GHOST DISCOURSE
C. Ayyapan
Lend the ears for my words. I am going to separate the pros and cons from your mind. You are in chain. Here only I remain to talk to you. My words will be true. I am not at all interested in the little pleasures of lies. You know why, I am a ghost or an evil spirit. Here I am compelled to speak. It may be out of my selfishness or prick of consciousness. Now you have the rays of consciousness. When the sun is tender you have the youthfulness of consciousness. It is when the sun crackdown in to darkness then madness infiltrates in to you like the arrival of moonlight.
I know your ignorance about the secrets of a murder and a suicide, which is haunting your consciousness. Now be calm. I am going to line your eyes with the nudity of truth. Don’t close your eyes move your head. Beware; my nail may touch your eyes.
First of all, let us begin with my suicide. I thought you were all aware of the reason. What a pity! I myself have to teach even the grammar of my mind. It is difficult. But there is no other way. I have to do this
It is meaningless to disclose the fact that i was the keep of your dearest brother. Everything was there between me and your brother that any women and man could have. That routine or ill routine had started when I was fifteen.
In a south monsoon season I came in to the attic of your home to spread out the paddy. When I moved back after spreading out the paddy I had been entangled in to the hands of your brother. I was frightened. I was being squiggled by knowing the intention of Kunjakove’s hands. I had been reddened between his lips.
When Kunju was climbing down the staircase, he said: “don’t tell this to anyone! Then I became a little bit frightened. Even in those days I was a fool. After six or seven year it was this foolishness that made me to ask: “Kunju will you marry me?” answer to this question was nothing but a piercing practical question.
“How can i marry you?” the helplessness of his question pained me. It is sure that a Christian could not marry a Pulaya wench, who is the daughter of a Pulaya servant in the home for domestic works, even though she is a primary school teacher.
On an evening when I reached home after meeting Kunju I became a little bit frightened. Mother was whispering to father that my cousin was spoiled. Will I too be spoiled? I felt suffocation.
My suffocation was unnecessary Kunjakove was very brilliant even at that younger age. He bought some equipment with the help of Pathrose, who goes to Thrissur market with betel leaves. But those preventions were unnecessary. He was impotent to give any indigestible gift to any woman. I slowly understood this when I started wishing to have his child and look after the child until my life ends. When he had known my dream he made a long spat. He slapped on my face with his fist. Then he tried hard to establish a fact that I did not love him. But he was defeated in that. At last he had said that he would commit suicide and suddenly laughed out. It was then onwards I started thinking about suicide.
I felt uneasiness for everything. Everybody was aware about the relationship between me and Kunjakov. At home father crushed me like Incha*. On some nights your brother took me outside home. After the use your brother too made strong slap on me. It was Gopi sir’s, who was our neighbour, ill actions that was ore unbearable. When I failed in the English paper for my pre- degree course he offered tuition for a short period. We are of same caste and he was gentle and handsome. He had started loving me since those days. When I knew this it was equal to the moment when a huge leach was swollen by the blood of my thighs while I was planting the seedlings. I looked helplessly at the leach. I was unable to put off it. Out of disgust I moved my legs and hands, and screamed.
Once Gopi sir tried to hide his folly with the tune of an artificial joke; “I have a thought to love you”. I said with a strong voice, ‘No’. Then with vindictiveness he said: “you will not become pregnant due to this” I was frozen as if I got slap on my face. There is no other way. I decided to uncover the truth. I said: “I am in love with another.................. he interrupted: “I know, but he does not have any feeling towards you”. I ran away with a kind of inner shiver. My flight ceased in front of Kunjakove. I asked him: “Kunju, don’t you love me”? He abused and grinned at me. I cried. It was not due to the first abuse by him. I understood that Kunjakove did not love me.
With that unending weep, my neck was entangled in to the rope.
Now it is about the murder of your brother by your Appachan*. I think it was a good deed. But when I was alive I could not think anyone would kill him. Let it be there. Why did your Appacan do it? This is the reason for your sadness. Now let me break the juice of this sadness. .
