Chapter 5 - Writing Kills

What if writing is harmful.

I came back to my senses slowly. The first thing I saw was Gowtham lying on the floor, motionless. His body was twisted slightly to one side, one hand stretched toward the table as if he had tried to hold on to something before collapsing. Blood had dried along his hairline. He wasn’t moving.

A sudden panic shot through me. I staggered back, my heart pounding violently against my chest. For a second, I just stood there, listening�"waiting�"for any sign of breathing. The silence in the room felt louder than a scream. He’s alive, I told myself. He has to be. I didn’t check. I couldn’t.

My mind shifted instantly�"from fear to urgency. I knew what I was there for. I didn’t have time to hesitate anymore. I rushed to his table and began opening drawers at random. Files. Prescriptions. Old case notes. My hands were shaking so badly that the papers slipped through my fingers. Sweat ran down my temples despite the cold air filling the room.

“Where did you keep them…” I muttered under my breath.

I moved to the side storage cabinet, pulling open shelves, knocking over bottles, my breathing growing faster with every second. The fear of being caught, the fear of what I had already done, the fear of losing control again�"all of it pressed against my chest at once. Then I saw it.

A small locked shelf, half-hidden behind a stack of files. I forced it open. Inside were neatly arranged capsule boxes�"different colors, different labels. My eyes scanned them frantically until one box made my breath stop.

ANGER & FRUSTRATION

ONLY ONE PILL PER WEEK

The warning was written in bold red letters, as if someone had already known how dangerous it was. My fingers closed around the box instantly. I didn’t feel any guilt. This was what I needed. This was what would finish the final chapter. I shoved the box into my pocket, cast one last glance at Gowtham’s still body on the floor, and turned away. I didn’t look back again. I rushed out of the clinic, the door slamming shut behind me, carrying with me not just the capsules�"but the certainty that whatever I was becoming now could no longer be stopped.

I rushed into the house and stopped for a moment, listening. Silence. Alisha hadn’t returned yet. This was the perfect moment to finish the final chapter. I dropped my bag near the door and walked straight to the table in the hall. My hands were still unsteady as I pulled out the capsule box. The lid came off easily�"too easily. A few capsules slipped out and scattered across the table, rolling aimlessly before settling near the edge. The empty, round box continued to roll back and forth for a second longer before slowing down, wobbling… almost as if it was refusing to stay still.

Almost as if it was saying no.

I didn’t stop to look at it. I grabbed a few capsules in my palm and rushed toward my writing room, leaving the box behind�"open, exposed, careless. The capsules on the table lay scattered like a warning I had already chosen to ignore.

Inside the writing room, I shut the door and leaned against it for a second, catching my breath. This is it, I told myself. The most intense climax I’ve ever written. I looked at the capsule resting between my fingers. One pill per week, Gowtham’s voice echoed faintly in my head. I swallowed it anyway.

The capsule slid down my throat, warm and final. I sat at my desk, picked up the pen, and stared at the page. My heartbeat slowed. My thoughts sharpened. A familiar pressure built inside my chest�"stronger than before, heavier, angrier. This wasn’t inspiration. This was something else. I lowered the pen. And I started writing.

Raghavan rushed into his house, his left hand buried deep inside his pocket. His shirt clung to his body, soaked with sweat. Dry patches of blood marked his bruises, stiff against his skin. His breathing was uneven, shallow. From the kitchen, he heard movement. The soft clink of vessels. The familiar sound of water running. She was there. Without stopping, he turned and went straight into the bathroom. He locked the door behind him and leaned against it for a moment, trying to steady himself. Slowly, he pulled his left hand out of his pocket. It was completely covered with blood. He turned on the tap and began washing�"first cautiously, then aggressively. Water splashed against the sink as he scrubbed both hands, rubbing until his skin burned.

Then it hit him. A sudden, violent dryness. His tongue felt thick. His lips cracked instantly.
His throat tightened as if it had forgotten how to swallow. He needed water immediately.

He stepped out of the bathroom and walked toward the kitchen. His eyes stayed low. He avoided looking at her, avoided even acknowledging her presence. His left hand slipped back into his pocket instinctively. He opened the refrigerator with his right hand, pulled out a bottle of water, and began drinking. Deep gulps. Desperate. Uncontrolled.

His wife glanced at him briefly; her expression filled with disgust.

“Filthy moron,” she muttered.

Raghavan didn’t react. He didn’t stop drinking. The water spilled slightly down his chin, but he didn’t notice. And then�"without warning�"his left hand moved. It slipped out of his pocket quietly. It grabbed the sharp knife place on the top of the refrigerator and suddenly started to stab her stomach continuously.  Raghavan didn’t turn. He didn’t look. He didn’t even seem aware. His left hand is again completely drenched with her warm fresh blood. The water slipped from his mouth due to recoil vibration because of the impact.

