail her over to where he was squatting and weeding the flower-beds. As the girl walked over, he reached into his shirt and pulled out a plastic-wrapped package, which he handed her. The girl was surprised, and a little concerned to see that the mali was looking wan, tired. She reached out for the package, but the mali would not let go of it. Uncle, are you ok? the girl said, You don't look so well.

Still clutching the package, the latter said, You must be wondering why I'm giving it to you, when T-saab specifically asked me not to show it to anyone. And under different circumstances, I never would have. It's just that - I think the reason for his suicide maybe in that notebook.

The girl and the mali stared briefly at each other. Finally the mali lowered his gaze and spoke, almost inaudibly: that day I told you I had forgotten about the book. But I hadn't. How could I?! Each night, every night after he died, he would come to remind me to destroy it, destroy it! I thought I would go mad from those visitations! It's not that he threatened me, or scared me in any way, no. It was the enormous grief, an abject, endless grief that he brought with him into my head. Finally, in sheer desperation, I pulled out the book one night and was about to set fire to it, when a gust of breeze from nowhere blew out the flame. Again and again I tried to set it on fire, and failed, again and again. And that night was the last night he came to me - not to ask me to destroy it, nor to reclaim it, but to display sorrow and pain so intense, so horrifying, that no man should ever have to suffer, or see someone suffering, that. His anguish was...pure insanity.

In the brief silence that followed, the girl looked carefully at the mali's face gleaming in the twilight, and was startled to see tears rolling down his cheeks. But before she could say anything, the mali quickly turned his face away, wiping it with his gamcha, before continuing to speak a few moments later, in the same low voice.

I never saw him again after that, that was about a year ago. I've been deeply grateful for that, but I also feel that I have not done something I have to do. And it's eating me up from the inside; and if it's not to destroy the book, then I don't know what it is.

He paused and looked straight at the girl.

That's why I need you to see what is in the book. I can't ask anybody else, like your father, because I've kept it for so long, without telling anyone, not even his family. And if there is something in it that might make my keeping it for so long appear suspicious, then I may get into real trouble. But you I trust, Little One. I know you will not let me down, whatever is there in that book. Please, child, look at it and tell me what you find.

The girl watched the older man's face carefully, trying to read it in the failing light. He sounded so deeply relieved and hopeful at the same time that the girl couldn't help but believe he was sincere. Add to that the tears she had seen earlier. And finally, her own curiosity as to the contents of the notebook - all of this decided the matter. I'll take it and look at it, she told the mali. But I may take some time returning it to you, depending on what I find in it.

I don't want it back! The older man said sharply; then, in a mellower tone, I mean, take your time reading it, and then get rid of it for me, in any way you can. I actually don't even want to know what's in it, unless it concerns me in some way. Or if it has something that the family should know about - then we can figure out a way to inform them. You decide, I leave it entirely up to you. Just don't give it back to me.

This subtle appeal to her vanity about her maturity sealed the deal. The girl felt very adult, very grownup, at these words. I will take the book and look at it carefully, speaking as seriously as she thought an adult would in these circumstances. And I won't tell anyone about it, nor will I show it to anyone. And I will tell you if there is something in the book that you need to know. So don't worry, uncle, you're in safe hands. The older man impulsively reached out and clutched the girl's arms tightly. Thank you, Little One!! I knew I'd done right by bringing this to you.

The girl nodded awkwardly, then bid the mali goodbye, to return to her room, while the old man returned to his gardening. Once in her room, the girl turned on the bedside lamp, pulled the book out from the packet and gave it a quick, preliminary once-over.

It definitely looked like it had seen better days, ripped and blackened as it was. It was a fairly common, soft-cover, slim notebook, wrapped carefully in old newspaper. It had about fifty pages, not too many of which were filled - perhaps no more than fifteen or twenty - with a thick, heavy handwriting. The early part, of about eight to ten pages, seemed to be some complex account of something in the form of a dialogue, which the girl had little interest in reading immediately, especially because the rest of the filled-up pages were in the form of a journal, with dated entries - some pressed together on consecutive days, others spread apart by as much as a month - and of course, written in the first person. The girl thought this to likely be far more interesting, so she settled down to read this part first.

