Arhi FF: Kalarikkal House-2 [Thread 3 link posted] - Page 110

part 33
OMG this is really so mysterious...
how did he die?
and why was he like that in those days?
poor Devaki...
and Kashi's mom wanted to name Kashi Devaki...
and her bro saw her aunt ghost...
and Kashi couldnt?
cont soon dear...

Hello again. So the last chapter was just so...thought-provoking. I read it twice and then went back to the chapters relevant to these strange sibling relationships (even though I couldn't, for the life of me, locate the eye-donation one. So excuse any random memory lapses, please). Also the ones on Lakshmi. God, I should just go back and read it all again, I think.😆

So anyway, Devaki and her life-story was very interesting. Women and their soul-bonds with the home and the family. No wonder Kashi seems to be so deeply entrenched in the mystery of the illam and its silent surroundings. In so many ways, she is in here deeper than even Pallavi, it seems. Or it might just seem that way because we see Kashi much more closely than her sister. So many mother figures, and all of them cursed in some way or the other. I was reading a previous part where Kashi and Arnav were having this argument about whether death takes more courage or life/living. Made me wonder what Devaki's end was like? Also loved the curse-reversal part. For me, it spoke of a progress- social and moral, within the Namboothiri family itself, especially because the father who had denied Devaki her agency earlier restores it by narrating something relevant to her story to his children years later. It is strange because I was reading Nietzche the other day ( purely for academic purposes, I assure you), and according to this man, truth is what you construct for yourself. There is no single, universal, permanent truth; there is only "becoming". I am now beginning to see how Kashi has 'become'.

About the rest of it, the connection between the siblings is actually quite mystifying to me. It is difficult to give an opinion because I as a reader know the story while the main characters don't, and I don't know where this is going at all (which is just great, by the way). One could of course say that there is some higher, transcendental power at play here, which would definitely be in keeping with the mood you have set from the beginning. The connection which led to the strange ghost viewing might be the eyes, I think. Sight, again, is a very loaded concept, and you have already made use of it in so many different ways here, all of them beautiful. Would love to see how you take this forward.

'The drugs, the death due to causes unknown- I would probably say it adds to the never-ending mysteries in this story if all of it were not just so emotional and depressing. A bright light extinguished, leaving darkness behind it even years later. Just plain sad.

Lastly, I will join the chorus of voices asking for this work to be published. It is truly worthy of reaching more people. Name your characters X and Y rather than from the serial, for all I care. They will remain just as beautiful to me.  👏

Another long, rambling thingie. Sheesh.


Edited by merit - 11 years ago

Once upon a happier time, when life wasn't all about how smooth your legs look, or how bad your haircut makes you look, a girl and her best friend were swinging in the park, making promises about how they'd never leave each other. The next day, this particular girl and her best friend met again. And again. The girl's best friend's parents never had time for her. Business trips. Pleasure trips. Unwinding trips. You get the idea. Her best friend, however, never hated them. She understood that they never had time for her, and loved them despite it. Everything was absolutely perfect. The girls were popular, straight A students. Nothing to worry about.

 

Then one day, two years later, the girl's best friend stopped answering her phone calls. Stopped hanging out with her. "Do you want to come and play?" "Nope. Too much pending work" "Do you wanna come over to my place?" "No. I have to go somewhere". The best friend was fast becoming a recluse. Her grades fell sharply. Her friends turned back on her. Everything was spiralling downwards. Way downwards.

 

 One of them, however, stayed. The one who had promised to steal her Jijaji's shoes on her wedding. She called at the best friend's place every day. She'd go to their place. Try to catch her alone in school. Heck! She even tried calling her parents, even thought she knew that the gardener knew more about their daughter than they did. "Nothing to worry about beta, she's just growing up" they laughed.

 

After six months of constant rebuffs from the best friend's home, parents and the best friend herself, the girl gave up trying. Maybe she doesn't want to be friends any more. It was a possibility, yes. A painful one, but a possibility.

 

A few months later, the girl and her best friend ran into each other. Pure chance.

 

Awkward silence, shy hello's, a cup of frozen yoghurt maybe?

 

There was something odd about the best friend now. Her eyes. They had lost their spark. The champagne like laughter, golden and bubbly. Gone. Never to return. The luminous smile was now a ghost of its past glory. It was dark, that smile. Dark. Sinister.

 

The girls talked for an hour or so. The weather. Their families. How they had promised to steal Jijaji's shoes. They talked. They jested. They laughed. But they never touched on the most important thing of all.

 

What the best friend had been doing all this time?

 

They walked off in different directions, promising to keep in touch. Promises they never kept. A few days later, the girl received a phone call, five in the morning. Apparently, the best friend had overdosed. She was dead. The girl stared at her phone, unable to believe. OD? Her best friend? How? Hadn't she, just a few days back, promised to call? The girl walked over to the best friend's house, and saw her friend lie on the floor, the corners of her mouth foaming. Opium, the doctors ruled. Overdose of opium. The girl watched blankly as they burnt the funeral pyre. It hit her, as the black smoke went spiralling towards the clear blue sky. Jijaji's shoes won't get stolen after all.

 

 

The girl, who had promised to never leave the best friend's side? Who had broken every promise she had made to her? That was me.

 

I could have done so much. Had my irrational fear of looking like an idiot not come into play. I could have talked to the teachers. I could have  tried harder to talk to her. But I hadn't. Because, the possibility, that she may not want to talk to me, was also there. Scary, yes. But it was a possibility.

 

I never asked what she had been doing all this while. Was it fear of the unknown? Or was it fear of the known? I don't know.

 

I have only one thing to say, in my defence. To quote the school councillor (who talked to me, after my parents were alarmed by the number of times I just wasn't hungry) "I was only human. And I had tried my best" That was my defence against the guilt. I was only human.

 

And it was the most pathetic defence I had.

 

I still wonder what happened, to make her turn to opium. What had happened, that my best friend was lying on the cold, marble floor, with foam sticking to the corner of her mouth. What was so great, that she shut me off so completely.

 

You know, when we both had absolutely nothing to do, she'd belt out Shakira's Hips don't lie; and I'd dance. We'd collapse on the bed, in a fit of giggles, after I wound provocatively raise an eyebrow, and blow kisses at her. We were perfect together. That's what everyone said, when they caught us in this rare moment.

 

Old, bitter memories, Devi. You bought them back.

-V

 

PS- I'm sorry, If I ruined your space with my story. It just rose in me, like vomit; after trying to supress the guilt for a long time. I guess it came out.

Edited by V323 - 11 years ago

Hey d, thnks a lot for the update girl, was going mad officially,stalking this.Well so they were once upon a time a happy family. Was unni murdered? Is there more to his death? Can't wait for more. Pls update soon!

So kashi's father meant dat her mother wanted to name her devaki bcoz she would remove the curse behind dat name as she is very pure n no darkness recides in her !!
N wat the hell does it mean dat the cause of her brothers death was unknow...der wasn't any drugs so how the hell did he die ? Is der a mystery behind it ?

Love the new pictures of Devakii you have put up ... 

Great update... And I did a double-take when I saw the title of the update , really! :-)

Your Devaki is gorgeous! Looks like a picture of a well known dancer. Who is she?

i read dis ff in one go...wooahhh...man...its freaking amazing...😃😃

wow. this is was something.