Suddenly, the room began to spin. The kitchen twisted unnaturally, the walls bending, the ceiling collapsing inward, the floor rising to meet them. Everything seemed to rotate violently�"throwing both of them in every direction.

I crushed the paper violently and threw it toward the corner of the room.

“This is not enough. This is not enough”
My voice echoed off the walls.

“This is not enough. I need more intensity.” I was shouting now.

I came into the living room, tense. I was blabbering to myself that I was not satisfied. I kicked the flower pot placed in the corner and shattered it. I ran back to the writing room and took another capsule in my hand�"one pill per week. It shimmered under the tungsten light. I hesitated for a second, then swallowed it immediately.

I could feel a rush of blood surging through my body; my eyes turned faintly red. Without thinking, I began to write again.

Raghavan rushed into his house with his left hand hanging in a cloth tied around his neck. He was wounded all over his body, dried blood clinging to every bruise. As usual, he tried to slip into his private room without being noticed by his wife. She was sitting on the sofa in the living room, scrolling through her mobile, when she noticed him. Shocked by his appearance, she stood up at once and followed him to the room.

He forgot to close the door, and she entered, shouting at him about his condition.

“What have you done now? You useless idiot…” He turned back looking at her. His left hand slowly escaped from the cloth hanger. They stood facing each other in absolute silence. The fingers of his left hand began to twitch. Suddenly, both of them were sucked and pulled out through the windows in opposite directions.

I tore the paper into two halves and flung them away. My eyes burned red, sweat soaked my body, and my breathing grew heavy.

“I NEED MORE�"MORE AND MORE. THIS IS NOT ENOUGH.”

I began pacing rapidly around the house.

I came back and sat on the writing chair, flexing my neck up and down. My eyes fell on the bunch of capsules scattered near my writing pad. This time, my mind did not think about “one pill per week,” even though I had already taken two. I swallowed one more�"my third in the last two hours.

This time, my entire face flushed red, along with my eyes. No one knew�"not even me�"that extreme frustration and anger were raging inside. My hands trembled as I picked up the pen. I focused completely on the writing pad and began to write. I didn’t even notice that someone unlocking the main door from outside. The door opened, and Alisha stepped in, slipping the keys into her handbag.

Raghavan slipped into the house and rushed straight into the bathroom before his wife could notice him. He locked the door behind him and turned the shower to hot. Steam filled the room, blurring the mirror, blurring himself. The water ran over his wounds, over the dried blood, washing away the evidence�"at least for now. When he stepped out, refreshed but hollow, he tied his left hand in a cloth and hung it around his neck like a broken limb.

He walked to the dining table. He took a plate and piled whatever food was left onto it without looking. Only then did he notice his wife. She had already finished eating. She sat in the same chair, her eyes fixed on her mobile screen, a faint smile froze on her face. Dried food clung to the fingers of her right hand, proof that she had been sitting there long after her meal was over�"motionless, waiting.

She glanced at him once. Raghavan sat opposite her, eating with his right hand, his left arm hanging lifelessly in the cloth. Her eyes crawled over him, slow and deliberate, as though she was examining something repulsive. Her stare did not blink. It did not soften.

Then, suddenly, her face changed to Alisha’s face�"it was no longer his wife. It was Alisha. The same expression. The same cold disgust. Staring directly at him.

I stopped writing. My pen hovered above the page as I noticed it�"twice, maybe more. I had written Alisha instead of Raghavan’s wife. A chill crawled up my spine, sharp and unfamiliar. For the first time in my life, I started feeling fear of my writing.

I continued writing, unaware that Alisha had entered the house. She stopped short, sensing something was wrong. Her favorite flowerpot lay shattered across the living room floor, soil and broken ceramic scattered like evidence of a struggle.

Raghavan avoided looking at his wife and focused on eating. His frustration was already boiling�"his condition, Alien Hand Syndrome, had pushed him to the edge. Control was slipping, piece by piece.

His wife stood up. She walked toward him with deliberate confidence, each step heavy with dominance. She bent forward, leaned onto the dining table, her face inches from Raghavan’s, and spoke.

“Hey, useless,” she said softly. “Do you know something? I’m pregnant.”

She paused, letting the words sink in.

“Don’t even try to find out who’s responsible. I have to align with this society.”
Her lips curved slowly. “But don’t worry. I don’t mind having you as an acting father for my baby.”

Her smile sharpened�"rude, cruel, merciless.