[What follows now are some selected - well, okay, we selected them! - extracts from some similarly selected dates in that journal, just to give you, the reader, a direct sample of that book. Oh do not ask how we got this, just go and make your visit, into this book.]

16th April

Today I was reminded of her again, when I saw someone on TV who reminded me of her, although they looked nothing like each other. Whatever it was, I was reminded of her, and wondering why she was coming back so persistently to my mind, when a strange coincidence took place: I got a message from her, asking me how I was. She was very concerned about the way in which I was being hounded by the admin - it seems even the trainees know about it now! It was no different from the way in which so many other trainees of mine, past and present, had also done. Yet, her reaching out at the very time when I was thinking about her seems to me more than fortuitous - seems something special.

17th April

I wrote her a message today indicating that I had found her presence rather distracting, when she had been my trainee. I added that she was a true combination of beauty and brains. I was so confident of the sign from the universe, that it had blessed my little flirtation, that I expected - no, was absolutely certain of - a positive, reciprocal, equally flirtatious response. But it turned out to be a minor disaster. She wrote back sternly asking me to desist from such communications with her as she deeply resented being seen as a sexual object. She added that she had only had a high regard for me as her trainer, and that I should behave like one, and not abuse my position by becoming a sexual predator. So I apologized to her, but reminded her that, since she had left, she was no longer my trainee, and that I was not just a trainer but a man with feelings and desires like any other man - which I think is a fairly reasonable point. But she was incensed even more! She demanded that I immediately stop all communication with her.

So that's it?. I felt - feel! - so ashamed that I deleted all the communication between us. But how incredibly stupid of me to think that the universe was actually conspiring to help me!! If it hadn't been for these stupid little superstitions I succumb to so often, I probably never would have said anything to her. Or maybe it was the fucking booze! Never write crap again, when drunk - look what an ass it's made of you. Anyway, whatever it was, I never should have written to her, and I've been served as thorough a scolding for that as any that I've deserved. So stupid!! If S ever finds out - I don't want to even imagine the consequences?.

26th April

I can't believe this shitstorm that's unfolding!! She took our messages and went public! They're circulating amongst the current batch, many of whom are now coming forward and accusing me of making them too feel similarly uncomfortable with my remarks or jokes, or, even if I had said nothing overt, just my gaze. The trainees have circulated these communications, and these accusations, amongst my colleagues as well. If that asshole R gets wind of this, he'll demand my resignation! The trainees first asked for a public apology from me, which I refused to give - I was, and am, furious that they didn't come to me before going to my colleagues! It's so humiliating to have my private correspondence being circulated like this - as it would be for anyone, because that is the nature of private correspondence, we write and say things we wouldn't in public - and then being asked to apologise for that!

So I decided to tap RH for some legal advice. He told me off roundly, for having behaved in a way unbefitting a trainer of my standing and repute; but once he cooled off, he offered to file a case of blackmail and other electronic crimes against the entire batch of trainees. He was absolutely sure there was a strong criminal case waiting to be fought there. For a minute I was sorely tempted, but then I figured that I really wanted this to blow over without S getting to know about it. So then he advised me to lie low and not do or say anything, for a while - but also to consider my options if the trainees did decide to go public.

Most importantly, he said, make sure your boss, R doesn't get wind of this, because it would be two birds with one stone for him: he can win brownie points with the admin by gifting your case to them, and get rid of you in the process. RH was referring to the other mess of mine that he was handling, the trouble with the admin. I said I would keep his words in mind, and called off.

Anyway, I hope this current batch lets it go now. It upsets me deeply to be in this position in relation to them, over something so mindless and stupid on my part?.

27th April

Now these uppity shits are asking for my resignation, or they're going to take it to the press! What the fuck!! I'm seriously considering asking RH to file cases against the whole bunch of these too-big-for-their-fucking-boots fuckers!!

I can't understand how this has happened?. I'm really worried now about S getting to know - she'll be utterly humiliated - and she is one person who values her dignity more than anybody else I know. What the fuck have I unleashed on us????

