The Book (a short story)
- himalaya him
- Mar 23
- 2 min read
Updated: 5 days ago
1:00 AM*
The room was a cave of shadows, lit only by the ashen glow of moonlight seeping through the windows. Advait sat hunched in his armchair, the hum of space ambient music throbbing softly from the speakers—a sound like distant stars collapsing. On his lap lay 'the book' : 230 pages thick, its leather cover cracked and stained, etched with symbols that seemed to writhe under his touch.
The story inside was written in chaos. One paragraph in crisp English, the next in jagged Sanskrit, then glyphs that made his eyes water yet he understood. It told of *Vasant*, a man who wandered the Himalayas two thousand years ago, clawing at the edges of his shattered mind. Vasant could pluck thoughts from the air like ripe fruit, but his own memories were buried under ice. His only anchor: the ghost of a child’s laugh, and a tiny woolen boot left behind in the snow.
*3:00 AM*
A crow appeared outside the window, its silhouette sharp against the moonlit glass. Advait ignored it, but its reflection flickered in the margins of **the book**, trapped between lines about Vasant’s despair.
*Tap. Tap. Tap.*
The crow pecked the window. Advait glanced up. The bird stared, unblinking, its eyes black as the void between stars.
“Just a story,” he muttered, turning the page.
*4:00 AM*
The whispers began—a hiss of syllables that slithered up his spine.
“Only a few understand the book,”
the voice rasped, oily and cold.
Crow : “Follow his dreams.”
Advait froze. The crow tilted its head.
“Whose dreams? Vasant’s? ”
The bird exploded into motion, wings thrashing as it vanished into the night.
*4:15 AM*
The book lay open, every page blank.
Except the last.
WHERE DID YOU FIND THIS BOOK?
“In the library,” Advait whispered.
Ink pooled on the page, bleeding into new words:
YOU DIDN’T FIND THE BOOK. THE BOOK FOUND YOU.
“How? What? ”
The paper rippled. Images surfaced—a Himalayan storm, Vasant kneeling in the snow, clutching a child’s frozen body. A scream trapped in ice. Memories fracturing like glass.
Advait’s chest tightened. “What does this have to do with me ?”
*4:15 AM*
The ink writhed:
WRITE THIS BOOK. HIS SON WILL BE ALIVE AGAIN.
“How is that possible? That was the past !” Advait’s voice cracked.
The symbols on the page dissolved, then reformed:
*YOU ARE REINCARNATION OF HIS SON.*
Advait staggered back. The room tilted.
The book’s pages fluttered wildly. Advait gripped the desk, memories detonating in his skull:
A Himalayan storm. Vasant’s hands, rough and warm, lifting him onto a yak. A lullaby hummed in a language only fathers and sons know. Then snow. Darkness.
A whisper: “Live again.”
*4:30 AM*
The crow smashed its beak against the glass, shattering it. Cold air flooded the room as the bird dissolved into smoke, its voice hissing:
“Blood is a thread. You are the knot.”*
End.
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