NIRUPAMA

(Some Secrets May Better Remain Secrets Forever)

'I cannot bear this', 'I want to pluck my eyes out' only these two sentences were the clues which the late girl Nirupama left in writing one on a wall and one in a book quite unintentionally and involuntarily to know about the reason for her committing suicide. Her father Ranganath, detective Smaran and his niece Menaka along with Nirupama's friend Sukanya pretty well understood that Nirupama did not want the said secret to be known to anyone else. But since her father Ranganath hell bent upon knowing about the said secret, detective Smaran and his niece Menaka ruthlessly investigated the matter only to unearth the said ghastly, shocking and astounding secret which the dead girl terribly wished to keep only with her in her grave forever.

x x x x x

"Is there any particular purpose behind your visit to me on this day?" after few seconds silence, Niranjan asked them.

"No." Menaka nodded her head in negation. "Suddenly Menaka and I thought to come and talk with you. It is always a pleasure to have a discussion with you to anyone."

"Thank you. But I don't think myself as interesting or amusing. I am just a normal and ordinary person."

"May be you are thinking yourself so. But our opinion on you is different. In fact Nirupama also thought about you in the same way." Sukanya said.

"Nirupama is a different girl. So enthusiastic and so active. I was always quite sure that she would become a great psychologist." Suddenly there was sorrow in his face and his voice was full of sadness.

The place filled with heavy silence. Only Niranjan broke it. "She used to tell me almost all the things of hers. Why she did not prefer to tell me anything at all before committing that ghastly thing...."

"Nirupama wanted to keep it a secret from one and all." Menaka said.

"Why you are thinking that Menaka wanted to keep that thing which compelled her to commit suicide a secret?'

"She took particular care that not to be revealed to anyone. No hint ... no clue ....nothing."

"But what about the writings she has left? 'I cannot bear this' and 'I want to pluck my eyes out."

"Are you thinking that she left these messages intentionally? Not at all. They were her involuntary and unintentional acts."Menaka hissed out.

Niranjan paused for a moment and then said and smiled. "You are right. My opinion also is exactly that. I just want to see what you do say to that. You are also thinking in a perfect way."

"Thank you sir" Menaka's cheeks were blushed on hearing that.

There was some silence again prevailed in that place.

"How long ago you visited her house before she committed suicide?"

"I often go there. I am a relative to Nirmala. There is strong friendship between me and Ranganath also."

"I know about that." Sukanya said.

"Not many times before her committing suiside. May be on only one occasion I think I went to her home just fifteen days or so before her committing suicide, I have to go out of station. I have come to my home only after her death." He paused a second before saying again. "I don't remember much about it now."

"Was Nirupama always friendly and affectionately to you?" Menaka was observing him keenly. She was remembering the discussion that went in between her and Sukanya about Niranjan.

"Hundred percent. She always has great respect for me. It is because of me she took psychology in her post graduation."

"I think I heard so." Menaka said. "Anyhow can you make anything at all out of the sentences she left for us to break our heads to know the meaning?"

"I am sorry. I have been also thinking about those sentences but could not come to any conclusion at all."

"Did my uncle meet you again to know about anything? I think that he had mention to me to come to you to see if you remember anything vital regarding Nirupama."

"Not recently." Niranjan said. "I am trying very hard to see whether there is any important thing that I can remember with respect to Nirupama. But I could not."

"It is surprising. None of us can understand why she had written those sentences so." Sukanya said heavily. After her discussion so with Menaka, she could not feel all normal at Niranjan even however much chance was there that their presumption was wrong.

The conversation with Niranjan was more than half an hour or so. But both of them also could not feel at home after a discussion like that about him. As usual Niranjan did not take off his back spectacles even for once all the time.

***

It was 8 in the night. Menaka completed her dinner early and came into her room upstairs. Ranganath was not in the home then. Nirmala said that she would take her dinner late.

Menaka was not feeling comfortable. She helped her uncle in some mysteries before. In all the matters she was successful. It was the only mystery that she was feeling frustrated. Even after having two clues directly from the person concerned, they could not go anywhere. Her uncle was still feeling optimistic but she could not feel like that.

She got off from the bed and looked around the room carefully. All the Nirupama's articles were adjusted neatly after she entered into the room. One cupboard there filled with her books. She went through the books many a time finding for a clue. She searched page after page in vain.

When she found Nirupama's dairy in that cupboard she felt so happy. She thought she sure could find clues in that to their mystery. But however many times she went through that the result was the same. She did not write it regularly. It appeared that she wrote it whenever she felt so happy. All the incidents narrated in it were someway or other related to the happy moments in her life.

'I am feeling so happy on this day. The first day in the college went on so joyously for me. It should be in fact dismaying to me. I have been separated from Sukanya my best friend. Why I have preferred to study psychology? Why Sukanya did not prefer to study psychology? But I got other friends."

Who were the other friends? Menaka surprised again. She already inquired with Sukanya.

"She did not make any serious friendship with anyone. Very few friends with less intimacy anyhow. I was the only close friend to her all the time. I am not thinking that she revealed anything about her secret to them either." Sukanya disappointed her. Menaka flipped over some more pages.