On the sixteenth day of my burial I escaped from the tomb. Directly I came to your home from there. But Kunjakove was not there. I guessed that he might have gone for the second show film. Let him come. I came to the room where you were laying. You had gone to sleep not thinking about the light. I wondered in your state of lying. You were in a bending position. You had hugged the pillow. The tip of your skirt reached up to your knees. Then Kunjakove came. It might be due to light which peeped from your room, he watched in to it. You were laughing. He stood like a statue as if he was frozen for a moment. He looked all around with a flurry. Then he gazed at your face. He came near your bed. Then you giggled for something. He frightened and stood back for a while. He noticed your expression. Then with a burning face he switched off the light. He sighed. At that moment a kind of light pierced in to me. I screamed out of fear or helplessness. Your sleep was disturbed. You hugged Kunjakove. When you frightened, I entered in to your body through that gap. Then I started laughing. Your father cried and when you were conscious you too cried. Your gestures were extremely unusual that confused everyone. You followed Kunjakove all the day. You lost your tranquillity in his absence. When he slapped, a flapping music of laughter was there in your weeping.
Except your brother, everybody knew that I impersonated in to you. He thought that you were mad. He did not have any faith in evils and spirits. He believed only in madness and rationality. Many said, I must be nail down to a Kanjirakutti* and must be carried secretly in to Chottanikara*. But your father was against this. But when all the relatives compelled and questioned, in a helpless he said,” if we do this, Rossikutty may be cured. What will we do when she commits something in outrange understanding everything that she had done earlier.........?
I was fearful for something else. Does Kunjakove commit any thoughtless action? If he dies how could I enjoy the smell of his sweat like this? But I had consolation for one thing. If he dies, like me he too will become a bad spirit. He will not lay in a cemetery. Then both of us could have free wandering. But even at that time I never thought that he would succumb to a premature death.
Your father is a saint who killed your brother with a chop as Kunjuhugged and slept with you while you were in chain. But like every holy deed it is difficult to understand your father’s act too. Why did he do that? Did Kunjakove take your disease as a convenience? I am not all sure about it. Let me explain my opinion.
He did it because of Kunjakove’s love towards me. It is not because he loved you. Our paternity is same. I understood this only after my death. My mother too was unsure about this. My mother was your domestic servant. She was unable to make it sure as your uncle also came near her for his mischief. My paternity was disclosed by God. God called me a sinner as I was a person who had been undressed by her own brother. I never felt bashfulness. I spited on his face and questioned, how could a Pulya wench become the sister of a Christian? Then there was a banana in God’s mouth. Eyes were bulged out. Then he bowed his head. Leave it Rossikutty. Your father was sure about our sisterhood. If utter in the language of God your father was not that much cunning to be aware about the premarital sexual relationship between my mother and your uncle. Then it can be questioned, why he didn’t protest the affair between me and Kunjakove. He had protested. Kunjakove himself said this to me. Once with a devilish face your father scolded him. “You must stop the affair with that Pulaya wench”. As he was frightened by father’s emotion, he disclosed the truth. “I will never marry her”. During this time the same banana was there in his mouth.
Now everything is clear to you. It was my nudity which Kunjakove had disclosed. When he hugged you, it was me in your body. He sinned to me, only to me. It was that fault that your father had crrected. That is why now he is in life imprisonment.
Now it is about my selfishness in this incident. Now I am disappearing from you. I fear you may be endangered if I leave you without explaining these things in their real sense. You must have a new life. Before that you must do a favour. Call our Kunjan Parayan* and tell him to put three bushels of mustard in to my tomb. Then i will not be able to come out. Ghosts cannot come out from the tomb without counting those mustards. No ghost can count them with one night. The duration must not be enough.
I know that you are doubtful, why am I not wishing to wander with your brother as he is an evil spirit. Ah! Now all your doubts are being cleared. That realisation is there in your face. You are in a notion that we share same brotherhood, aren’t you? Sister you are mistaken! The fact is not that.
I watched Kunjakove’s death with a lot of hope. I was eagerly waiting for the separation of his soul from the body as I wished to cover his eyes from behind. The moment when he died, a truth is revealed to me. Kunjakove does not have a soul. He had only a life and breath. What should be the reason for that? He was a rationalist who never believed in human soul. It may be the reason. Otherwise it may be due to the crying and gnashing of teeth by God who speaks Bible language.
Thus, there is no other option for me. I am compelled to return in to my tomb. Don’t forget about those mustards. I offer my freedom to you. Look in to your legs, to make sure about my withdrawal. Where, where is that chain?
Translated by Brijeesh Kumar CM