28th April

I apologized to the trainees today. It was an unconditional apology, to them and to my colleagues in the training department. From what I understand, my colleagues decided to try to keep the matter quiet, so that it wouldn't reach R's ears. But this could happen only if I apologised to the trainees, because they had threatened to take the matter to R directly, if I did not apologise. My colleagues have been wonderful. I believe they negotiated the trainees down from the demand for my resignation to accepting my apology and the condition that I would not train the current batch - who had supposedly felt uncomfortable with me. So I gave them an unconditional apology, and specially to the girls whom I had apparently made uncomfortable.

But those were not the worst parts of this truly miserable day. The worst part came before that, in the morning itself, when I finally decided to confess all to S and to ask for her forgiveness and advice on this matter. I had to. If she comes to know in any other way, it would be far worse - so I told her. She and M, bless her soul, helped me draft the letter of apology, after I'd told them. I also had to tell little P because she kept asking her sister, and M would keep looking pointedly at me - ask Dad, she said finally. So I told little P as well. I was hoping she was still too small to really understand what has happened to me, but the look of sheer disgust she gave me afterwards hurt me more than anything else has, ever. She maybe just twelve, but she's already as fiery and independent as her mother and her sister - under other circumstances, I would have been so proud of them, for seeing everything - seeing me! - so clearly, but handling everything with so much maturity and grace, including little P.

I have never before felt such an intense desire to die. Quickly and silently.

5th May

So much has happened in the last week. My life has descended into a bottomless toilet.

I tried very hard to keep things "normal", which was a stupid thing to do, looking back, because something so insanely abnormal had just happened. The humongous elephant of a question that hung between all of us - why did I do it? - was the one thing I wasn't ready to talk about it, not even acknowledge. And the longer I refused to talk about it, the more the tension grew between them and me - until yesterday, when it all came crashing down.

It started with M calling me in the morning to come and talk about this with all of them. You can't pretend like nothing has happened, Dad, she said, You owe us all an explanation, especially Mom. And we can't keep living in this suffocating, toxic silence that you've unleashed, and tiptoeing around you on eggshells all the time. We need to talk!

I refused bluntly. I told her I wasn't ready to talk yet, but I was happy to come and listen to what they had to say. She flared up and accused me of being a coward and a sick old man, preying on young women, and then not even having the guts to - I didn't let her finish. Instead - heaven help me! - in the middle of whatever she was saying, I lost it completely, and hit her.

The sound of my palm striking her cheek was so loud that it shocked even me and I froze. She went stumbling from me, almost fell down, and then, her hand rubbing her cheek, she stared back at me as if I was a complete stranger. But what really numbed me was the sheer terror in her eyes - I've never seen her or her sister ever look like that at anyone.

I was deeply ashamed of myself and tried to reach out to her, but she screamed and pushed me away, hard, so I fell back on the bed. Before I could say anything, S stepped between us and asked me to get out of the room immediately.

I left the house and walked aimlessly for nearly four hours, unable to think. When I came back, there was a lock on the door, with a note: We're leaving, it said, We all think you need to be on your own for a bit. Call me when you're ready to behave and converse like a mature adult, and not like a thug on the street. It was signed by S. There was no mention of where they were going, or how long they were going for, but I'm fairly sure she's gone to her sister's place. They might as well have gone to Mars, because she knows I'll never go over there.

I was very upset yesterday, but today I've been thinking, Fuck it!! Maybe I do need some alone time to figure this crap out, so it's just as well they've gone. I'm going to apply for some leave from tomorrow - in any case the trainees don't want me to teach them, and the less I see of my dear colleagues the better for both of us?. I certainly am too deeply ashamed and embarrassed to encounter them.

15th May

Today, S called to ask me why I was trying to reach her. I've been trying all week to speak to her, but she wasn't taking my calls, but today she called back finally. I was so happy. I told her the truth, which is, that I missed her and the kids tremendously, and that I would really like to see them, and that they couldn't have come up with a harsher punishment than this, isolating me like this. I asked her how long she intended to punish me for.