'What an interesting person Niranjan is! I am really so much interested. If it were not for Niranjan, I would not have joined in psychology at all. I am not regretting at all for my joining in psychology. Psychology is indeed a very interesting subject."

Menaka hissed heavily and flipped to further.

"It seems Sukanya also is enjoying whatever she is studying. No surprise she selected that major herself. Still I cannot have anyone else as a friend as that much of Sukanya. She is really so wonderful. I do enjoy a lot talking with four people. Father, mother, Sukanya and Niranjan."

Menaka nodded her head helplessly. 'Why did not you leave a single clue in your dairy Niroo?' she thought disappointedly while flipping the pages. She suddenly stopped at one page.

'On this day my new friend Mallika said 'your eyes are so beautiful. They are the main attraction in your face'.

Menaka sat bolt straight in the bed. She missed it reading previously. My god! She continued reading it.

'It is not new to me that people praise my beauty and my eyes. But I oddly felt even more happy when Mallika said that my eyes are more beautiful and attractive. I observed myself carefully in the mirror. I am glamorous of course. But I cannot see that much special in my eyes.'

'The most important thing here is' Menaka thought 'whether she believed it or not Nirupama felt happy that other people praising her eyes. She did not despise them. There is no chance at all that she hated them that much to want or strongly wish to pluck them out.'

The other narrations in the dairy were also in the same way. Menaka finished them all fast and got off from the bed. She put the dairy in its usual place and started pacing across the room.

It seemed to her that the pieces of the puzzle were about to fallen into place. A simple thing , a simple logic was missing. If that was found out. She started thinking furiously.

Point one. Nirmala and Ranganath could not have children for ten long years. Then how suddenly they gave birth to Nirupama? But instances like these were happened. After years of longing, after losing all the hope, women do become pregnant.

Point two. Niranjan, a surprising and interesting character. Why he particularly settled in this village after his retirement? He liked this small town. No surprise. This is s a beautiful town. Many people wanted to settle here.

Point three. Nirupama wanted to keep her suffering as a secret. Why she did not want it to be known to anyone else? Why she wanted to maintain this damned secrecy even with her very dearest and close people also? No answer to this so far.

Point four. Nirmala's peculiar madness. There was no strange in her becoming mad like this. But she was only partly mad. Why did not she become totally mad?

Menaka did not know why but she concentrated on the last sentence. Why did not she become totally mad? This only started making rounds fiercely in her mind. Her whole concentration remained on that.

Then something struck her consciousness just like a thunderbolt! She just stopped wherever she was then. Her mouth agaped and eyes became wide. Unintentionally looked at the photo of Nirupama and it was as usual.

Why did not she get this thought before? She thought. As she concentrated on that most she was becoming herself more and more convinced of that. She had decided in herself to talk with her uncle about this as fast as possible.

***

"It is after a very long time we both met like this." Nirupama said to Sukanya.

"You are absolutely true." Sukanya said. "You don't know how much I am longing to see you. Why did you leave me like that?" Sukanya angrily asked.

"I did not leave anyone of you. I am with you all the people all the time." Nirupama smiled.

"If it is so why cannot we see you all the time?"

"Oh, forget. That is not necessary. I have come to you and you are talking with me now. Is it is not enough?"

"Yes, enough." Sukanya nodded her head.

"Now come with me. We are going to the beach." Looking into the eyes of Sukanya, Nirupama said.

"There is no sea in our town. There is no beach. If we want to go to beach we have to go to a long way."

"No. Now there is a beach in our town. It is so beautiful. Come with me. We can see that."

Both started from there. Sukanya surprisingly found that Nirupama was flying in the air. She was not walking on the floor.

"You are flying in the air!" Sukanya said with surprise.

"You too can if you want. Just try" Nirupama said.

"No I cannot." Sukanya nodded her head in negation.

"Don't say like that. Just try." Nirupama encouraged her.

Then Sukanya tried to make herself fly into the air. Surprisingly she floated into the air without any effort.

"How it has become possible to me to do like this?"

"If you stay with me anything is possible to you. Now see we have come to the beach and the sea."

There was really a huge sea and the beach but there was no one in that beach. There were huge boulders in it and Nirupama led Sukanya to one of them and made her sit on it and she sat beside her. It was such a huge boulder. Sukanya looked into the face of Nirupama. She was so happy.

"Do you like it?" Nirupama asked her.

"A lot. Thank you very much." Sukanya said.

Suddenly there was change in the face of Nirupama. "I did not want to leave you people. But I have to."

"What do you mean?" Sukanya startled on this change and asked her.

"Yes. I have to kill myself and go away from you people."

"Why did you do it like that?"

"No. I cannot say that to you people. I don't want it to be known to anyone else."

Sukanya remained silent looking into the face of Nirupama.

(..........to be continued)

(I hope you enjoyed it so far. Please don't forget to rate and review it. I update the next chapter as early as possible.)

#investigation #detection #psychology #hypnosis#hypnotism #love #romance #romantic #suspense #thriller #sentiment #family#suicide #psychology #hypnosis #self-hypnosis #psychiatry #psychiatrist