The Mid-Nightmare

"Stay Close To Anything That Makes you Glad You're Alive! " I couldn't get this quote off my head. It would've possibly been from one of the million pages that flooded my facebook feed. The top right corner of my mobile read '2:41 AM'. Tossing in the bed with thoughts clouding my head, I lay there wide awake. Ilayaraja and A.R. Rahman didn't manage to give the much needed sleep. Lullabies, no longer embraced my tired eyelids. Even the cuddly teddy bear failed at putting me to sleep. Trying to measure my height with the width of the bed didn't help either. 

Grabing the blanket closer and pulling it away finding No comfortable position to sleep and the night already seems like a Haphazard. 

Just not that, at this time of night when everyone is down getting all comfy in their mattresses, I lay there with a thought train. 

Everything seems amusing. Everything.

From the pattern of the bedsheet to the fluffy pillow. 

From the messy hair to the teddy bear.

From the the chill air hitting my face to the clock ticking away . 

From the vent of the AC to the pattern of the fan. 

From the shadow play to the screens that seems to play a 'sneak -a- peek'. 

There is utter silence. 

The kind of silence that'll hurt ur ears. 

It was the time of the night when even the crickets slip into deep slumbers. 

It was that time of the night when the security guard of the flats  falls asleep and keeps everyone  awake with his wild snores. 

Suddenly, out of the blue,  I heard a sound. So shrill yet so calm. 

Then, there was silence again.

What puts me in shock is that, this kind of silence is something that I've never felt before. The defeaning silence. 

No buzzing mosquitoes. 

No sound of the crickets. 

No chatter of the neighborhood girl in call with her long-distance boyfriend. 

No High decibel tennage guys playing 'soup' songs

(Soup* - the melancholy sort genre wherein complaining 'how mean of a girl for having left the guy' is a mandatory! )

No roar of the upstairs guys' FIFA game. 

No snores of the watchman. 

No sound, At all. 

And I heard it again! 

The sound is shriller now . 

I've started having a weird feeling that it is from somewhere closer. 

I guarded myself with the blanket  and started feeling that the silence is numbing every other part of my body . Every other horror movie flashes in the mind screen. Every other ghost story starts to feel real. Every other cemetery tales seems to have life.  The chill runs down the spine luring me into the darkness. Shutting the eyes close doesn't help either. 

*Grrrrrrrrr* The horrifying sound interrupts the thought process. It's growing closer and further shrill. 

It's no longer a defeaning silence.

The silence is smudged by this grumbling sound. 

It's a roar. The horrendous life wrecking roar. 

I couldn't feel myself. I lay there with an excruciating pain. And then, it roared again. 

It was from within. 

From within the stomach.

It roared again. 

"Stay Close To Anything That Makes you Glad You're Alive! "

Well, that makes so much sense now! 

And that's when I shifted my fridge to my bedroom and the foodie within Exclaimed at the midnight snack!