She was silent for a moment, then said, with no unkindness, in a very matter-of-fact way, You are still talking like an immature teenager. Please grow up. We are not punishing you, we are waiting for you to grow up and behave with responsibility towards yourself, your family and your profession.

I'm glad she cut the call then, because I fear I was about to say something really nasty. But I'm glad now that I didn't get to do that.

But I can't understand this crap about responsibility! I took responsibility by apologising, unconditionally that too; and by confessing everything to S voluntarily. So what the fuck more do I have to do??

Another unpleasantness happened today. I fired mali-bhaiya. I felt like shit after I did it, and I don't even understand why I did it. I caught him staring at me as I was roaming around the house talking to myself. Today he's only seen me, tomorrow he may actually hear what I'm ranting about. I don't want anyone's eyes on me, not even my friends - whose calls I've stopped answering anyway. That's probably the reason I fired him, instinctively. But I still feel really bad about it.

I no longer trust myself - I increasingly feel as if I'm doing things that I have not willed or wanted. How is that possible?

18th May

Everyday, day after day, I ask myself that same question: why did I do it? Why did I try to start flirting with this girl? And why did she react so sharply? I know it was a stupid thing to write, but I don't think it was particularly offensive either. At least, not so much that it had to be made into such a circus!

Or perhaps it was the simple fact that, as her trainer (albeit former), and that too one so much her senior I could be her father, I had come across as utterly revolting?

Or was I, in fact, the sexual predator that she thought me to be? Could I be predatory without even realising it?

I think I will have to answer this question first, to be able to answer the other one - why did I do it?

24th May

I continued to badger S with my phone calls. Yesterday she finally answered; I was so surprised that I blurted the first thing that came to mind: I need you!

She was silent for a while - long enough for me to think she'd cut the call, pushing me quickly to the edge of panic, and a monumental rage at myself. Then she simply said, I'll bring the kids to see you tomorrow. She would have barely caught my grateful shout of thanks, when she cut the call.

Then I did something that I hadn't done since my teenage years: I sank to the floor and shivered and wept for a long time.

Today she called in the morning to say she was bringing the girls over for lunch. I cooked up a feast of their favourite foods, and waited impatiently for them. But when they came I almost froze up completely. Their entire body language, both of them, shouted out their fear and disgust. I had wanted to pick them each up and swirl them around and hug them and cry with them and say how sorry, how incredibly sorry I was - but I froze. S ushered them into the house, and the lunch that followed was a horrendous experience - for all of us, I'm sure.

S called me aside as they were leaving. She looked a little concerned and asked me about my health. I told her how I was suffering from bouts of insomnia, followed by brief stretches of sleep filled with nightmares. She just looked at me with that intensely compassionate, kind, loving look that I missed so much, and said, I will do whatever I can to help you. But you need to address those questions that you're avoiding, and you need to do so with the girls as much as with me. And you need to explain your violence, and assure them - assure us! - in some way, that you will never ever raise your hand on us again. Without that - well, you saw today what kind of a situation you would have with them?.

I tried to tell her some of the things I'd been thinking might actually serve as suitable answers - answers that she might find acceptable: that I'd been so pedestalised by my trainees over the last few years that I thought they would never turn against me; that I had gotten so bloated with hero-worship that I thought I could do no wrong; that the girl meant nothing to me beyond a passing flirtation - all of which were probably true to some extent. But even as I began stammering out these half-truths, I realised why they could only ever be half-truths, because none of them showed me taking responsibility for anything. So I stuttered, squirming, into silence.

Then it struck me that I should at least ask if they were alright for money, if they needed anything. I asked as much. She stared at me in utter sadness, then shook her head and walked away.

The gaze from my children as they left, filled with an attempt to hide their loathing, stayed in my head for long afterwards.

25th May

Last night again I couldn't sleep for a long time, and it was almost dawn when I finally dozed off - only to repeatedly see my children's contemptuous look, dancing on the faces of people and other strange creatures in my nightmares. I woke up twice: once, when I had to use the loo - I got up, went to the bathroom, peed, washed my hands, all in crystal-clear detail. Then I looked at myself in the mirror and saw, with the same crystal clarity, a teeming mass of shadows around me, inside me, looking out through my eyes blindly, but with an expression of such intense predation that I shouted and woke up again - this time for real, to find myself in a pool of my piss.

