Where did it come from?
Semester break was over. He was back in his hostel room with Karan.
"Did you miss gaming," Karan asked the first question in the morning.
"Do you think my hometown doesn't have internet cafés to play games?"
"Then did you miss me?"
"Absolutely not." Martin answered with a straight face.
They went to college the next day. Vanessa and Martin had eye contact for a nanosecond followed by Brian jumping over Martin and asking, "who is she? I never noticed her. Is she a sophomore?" Martin ignored his interjections and took a seat.
That evening when Martin was walking on the pavement to go to a convenience store. He saw Vanessa sitting outside that store, alone, munching. He bought something to eat and sat with her, giving her company.
"You didn't go to the café today?" Vanessa inquired.
"Wow… you really know a lot about me, while I know nothing about you. This is unfair, ma'am."
"You can call me Vanessa," she said.
The sun set down. She started stargazing. She was fed up with her strong hearing sense. She knew the secrets the next room couples had kept from each other because they didn't trust each other, just pretending to be lovey-dovey for the sake of showing off to their friends and family. Everything would be sorted out once they talked openly with each other, otherwise they should just break up. That won't go a long way. A high school student was sitting at the corner table in front of hers. He was unhappy living with his aunt, only if he lived alone he would have been more happy than how he was at that time, were his thoughts. Vanessa heard him talking on his phone. She sighed, "the lack of trust they have." "Me?" Martin asked, feeling triggered.
"Not you, but that boy. The strong hearing I am gifted with gives me a hard time. It is more of a curse than a blessing. I can hear other's secrets, their opinions. People cannot trust others nowadays. Majority of their problems will disappear once they talk."
"Oh, so you have a power as well, power to hear sounds. No wonder, we both are attached, I mean, we both are unique."
"Huh!"
"Nothing, I feel glad."
She warned him to be careful not to expose his powers to anyone, not even his friends as you never know who would take advantage of you. Martin replied, "I am hearing this for the second time now. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. Your secret is safe too. I believe there are other people like us in the universe. Don't you think we exist for some reason? Who is the villain?" Vanessa herself doesn't know. They exchanged their phone numbers and went their separate ways.
It has been a week and Marrin and Vanessa have become closer. One day, Brian's mother invited Brian's friends to their house. Brian lives with his mother and a sister. They have their own property located not so far from the college. A swimming pool, a small library, a collection of cars, numerous servants, they had everything a rich family is expected to have. "Wow, I want to live your life. You must be getting everything you want immediately," Karan said with glimmering eyes.
"No, it's not like that," was Brian's reply but Karan ignored him. They talked for hours in Brian's room while Karan admired his belongings all the time. Martin noticed that his room has a monitor set to play games. "You can play games as long as you like, right?" His two friends had lunch and left by the evening. Nothing weird happened but the atmosphere inside wasn't positive either. Oddly enough, Martin felt trapped and a bit suffocated there.
When he reached his room, he felt a sharp pain in the center of his forehead. Karan was alright, roaming in the park outside. The pain disappeared after about 20 minutes and he slept.
No sooner did he close his eyes, then he envisioned that a man in early thirties was running along the river shore. He was constantly looking back and panting. Someone was following him with a knife. Then the victim was caught by the culprit and he kneeled down, pleading to spare his life. But the other person didn't show any mercy and slit the victim's face with that knife. The victim opposed the gash with his two hands crossed in front of his face. Just then Martin woke up, heavily breathing. "I wish this isn't true."
He walked towards the washroom to wash his face. "Ahhh…!!" He screeched loudly enough that Karan sitting on the park's bench just near to the hostel heard this scream coming from the first floor of the hostel. Others may have heard but they didn't pay much attention and ignored it. Also there weren't many students in the evening inside their rooms.
Karan came rushing to the room only to see his friend sitting on the floor with a shocking, exhausted face, staring at the floor. Karan walked a few steps forward to see what's that shocking thing lying on the floor. Karan couldn't believe his eyes, and moved his eyesight in the direction of Martin out of concern. He broke the silence, "what happened? Where did it come from?"
There was a human pinkie finger lying on the ground with its blood dried up. It seemed as if the finger was preserved in a refrigerator and then purposely dropped there. Both of them were blank.
After ten minutes, they returned to their senses. Karan said, "should we tell this to the police or warden or Brian or anyone who could help? I don't think we can handle this by ourselves."
"Wait, I have something to tell you. I had a dream, sorta, where I saw a person getting bashed on his face by a knife. I know this is stupid but could this be related to my dream?"
"Who believes that? Firstly pick up that finger and then think further on what to do and whom to tell."
"I am more shocked than you. Can't you do that?"
Karan took two 30 cm rulers and used them as tongs to pick up the frozen finger from the floor. "Why will anybody do this on purpose? Did you get into fights at cafés and didn't tell me?"
"No, I didn't."