Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Phantasms from the Fog


“Damn, I think we’ve run out of petrol” he finally let the awkward truth out and looked uneasily at her. It was partly her fault because the scooterette without a fuel gauge was hers and all he did was ride it with her. The evening was getting chillier and a mild fog was settling, blurring their sight to some extent. They had been standing there since the last ten fifteen minutes with him diagnosing why the scooterette had conked out all of a sudden.
She watched him leaning down, squinting at the engine and desperately groping the wires. It was very irritating. “What’s the use, you idiot? Just find some petrol from somewhere” she yelled. He stepped back ruefully and mumbled “D...Do you have a can or bottle or something?” Silently she handed over an empty mineral water bottle from the bag. He took it with visible relief and said, “Y..you just wait here and I’ll get it. The pump is just two minutes walk away. You can even see it... Look, there... Put that cap on, O.K? And... I’ll be back in five minutes. Umm... by the way, don’t call me when I’m at the gas station, O.K? It’s dangerous. My phone’s an old one. ESD spark from the phone may... You know, ESD...Electrosta...” “JUST GO, ASSHOLE” she screamed before he could finish.
How did I end up with this kind of a loser, she thought while watching him with disdain, nervously hobbling towards the gas station.
A filthy cur which came limping observed him and the bottle with interest. It sniffed around the scooterette for a while and nestled in a pit beside the road.
Having nothing else to do, she started texting and suddenly realised that she’d run out of balance too. All she could do on the roadside in this wintry evening was watch a stupid dog nuzzling in a pit or talk to him which would frustrate her more. She pondered over the irony; there was no balance to call people whom she liked to talk with but some stupid plan would let her hear his nervous harping for hours if she wanted.
A good fifteen minutes passed and he was nowhere in sight. Her frustration was mounting alarmingly. “Curse this life, why do I have to bear this jerk who can’t even get a bottle of petrol from pump at a walking distance?” She swore aloud.
She flipped the phone open and called him. It rang thrice and suddenly his nervous stammer came through “G... Good heavens... dear, didn’t I tell you not to...” and then everything happened like a scene from a movie. As the call got disconnected, a deafening explosion made her swivel towards the direction of the petrol pump and a crimson ball of fire slowly went up from there, the dog fled past her with shrill yelps.
It was all silent once again. The orange flames were prominent now and clearly visible to her.
She collapsed on the road sobbing and muttering “Bastard, how could you mess up that one simple job???”

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Moral of the story: Nothing. Don't read random blog posts out of boredom.
The title has a creepy note, na? I was thinking about continuing with the fog thickening, wolves howling, the girl panicking, the burnt dead nerd chasing her with a splinter of his phone and all, but then I got bored. 

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