Since then I haven't slept, this time also because I fear what sleep brings. In the meanwhile, I think about those questions, and what their answers could be, and the more I think about them, the less I like what I find myself thinking.

28th June

Contrary to Sartre's experience, I have found that hell is not other people. Or rather, the hell that is other people is only the surface of the bubbling, oily broth that is the real hell, which I have found is actually deep within myself.

I have spent the last month almost entirely in my room, my little asylum, in the corner of this vast house. I cook and eat whatever I can when I'm hungry, so I use the kitchen, and of course the bathroom. So I have no idea what the rest of the house looks like. But I will have to get some more provisions, because I'm running out of things to eat.

These last few weeks have been a voyage into this hell - a voyage, I now realise, of which I may never ever reach the end. In moments of brief - all too brief! - respite, I have tried to understand this hell, to render my experience of it into words, to give that experience a shape and colour and weight - but it keeps slipping out of my sleepless mind. I feel like I am the broken shards of a mirror trying to piece itself together, but only drifting further and further apart, bearing multiple distorted fragmented images of me. Maybe the slipping out, and this fragmenting, is itself an integral part of this experience of hell. If it is, it is nevertheless only a very small part; the real experience of hell is in the excavation I am undertaking inside me, exhuming ghosts I thought were long exorcised away. I wonder if, like in that old horror movie, I'll bring back something that will possess me so completely that no exorcism will work?.

I didn't realise till yesterday that the tools I was digging with were the very same questions that I'd been thinking ceaselessly about. Maybe that's why the stuff I'm exhuming is the inky, slimy stuff of decaying desire, flowing out of me as the shadows I see in my nightmares.

And worst of all, every night as I slip desperately over the thin ice of sleep, I hear a man's deep voice reprimanding me, berating me, for my weakness, my cowardice, taunting me with the images and voices of the women I have desired in my life, their clammy hands flowing stickily over my body as I finally succumb and slide into one nightmare after another. And as I slide down, I realise that the deep man's voice is my voice, booming, becoming the voice of all men, booming and echoing in the cavern of my cranium.

30th June

Last night the shadows came out of the walls and roamed around the house. I heard the dogs barking madly outside, then watched, terrified, as the shadows became enraged, manic, and surged around me, engulfing me in a grey, boiling, septic darkness. A voice in my head screamed, Tell them to shut up, tell them to shut up!! It felt like every cell in my body had suddenly developed its own lips and mouth and tongue and throat, and was screaming, screaming with the pain of the shadows.

I somehow stumbled and bludgeoned my way to the door and ran out of the house in terror. The moment I crossed the threshold and flung myself into the midst the dogs, I felt as if a planet-sized weight had been lifted off me, under the oppression of which I had become so completely abject that I could no longer even sense it - till I stepped out into the company of the dogs.

I didn't dare go back into the house. I just lay down there in the overgrown, unkempt garden, deep with grass and weeds, with the dogs around me and a cool summer breeze to cover me, under the trees and the stars. I don't even remember passing out; I just slept soundly and dreamlessly for the first time in a long, long time.

I think I may have found the answer to my sleep issues.

9th July

It worked for a few nights, during which time I started feeling much better, and actually went out once, to the market, to pick up some vegetables and eggs and other stuff to cook with, in case I got a chance to call S and the kids over again. I even managed a civil conversation with that asshole R, who called to inquire about my "health condition", as he called it, with much solicitousness. Since I was feeling so much better, I decided to call S and the kids and see if we could have another meeting.

The first thing she asked me was whether I was ready to have an adult conversation and an adult relationship, with her, and if I was ready to be a responsible parent to M and P. I almost lost my temper. There's no need to be so patronising! I snapped, then felt a massive attack of guilt and fear that she would cut the call. Instead, after a pause, she simply said, I didn't mean to be. I'm sorry it sounded that way to you. What I meant was -

I interrupted: I know what you meant, it's OK.

