Death Walked Down this Corridor

The winding corridor looks darker than before. The solitary bulb glows trying to dispel the darkenss. A solitary moth engages it. The shadows seem darker and a deathly stillness prevails. Some figures walk around the shadowy corners, stubbled and untidy.

A faint light peaks from under the closed door. The fan hangs still. There is a strong odour that I can not tell. A bunch of incense sticks burn in the far corner. There are too many of them. All placed in that one room as if they were intended to supress something. A door flings open, I can not tell why. There is no gale, not even a breeze. A boy in shorts and a crumpled t-shirt walks out in a hurry. He covers his nose with a dirty looking piece of cloth. He looks unsettled, his eyes red, his hair unkept and his slippers ragged. He walks past taking no notice of me. It hits me then, I am begining to tell the odour.

There are hurried footsteps beyond the dark corner behind me. I turn around. The solitary bulb shines on, the moth's still fluttering around it. I hear some distant incoherent voices. Three, may be four, voices, I figure. Four days...Suicide...Groundfloor...!!! is all I catch. The voices grow fainter with each passing moment. I can not hear them any more. The smell catches my attention again. Four days, suicide, ground floor come to mind. I put them together and realize that someone had committed suicide four days ago in one of the rooms on the ground floor.

The body lay decomposing, in the room with the many bundles of incense sticks, until they discovered it this morning. The incense sticks are doing a resonable job of supressing the rancour odour. Morbid pictures flash before my eyes. The room in which the suicide was committed is in front of me gaping wide like a death hole. I step back and then forward again. I stare at the room, then the fan and then the room again with a thousand thoughts grazing my turbulent mind. The whys, when and hows will remain unanswered. My phone rings, I answer it and head for the fifth floor. No amount of incense will be able to hide the fact and I shall always know that once death had walked down this very corridor.