Something That Followed?

Dear YGS readers, I am Mayank and I live in Patna, India. It feels so good to write here again after such a long gap. I am writing this story to share an extraordinary incident that took place in December, 2018. I was in the final year of my undergraduate degree program, and the exams for my penultimate semester had just concluded. It was followed by a 2-week holiday, during which almost all the students would go home. My friends and I also followed suit and booked our tickets to go home. The day before leaving the hostel, as we were getting bored, we decided to go on a bike ride.

My college is located somewhere in Delhi-NCR region. Now let's come to the first incident. We were a group of four friends and shared 2 bikes. As planned, we went out to explore the city in groups of 2, on each bike. It was around 6 pm in the evening when we started. Each of us wore thick jackets to protect us from the brutally cold weather outside. Our attire kept us quite warm and we didn't feel any cold. The Indian tea from a highway snack shop also made sure that our bodies stayed warm enough.

We had a quite pleasant day roaming the city and at around 7:30 pm we decided to return to our hostel. As the temperature had dropped further by then, we zipped up our jackets, wore the winter caps we carried, had some more tea and started. On our return journey, we faced a huge traffic jam (a common problem in India). Traffic jams are not really fun, hence we decided to take a short cut to reach our hostels on time. As we went ahead, the roads seemed more and more deserted. When we got near the end of our short cut route, a long, straight road lay ahead. The road was about a km long and at its end merged back with the main road. There was empty, barren land on either side of the road as far as we could see. We paused for a moment, checked if we were on the right path, and then entered the road. Then a really strange thing happened.

I already told you as per a rough estimate, the road was about a kilometer long. We had gone through half of its length, when all of a sudden, we felt an abrupt, steep drop in temperature. I know what you'd say, it was the month of December, harsh cold weather outside, and it's natural right? You're right! But would it be very natural or rational, if the temperature dropped by more than 10 degrees Celsius within 1 or 2 seconds. We felt something similar. For a stretch of about 200-300 meters, we felt paralyzing cold. The drop in temperature was so steep that we couldn't react. It was as if the temperature was instantly changed by some external force. After crossing that small stretch of 200-300 meters, the temperature became normal again. This rise in temperature was as sudden as the drop. We immediately stopped, collected ourselves and asked each other- "Did u feel it? ". All 4 of us did. Since the hostel gates would close soon, we brushed it off and went ahead.

After returning to the hostel, we didn't talk about it as we all had to prepare for our early morning trains. We were not horrified by this and thought there might be some rational explanation for the phenomena we encountered. And there could indeed be a scientific explanation for this, I don't want to endorse any superstitions.

But I am writing this story because this was not the end. I reached home the next evening. As I was tired, I relaxed all day and didn't do anything else. At that time, only me and my mother were at home, father had gone on a business tour. The very next day, something strange happened. It was almost bedtime. I was in my bed waiting to fall asleep, when all of a sudden, I heard my mother cry from her bedroom, " Leave it... Who are you?... Get out ". I immediately rushed to her. She clung to her blanket tightly and was looking anxious.

I could not understand anything and asked her what had happened. She told me that she was reading a book, when all of a sudden she heard the edge of the bed creak as if someone got on to the bed. That bed was quite old and often made creaking sounds whenever someone sat on it. First she ignored, but a few seconds later she clearly felt someone try to snatch her blanket like a thief does. When she held onto the blanket, she could clearly feel a strong pull from the opposite end. The duel between mother and the imaginary thief ended as soon as I entered the room.

As I was just going to console her, I saw very fine sand and dust particles spread on one side of the bed. Let me tell you that we have a habit in our family that whenever we go out, we change our clothes before even touching the bed. Keeping our bed clean and dust free is considered sacred in my family tradition. For that reason, we have a separate set of clothes for going out and we never wear them while we are in. I can assure you that the sand couldn't have come from our hands or clothes. It being a December month, all windows were locked to prevent the cold breeze from getting in. There was no construction activity going on anywhere in the vicinity. So, where did the dust come from?

I was thinking about all this in my head, when I saw some more sand on the bed sheet and this time on some other portion of it. I saw to my horror, the amount of sand increased with each passing moment. My mother and I removed the bed sheet and lay a fresh one. Then the activity stopped. We said some prayers, gathered some courage and went to sleep. We slept in the same room for the coming days until father returned. My mother has had a few paranormal encounters before this one and she did not panic. She told me to forget about it and that this also was a part of life which we should accept and make peace with. She was of the opinion that whatever the entity was, it didn't wish to harm us. We never faced anything of this sort again.

I did not tell this to friends in the hostel as I thought they wouldn't believe. They would probably dismiss my story. We never discussed this topic of temperature drop. So, I don't know if any of my friends faced any paranormal activity after the encounter on the deserted road. If you are wondering why I linked these two incidents, then let me tell you something. There was sparkling yellow sand on my bed sheet that night. On the night of the ordeal on the deserted road, I remember that on my return to the hostel, I checked my jeans. It was smeared with yellow sparkling sand.

Thank you so much for reading.