But she pressed on as if I hadn't spoken: What I was referring to was the issue we left you with - the assurance that we, the girls and I, needed from you and the questions that we asked you. We are entitled to the assurance and the answers as you yourself would admit. Without those we really can't move forward with you. You need to see that clearly.

I had nothing to say. What was I supposed to tell her - that those questions were now so deep inside me that they resounded in every heartbeat, in every breath? That the deeper I went with them, the scarier the shit that I found? All that I've papered over, covered up, buried, carefully and relentlessly, over years, so that I wouldn't have to be aware of them - now they were all floating up from inside me like turds in overflowing sewage. How could I tell her that? That there are voices in my head now that I no longer recognise as me, memories I can't believe, don't want to believe, are mine? How could I tell her that, when I look in the mirror, all I see is a creature in my eyes tormented by being torn between a deep, deep, insatiable lust and a relentless terror of being discovered? And I see that creature verging on violence, willing to do anything to not be discovered. How do I tell her all this? And what assurance will that give?

And how do I tell my children all this?

We spoke a little while longer - perfunctory mutual inquiries about each other's health, my inquiry about the children, some reminder S had got about some pending bill that I'd forgotten to pay, and which I can't remember again now?. I could almost smell the relief in her voice when we said bye. Or maybe I didn't smell anything, and it was just my guilt projecting outward.

As usual after that, I ranted and raved, pacing up and down inside the house. I can't remember what I was raving on about - I do remember speaking in different voices, playing roles, entertaining myself out of the sudden collapse of my recent sense of well-being. But I also do remember a part of me feeling increasingly incensed, angry, vicious and spiteful even. And I remember spitting my spite at the house too, and deciding that I was not going to be chased out anymore from my own house every night. So I slept inside last night - or rather, I stayed inside; sleep, I did not. Not till it was almost dawn - and as usual, the nightmares were waiting for me.

13th July

I am increasingly convinced that I am doomed.

I can no longer tell the voices from my past, in my head, from the voices that float around in these rooms - or so it seems; for all I know, they too are only in my head. Which is why I can't tell them apart.

Who is it who writes this? Is it me? Or me? Or me? Or me? Or I? Or me? Which one of these am I? Is the I who writes the eye that sees? Or is someone else seeing through my eyes now? What if I now pull up those questions - Why did I do it? and, What assurance can I give them? - who will answer?

But surely, the answers are not so difficult! Answer to Question One: I did it because I could. Answer to Question Two: I assure you this will never happen again, I will never be violent again, because I never again want to be in this hell - which is where I will land up if I repeat these things, except it will be ten times worse. Just imagining it is scary.

But what about that cunning, devious, deceptive bastard of lust whom you have begun to see clearly inside you? When you say, I did it because I could, is it this rapacious bastard who speaks? Who is basically saying that he will hide in the folds of your vaunted gentility, to spring out at trusting, unsuspecting young girls? And they won't know whether you're just being friendly or subtly taking advantage of their position in relation to you? You see, that's what all those other girls saw in you, that made them uncomfortable - this devious dandy, cloaked in charm, making sheep eyes at them. And they would have just laughed you off, if you had been any other old man - but their trainer?? How they must have dreaded you!!

I recall the moment when P looked at me with such loathing, and suddenly remembered something M had said, in her rage at my refusal to talk: Dad, what if one of my teachers had behaved like this with me? What would you have done?

And I remembered that it was one of the things that made me hit her.

I realise now that I am the man that every parent warns their daughters about. That man, who comes in many guises, speaks in many voices, but all with that one same intent that even they may not be aware they have. That man, who lives in all men. Who is legion. He has told me his name - Old Longtooth. So called because of the long tooth standing perpetually erect from his loins.

20th July

Everyday we watch each other, Old Longtooth and I. I've realised that he is constantly seeking a way not to be seen by me - and what better way to do that then to become me? I have found myself speaking, or thinking, or doing, what Old Longtooth wants so many times now, and then immediately trying to distance myself in my own head from that - but I still find it difficult to keep vigilant about him.

