Like
always, he came home tired after a harrowing day’s work, opened the door with
his keys, hung them on the key-latch and took the keys to her mind from it.
He would now head straight to her room; unlock her mind with the keys; see her dream for the day, and bring it alive.
This is how it was every day.
This is how it had been, from the very first day of their meeting.
She had known the instant she had set his eyes on him – he was the one: the one meant for her and her alone. The only one who could be handed the scared keys – the keys to her mind.
He too had known from that very moment. Known and recognised her as his destiny.
They had not spoken, they had not needed to: she had simply handed the keys to him, and he had taken them – quietly, but with a surety that solemnized their relationship beyond the need for any formalities.
Every day since that day, he had been unlocking her mind, and making her dreams come alive – no matter how bizarre, how impossible. For, there had been a clause in the solemnizing of their unsaid vow: if ever he failed to make her dreams come alive, she would cease to exist - she would, die. He could not, at any cost, let that happen.
As he headed to her room today, however, everything seemed quieter than usual. Alarmed, he approached with some trepidation; saw her asleep on her pillow as always, and just like every day, gently inserted the key in her head and turned it slowly. Her mind and her dream for the day lay in front of his eyes like a still from a movie.
There she lay, flat on her back, blood oozing from the spot in her back where a knife had been stabbed only a few seconds ago. And stooped beside her, hunched the man who had stabbed her – a bloodied knife still in his hands.
Sweating and trembling with fear now, he reached into her head - into the crime scene - and turned the face of the murderer towards him.
He froze.
Looking up from her head, knife still in hand, stood his own miniature…in the same checked shirt he had worn to office that day.
He would now head straight to her room; unlock her mind with the keys; see her dream for the day, and bring it alive.
This is how it was every day.
This is how it had been, from the very first day of their meeting.
She had known the instant she had set his eyes on him – he was the one: the one meant for her and her alone. The only one who could be handed the scared keys – the keys to her mind.
He too had known from that very moment. Known and recognised her as his destiny.
They had not spoken, they had not needed to: she had simply handed the keys to him, and he had taken them – quietly, but with a surety that solemnized their relationship beyond the need for any formalities.
Every day since that day, he had been unlocking her mind, and making her dreams come alive – no matter how bizarre, how impossible. For, there had been a clause in the solemnizing of their unsaid vow: if ever he failed to make her dreams come alive, she would cease to exist - she would, die. He could not, at any cost, let that happen.
As he headed to her room today, however, everything seemed quieter than usual. Alarmed, he approached with some trepidation; saw her asleep on her pillow as always, and just like every day, gently inserted the key in her head and turned it slowly. Her mind and her dream for the day lay in front of his eyes like a still from a movie.
There she lay, flat on her back, blood oozing from the spot in her back where a knife had been stabbed only a few seconds ago. And stooped beside her, hunched the man who had stabbed her – a bloodied knife still in his hands.
Sweating and trembling with fear now, he reached into her head - into the crime scene - and turned the face of the murderer towards him.
He froze.
Looking up from her head, knife still in hand, stood his own miniature…in the same checked shirt he had worn to office that day.
