Chapter 2: The Scent of Samosas

Chapter 2: The Scent of Samosas

Sleep offered no escape, only a replay of the nightmare. I was running, the wet squelch, drag, drip of that impossible creature pacing me perfectly, its hollow, phosphorescent eyes burning into my back. I woke with a gasp, drenched in sweat, the phantom smell of river rot thick in my nostrils. The morning sun streamed through my window, painting stripes of reassuring light across the floor, but the terror of the night clung to me like a damp shroud.

It was a dream, I told myself. A hallucination. Bad beer mixed with old ghost stories.

But then the craving hit.

It wasn't a memory; it was a physical presence. A raw, gnawing emptiness in my stomach that had nothing to do with normal hunger. My mind screamed for the crisp, golden shell of a samosa, the hot, spicy potato filling, the slick of oil on my fingers. It was an obsession, a beast clawing at my insides, demanding to be fed.

My mother was already awake. The scent of her usual morning puja—sandalwood and camphor—was choked out by something sharper, more acrid. I found her in the main room, not praying, but working. She moved with a frantic energy, her face pale and grim. She was sprinkling water from a small copper pot onto every windowsill, every doorframe, her lips moving in a silent, desperate chant.

“Ma, what are you doing?” I asked, my voice hoarse.

She didn't look at me. “Reinforcing the thresholds.” Her voice was tight, brittle. “Go, eat your breakfast.”

In the kitchen, a plate of fresh parathas and a bowl of dahi waited for me. I tore off a piece, but the moment it touched my tongue, it turned to ash. My throat seized. It wasn't what I—what it—wanted. My stomach churned in violent protest. All I could think about, all I could smell, was the imaginary scent of spiced potatoes sizzling in a vat of hot oil.

I pushed the plate away, my hands trembling. This wasn't normal. This wasn't just a hangover. I needed my friends. I needed to hear them say they’d seen nothing, that I was being crazy. I needed the anchor of their shared reality.

I called Vikram first. He answered on the third ring, his voice sharp and irritated.

“What?”

“Vikram, about last night…” I started, my voice barely a whisper. “The thing… the thing from the water…”

“Stop.” The word was a slap. “We were drunk, Arjun. We saw a shadow on the water and spooked ourselves. That’s it. End of story. Don’t be a child.”

“But it walked,” I insisted, desperation creeping in. “It followed us. I could hear it!”

“I’m hanging up,” he snapped. “I don’t want to talk about this again. Forget it.” The line went dead. His denial was so aggressive, so absolute, it felt like a wall slamming down between us. For a second, I almost believed him. Maybe I was going mad.

Next, I tried Sameer. His fear would be my proof.

He picked up instantly, his voice a panicked hiss. “Hello?”

“Sameer, it’s me. Are you okay?”

“Don’t talk about it,” he whispered frantically. “Don’t even say it over the phone. My mother… she says words have power. We never should have gone there.”

“So you saw it too?” The relief in my voice was pathetic. I wasn’t alone.

“I saw nothing!” he lied, his voice cracking. “I saw nothing, and I’m never going back to that river again. Don’t call me about this, Arjun. Please. Just… leave it alone.” He hung up before I could say another word.

His terror was a cold confirmation, but it offered no comfort. He had burrowed into his fear like a hole, pulling the darkness in after him.

Rohan’s phone went straight to voicemail.

I was alone. Alone with this monstrous, gnawing hunger and the memory of those glowing eyes.

Throughout the day, the craving intensified. The phantom scent of fried food became my personal tormentor. I’d be sitting in my room, trying to read, and suddenly the air would fill with the rich aroma of fresh pakoras, so vivid my mouth would water and my stomach would cramp with need. I walked to the corner shop for a bottle of Coke, and I could have sworn I saw a street vendor with a cart of sizzling bhajis, but when I blinked, the street was empty. The sound of oil popping and hissing became a constant background noise in my head, a maddening soundtrack to my fear.

My mother, meanwhile, turned our home into a fortress of faith and fear. She lit bundles of dried herbs I didn’t recognize, filling the house with a thick, choking smoke that stung my eyes. She found an old, tarnished silver nail and hammered it into the wood of our front door. Her prayer beads were a constant presence in her hands, the clicking a frantic, unending rhythm. Her fear was a palpable thing in the air, a cold weight that settled over our home, making the ordinary feel threatening. The safety of these walls was becoming a cage.

By evening, I was weak, hollowed out by the relentless hunger. I hadn't eaten a single bite all day. I found my mother in the kitchen, her back to me, staring at the small Tulsi plant on the windowsill.

“Ma,” I said, my voice cracking. “You have to tell me what’s going on. How did you know? About the samosas? What was that thing?”

She turned slowly, her kind eyes now ancient and weary, filled with a sorrow so deep it stole my breath.

“It has attached itself to you, Arjun,” she said, her voice heavy with grim certainty. “It noticed you at the river. It marked you. It followed your scent home.”

“But what does it want? This hunger… it’s driving me insane.”

“The hunger is not yours,” she said, taking a step closer, her gaze intense. “It is the creature’s. It is a line, a psychic thread it has cast into you. It cannot cross a protected threshold, not yet. So it pulls on the line. It uses a craving for something earthly, something strong, to create a hook.”

She reached out and gripped my shoulders, her fingers digging in with surprising strength.

“You must listen to me, Arjun. This is the most important thing. You cannot give in. Do you understand? You cannot eat what it wants you to eat.”

“Why? What happens if I do?” I pleaded.

Her eyes filled with a fresh wave of terror, a reflection of the horror she saw in my future.

“To give in is to feed it,” she whispered, her voice trembling with the weight of the words. “You won't be feeding your body. You’ll be feeding the connection. You’ll be telling it, ‘Yes, I accept you.’ You’ll be nourishing its hold on you, making it stronger. You will be opening the door from the inside.”

As she spoke, a breeze drifted through the open kitchen window, carrying a scent that was real this time, not a phantom of my tortured mind. Our neighbors, the Sharmas, were frying something. Samosas. The aroma, rich with cumin, coriander, and hot oil, wrapped around me, a seductive embrace.

The beast in my stomach roared. My resolve wavered. A single bite. What could one bite do?

At that precise moment, as the thought crossed my mind, the cheerful light in the kitchen seemed to flicker. A chill, damp as a tomb, snaked its way up my spine. From the corner of my eye, I heard it.

Drip.

A single, distinct drop of water hitting the tiled floor.

I snapped my head around. There was no leak. The floor was dry. But the sound had been real, and with it, the faint, sickening smell of river rot, cutting through the heavenly scent of the samosas.

My mother had heard it too. Her hands flew to her mouth, stifling a gasp.

The creature was outside. It was listening. And it was hungry.