I think about the question that became prior to the Why did I do it? question, viz., the Am I in fact a sexual predator? question. I know the answer clearly to both now. But that doesn't really help me answer the question of her reaction. Or doesn't it?

Thinking about it now, it seems quite possible that that girl - like so many girls and women I know - was subjected to sexual abuse, or even just unwanted sexual attention, at some point in her life. And it's possible also that it was from someone against whom she felt she could do nothing - so that, when it happened from me, she unleashed hell - all the hell she couldn't unleash on that other perpetrator, doubled for me.

Or was it? Is this just Old Longtooth's minimising estimation of my action - that it did not warrant that kind of reaction from her - and is it actually very much warranted? How the fuck does it matter whether or not she was subjected to this stuff earlier - how does that give you any kind of right to mitigate what you did?

What you did??? What the actual fuck!!?? We did it! Don't you go pretending that you had nothing to do with what happened - I don't remember anyone saying, Don't do this! at that point! You went along with everything!

Maybe - and that's why I need to distance myself from you. Because a part of me can't stand you, and all that you represent, and that part feels compromised so profoundly by you. Which is why, whatever answer I give S and the kids has to show that I am not you, that I became aware of you and will work towards destroying you. I have to relentlessly attack you inside me, kill you off, just as I have to relentlessly attack your supply lines from outside, that feed you and keep you alive.

You'll never get rid of me. I am legion. And you and I are the same.

Never.

24th July

Where does one's responsibility as a spouse and a parent begin, and where does it end? I want to live, but only without Old Longtooth's legions swilling around inside me, and popping out when I least realise it. I want to live for S and M and P, and for the lives we had together. I want to be able to hug M again, and tease her about her boyfriends, and play chess with her, and rant with her about the government and the politicians and the economy. I want to carry P piggyback again, and swing her around till she squeals with delight, and run around in the garden with her and the dogs. I want to go shopping with S, and come back home and eat dinner with her and the kids, and chat about our days, and then retire to our room where we would so often wait and wait and wait for the kids to fall asleep, so we could make love - tender and intense and passionate - and almost as often fall asleep ourselves, waiting and waiting and waiting. And then laughing crossly the next day.

I want to be able to love as I used to, wildly and freely and single-mindedly, responsible only for my love and my loves?.

But it's all become so dirty now.

Old Longtooth laughs in my head, scoffs at my ideas of responsibility and love. He has to die.

You'd have to die too, idiot. You can't just kill me and think you'll survive unscathed.

Maybe. Or maybe I can device a 'suicide' plan in which I will survive, and you won't.

Which one of us? Me? Or you?

I recall reading something once, written by a writer who was intimate with ghosts, that the only real telepathy is between a writer and a reader, through the magic medium of words on a page. Makes sense...with any other kind of 'telepathy', how the hell do you know the voice in your head is not just your own.

If I can't get rid of you, I'd rather die.

4th August

I know for a fact now that there have been innumerable occasions when Old Longtooth has become me, and I have become Old Longtooth, and I've been none the wiser for it until much later. He makes my stories his, and his stories mine, until I can't tell the difference.

But what if I could invert that? What if I could write and re-write Old Longtooth's stories, so that I slowly and inexorably replace him with me? After all, if it is only in writing you that I am able to separate my voice from yours, then it is only in writing that I will subsume your voice into mine - writing me, everywhere that you try to write you.

You can certainly try - it would just be an interesting exercise in suicide by writing, if you ask me - but do go ahead. Because I am vast, I have more stories in me than you can begin to comprehend, and all those stories are constantly shaping the landscape of your - our! - lives so decisively that there is no way you can re-write them. You'll just become one of them. One of us. Even more than you already are.

Maybe. But something has to be done if I want S and the kids back - something that involves your utter and complete disappearance from our lives.

8th August

Yesterday I caught myself writing to her again - a sick, lame, grovelling note, asking her to remember that, even if I had been her trainer, after all, I was just a man, with a man's desires and feelings and sensibilities. And I wrote an email to S that was horrifying in its dryness, in the blatant lack of interest in her or the kids. I cannot recall with any accuracy if I'd sent these messages or not. My trust in myself is non-existent now - Old Longtooth is everywhere in me.