Raghavan pushed himself up from the chair. His left hand clenched a fork, its sharp edges catching the overhead light, gleaming with intent.

At the same moment, Alisha began to examine the living room. Her eyes scanned the chaos�"the broken pot, the tension in the air. Then she noticed the capsule box on the floor. A few pills lay scattered around it.

She picked it up. Her eyes moved to the label.

ANGER AND FRUSTRATION �" ONLY ONE PILL PER WEEK.

Her breath caught. Shock hardened into suspicion. Still holding the capsules and the box, she walked toward my writing room�"a place she had never entered in our entire life together. I noticed her stepping in. No one was allowed here. No one but me.

“Hey, Irshad,” she said firmly. “What is all this? Don’t you think you should talk to me about this?”

She stretched her hand forward, showing me the capsules and the box. Something inside me snapped. Control drained away without warning. I stood up abruptly, locking my eyes onto hers, rage pouring out unchecked. My right hand gripped the pen tightly. Its sharp nib glittered under the tungsten light.

The sharp edges of the fork in Raghavan’s left hand
and the sharp edge of the pen in my right hand
glowed together�"
two weapons,
two realities,
bound by the same uncontrollable force.

Raghavan stood up and stared at his wife holding the sharp fork in his left hand.

“You are staring at me. How dare? You filthy moron!!!”

Before his wife could react on anything, Raghavan’s left hand came into action by stabbing the sharp fork into her left eye 1.5 inches deep, which had punctured the retina already. His left hand crawled over the dining table and grabbed the eating knife. He looked at his wife for a second, who was standing unconsciously with a fork stabbed straight into her left eye. But this time, his left hand stayed idle, he pushed her head intentionally using his right hand on the table. He held her face tightly to the table surface using his right hand and looked at his left hand which was lying down idle.

For the first time, his proper right hand and his alien left hand coordinated smooth and beautiful. The right hand was holding the face tight on the table and the left hand started to slit the throat with the eating knife until all the veins, muscles, tissues and bones were shattered and no more in its own state.

THE END

M.D. Purushathaman of Butterfly publications closed the book and looked at the preface attached to the cover page with Irshad’s photo in the left corner

Preface

“This book was not finished in peace.

My husband, Irshad, lived for stories. Writing was not just his profession�"it was his breath, his refuge, his way of understanding a world that often felt heavier than words could carry. He believed that stories never truly belong to the writer; they belong to those who feel them.

While completing this book, he lost a battle that none of us saw clearly until it was too late. He killed himself unfortunately and he left us forever

As his wife, I struggled with the decision to bring this book to light. Yet every page reminded me that this story was already alive�"waiting, breathing, asking to be read. To keep it hidden would have meant silencing a part of him that still speaks. So I publish this book on his behalf.

Not as an ending,
but as a continuation.

I believe Irshad still exists wherever stories are written, wherever emotions are felt deeply, wherever words are brave enough to touch the dark corners of the mind. In that sense, he never really left.

This book is offered with love, pain, and remembrance.

In the loving memory of my beloved husband,
Irshad.

You are missed.
You are remembered.
You are still here.

Loving you forever,
�" Alisha”

M.D. Purushothaman was looking at Alisha who was sitting in the front with a painful smiling face.

“It was very intense and unbelievable!! I have never read this kind of story in my life time and I don’t think I would ever”

Alisha was silently listening. He continued.

“Do you know? This book created a huge record in selling across all the publications in India. But it is very sad that Irshad could not witness this unbelievable success”

Alisha just gave him a blank smile which seemed very painful.

“Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you need any help…” he continued.

“Thank you very much. But I am good”, she responded back.

Alisha stood up and walked towards the exit door, which Purushothaman was watching at her until she left the room. He then called his PA and handed over the book. He took the book to the reception area, where all the best selling books in the publication’s history were stacked in the rack. The top position in that rack is empty, where the PA placed this book. Finally, the book attained the place where it was supposed to be, the top most selling record in publication’s history. Irshad retained his crown in the writing kingdom.

Hey… this is me. My name is Irshad. I may have lost my physical form, but I still exist in the form of air. I have told you many things�"about my writing, my kingdom, my passion, my hunger to be the best. But there are a few truths I never admitted… not even to myself while I was alive. Yes, I loved writing. I chased it. I worshipped it. I sacrificed everything at its altar. But I loved Alisha more. More than stories. More than success. More than the fear of being forgotten. Even those dangerous pills�"those emotions I forced into my veins�"could not overpower what I felt for her. They could twist my mind, blur my reality, steal my control… but they never touched that one truth.

As I already mentioned I am exist in the form of air, always around Alisha….

THE END

 

 

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