Ink Drift - July

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Madness Issue 12 - Fear laughing and sipping tea, my father’s laughter ringing in my ears so clearly, it all felt so real and surreal and when I went to catch on to my father, to feel his touch once again, I fell down, my mother coming to my aid. There were also unknown voices that I heard at night, low unintelligible sounds and then the one time when I could clearly see the swing in our backyard swinging all by itself on a hot summer day. But all these are just my imaginations. As I enter my house, my mom is sitting on the sofa with a determined look, she stands and plainly says – “we are going to meet the psychiatrist, get ready”. My protestations fall on deaf ears. An hour later, mom and I are sitting in the waiting room, I feeling disgusted with my mother, on her lack of belief over me, thinking that I am mad. At the same time that feeling of anxiety again creeps up on me. Two hours later, the doctor establishes that I have schizophrenia, that I am on an advanced stage and writes down a list full of medications. I see my mother fall apart with every word the psychiatrist utters, for me; I’m lost in a daydream, this big word only heard about in newspapers and as statistics. “13.7% of India’s population is mentally ill.” the headline said, I uttered a low laugh, the headline that seemed so distant for me, was now my living reality. On the way home, my mom spoke some words of encouragement but they blurred out in the distance for me, I was lost in the running trees, racing with our car, which then started swirling in front of my eyes and then in my head, my head felt heavy again. I looked at my mom, pitying her, at this age she’ll have to deal with a schizo—or whatever the word is, basically, a mad child, she was right I guess, I had turned mad. As we enter into the parking lot, I casually look into the rear view mirror and suddenly catch a glimpse of something black standing at the gate of our house. I immediately pop my head outside to look, but see nothing, maybe one of my imaginations again. My life changed again, in a matter of few days, repeated consultation sessions with my doctor and heavy medications became a part of me. My imaginations, or what they called – delusions, grew intense, weirder and vivid by the day, often ending up with me shrieking, and my mother half controlling me, half controlling her tears. Differentiating between what was real and what was not became hard; my mind felt mushed most of the time, only the remembrance of the times with my father made me smile. But the sounds at night and the feeling of a presence constantly near me felt different, they didn’t feel like my delusions, but felt concrete. My mother of course looked on me with pity, thinking it to be another of my schizophrenic bouts. Mom used to keep a strip of medicine near my bedside table for immediate access, the medicines did of course keep me sane till it’s effect lasted, the only time I felt sane, the other being, when I used to have delusions about my father and me, at least he felt real and near me during those times. During one of these nights, as I was half awake-half asleep, I again heard the eerie noises that I always hear, now myself believing that it’s only my mind playing with me but they always could be heard at a distance, today they felt like they were coming nearer…nearer and nearer, almost at the foot of my bed and then suddenly I saw the same black apparition that I saw at the gate of our house that day, the shadowy spectre, just standing there, instead of getting frightened I was all the more sure that this was my schizophrenia talking, I moved to the side to get my tablet, thinking that I might have missed the dose and hence these voices and apparition, I turned over in the dark to grab the strip and feel the medicine but something was not quite right, instead of expecting to hold a new, unused medicine strip, my hands felt a hollow in the strip, one single hollow in the whole strip. The voices grew PAGE 26 www.inkdrift.com
Issue 12 - Fear Madness louder, the apparition now moved towards me. The morning rays of the sun fall on my face and wake me up. It’s 7:30 am. As I get up, my mother peeks into my room at the same time, smiles and says - “rise and shine my dear! rise and shine”. But I’m unable to respond to her chirpiness, a heavy feeling of anxiety creeps up and settles on my chest. I have to leave for work by 9 but this heaviness sitting on top of me, makes me wish only if I could stay in bed all day and do nothing, even the thought of meeting, talking, laughing with people drains me. I get up, unsure, hesitant, carrying that feeling of burden still latched on to me. After freshening up, I go downstairs to meet my mother and decide to explicitly tell her to stop her irritating morning cheerfulness. I meet her downstairs, busy making breakfast and as soon as I am about to confront her, she says – “good morning dear, I was just about to call for you, I thought you were still sleeping, come on have your breakfast”. As I sit on the table with a confused feeling, she asks me – “what is the matter, dear? Why do you look so lost?” I ask her- “mom, did you not just come to my room and say, “rise and shine dear, rise and shine”, then why did you say that you were about to call for me?” My mother responds with another confused look and says – “No dear, I never came up to your room, I was downstairs the entire time”. We both looked at each other for two minutes, unsure, hesitant and I, dreading of what was about to come next. I finally say, “it’s ok mom, it maybe is just my imagination”. My mom’s expression change from confusion to perplexity and sitting across me she says – “ What is going on? Your surly face, your disinterest in work, your avoiding all types of communication and your frequent IMAGINATIONS!” shrieking at the last word and flaying her hands in an animated fashion. “I’m genuinely concerned now”, she continues, “don’t you think we should go see a doctor?” At this point I start to feel tense and anxious and shout out at her, “Mom, I’m fine, stop bothering me! By doctor you mean a shrink, so you think my mood swings are madness now?” and I leave in a huff, leaving behind my concerned mother. As I sit on my desk, after completing the herculean task of smiling and wishing good morning to everyone at my office, I go over the recent events of my life. Things have definitely changed; I have lost interest at work. My desk, my room, my life is a mess, I don’t even feel like dressing up and my mom is in a constant state of worry over me. Maybe this all started after my father’s death. I shared a very close bond with him. He understood my introverted nature, he was my only friend, with whom I could share anything, I remember the evenings spent over tea, where we talked about anything. All this changed with a car crash. I lost him. All this was fine, withdrawal symptoms they fancily call it. But my ‘imaginations’ were new and different, they began recently and rapidly, clouding my mind completely when it happened, making it seem so vivid. Sometimes the birds from my window I could see not in one colour but in all types of different colours, slowly they would start convoluting, as I would keep on staring, finally causing a sharp heaviness in my head and blacking me out. I saw my father and myself sitting on the same bench in our garden the other day, laughing and sipping tea, my father’s laughter ringing in my ears so clearly, it all felt so real and surreal and when I went to catch on to my father, to feel his touch once again, I fell down, my mother coming to my aid. There were also unknown voices that I heard at night, low unintelligible sounds and then the one time when I could clearly see the swing in our backyard swinging all by itself on a hot summer day. But all these are just my imag- PAGE 27 www.inkdrift.com
Page 1 and 2: J U L Y 2 0 1 7 FEAR Price 100 ₹
Page 3 and 4: FEAR Volume 1 | Issue 12 | July CON
Page 5 and 6: Issue 12 - Fear Taken by a Storm Ta
Page 7 and 8: Issue 12 - Fear The Fear The Fear S
Page 9 and 10: Issue 12 - Fear Face of Fear Face o
Page 11 and 12: Issue 12 - Fear Oblivion A number s
Page 13 and 14: Issue 12 - Fear Just Out of Fear Ju
Page 15 and 16: Section Two STORIES “Infested pla
Page 17 and 18: Issue 12 - Fear The Creep Factor ma
Page 19 and 20: Issue 12 - Fear The Creep Factor dw
Page 21 and 22: Issue 12 - Fear Backing Out of Unce
Page 23 and 24: Issue 12 - Fear The Banyan Tree of
Page 29: Issue 12 - Fear Madness the other s
Page 33 and 34: Issue 12 - Fear Not Everything is D
Page 35 and 36: Issue 12 - Fear Aishwarya Ashok luc
Page 37: “ W e m a k e u p h o r r o r s t

Ink Drift - July

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