Today I called mali-bhaiya and asked him to come over. I wanted him to take this notebook and perhaps even destroy it, because I realise now that the more I write about Old Longtooth, the stronger he gets. I tried to destroy the notebook myself, but couldn't - every time I tried to throw it away, or tear it apart, or set fire to it, my hands would revolt against me. He has almost total command over me - at least, the part of me that wants to get rid of him. To reverse the words of the poet, He is all princes, and all states, I.

But mali-bhaiya didn't understand what I was asking of him. I tried so hard to explain to him why he had to do it, and not me - I tried threatening him, cajoling him, bribing him - nothing worked! He says he'll drop in after 3-4 days, but I won't fucking last that long!! Old Longtooth is becoming stronger with each passing day.

And how else would it be? We have grown exceedingly fond of this place, and two days ago we had a conversation with the dogs. With their leader actually. We'd gotten really tired of being barked at, and that horrible sound they make. I taught the leader a new song - yes, the very one you've been hearing them howl over the last couple of nights, their tragic aria, sung for the fading of the moon. They just love it, did you listen to them yesterday?

But tonight there will be no moon, and no howling, and no barking. Tonight, in the silence, we will come into our own?.

No. I'm not going to write you anymore. Motherfucker.

That was the last entry. When the girl finished reading, she realised that she'd been up well into the early hours. In a couple of hours it would be dawn. She closed the book and lay down and listened quietly to the night, her mind full of the travails of T. It dawned on her slowly that the dogs were very quiet - and then she realised that she had been missing their barking and howling - in fact, they had been howling the last two nights. She sat up, bolt upright, wide awake: what if mali-uncle and T had been right about the dogs and ghosts? Were ghosts roaming freely tonight?

Terror flooded into her in sudden, ferocious waves. She froze, unable to move, unable to think, staring hard into the darkness in the corners of her room that the bedside lamp's light didn't reach. What was there? Was that movement she saw? The shadows seemed to fill and turn and reach up the walls, like long, curving hands with long curving fingers?.

She squeezed her eyes shut, slid deep down into her blanket and covered her ears. A glow of anger began to grow in her after a while - at mali-uncle, at stupid T, at she herself, for cowering like a frightened puppy. With a curse, she leapt out of bed, turned on all the lights and blasted the most raucous music she could find in her collection directly into her ears, with her headphones on. It worked. After a while, she felt foolish and childish, for having reacted with such fear. They were just stories, she reminded herself, just stupid stories, that T - clearly a nut-job, if ever she'd seen one! - had succumbed to. With newfound confidence, she decided to turn in, and go to sleep.

She lay down, tucked herself in comfortably, then reached to turn out the light next to her. Which was when she caught a glimpse, in the cupboard mirror, of the shadows swirling around her, behind her?.

[A little after this, the girl and her family left the house. She fell very ill, you see, and we couldn't really get past the mad circus of her delusions and deliriums. When she recovered, she actually ran away to live with her grandparents - refused to rejoin her parents unless they left this house. We all believe that to be a rather nasty put-down - surely we didn't deserve that! We're told by the cats we know that she is now studying in some girls-only college, not far from here. Or not; these stories are hard to believe, cats will say anything, just to watch you believe them.

T's wife and kids have left the country, according to the cats - a pity, they were such a promising lot! The mali too has disappeared. We suspect he's gone back to his village - our brethren there will take care of him.

You've probably figured by now that we are Old Longtooth - though we have many names besides. We are legion, you see. In English, we're commonly known as 'ghosts', but we have many names in many languages: 'yurei' in Japanese; 'bhooth' in many Indian languages; 'mzuka' in Swahili; 'shabah' in Arabic - and so on. What none of these words tell you though, is that all ghosts are stories - and all stories are ghosts. We've inhabited you since forever, you just didn't know, because you kept thinking you were writing your own story. And perhaps you were - for us?.

But enough about us: tell us about you. What's your story? Share it with us, and we'll share our stories with you.

Oh, and do tell us if you have any dogs.]