OS: Asad Khan and the Lady Jinn

Asad Khan and the Lady Jinn

In an old town two teenage boys were walking through a forest densely populated with greenery when they spied a trail winding through the trees like a coiled snake. They decided to follow the trail for fun and ended up standing on the edge of a swamp that was immensely larger than anything they had ever seen. They never got to go anywhere outside of the little town that they lived in because their father was too miserly to take them on any sort of vacation. Asad had convinced his younger brother Ayaan to go on a walk through the woods with him and was rejoicing in the fact that they had come across something new to do in the dilapidated town. Asad decided that he wanted to get a closer look at the new area so he cautiously started to move even closer to the edge of the swamp but jumped back as he heard the throaty croak of a toad. As he turned around he saw his brother, Ayaan, standing ever so still with a face as white as a cloud on a sunny day and looked to see a strange woman they had never seen staring out at them from the opposite end of the swamp. Asad and Ayaan both turned and began racing out of the forest and neither would dare to turn and look back because the sudden croak of the toad and the appearance of the lady in the serene area had frightened them badly. They only slowed their pace when they had gotten out of the forest and found the familiar dusty road which stretched out for miles like the horizon as it connected all the towns within the large region they lived in. Soon they turned off of the road and walked through the town until they approached the dingiest house in the neighborhood which had cobwebs and vines twisting and hanging around it from all sides like streamers of the once grand house. Both boys looked at each other with gloomy faces before Ayaan was about to push the door open which looked more like the rough back of an alligator. The broken door was a reminder to both boys of a horrible day when their father had come home after spending the evening getting drunk as he usually did and tried to attack their mother who was standing by the door. He had missed his wife and instead broke the door and fell headfirst straight onto the porch. It was what happened after that incident that caused the boys the most pain when they had woken up the next morning to find their mother had disappeared. Asad shook the feeling off and turned to Ayaan and pointed his finger North while saying "let's go and speak with the old hermit that lives at the outer edge of town to see if he knows about that woman we saw today." Ayaan answered that he thought it would be better that they forget about the whole scene because he had a bad feeling about finding out more. They argued for some time until Ayaan finally relented and began to follow Asad who was now wearing a very noticeable triumphant grin. One thing they had forgotten was how the old hermit liked to play tricks on people and they only remembered that when the old man suddenly leapt out of the trees like a snake jumps out to catch its prey. Both boys screamed as the man gruffly asked what they were doing in his yard. Ayaan stammered out "S-ss-sorry sir we just wanted to ask you for a favor." The old man with skin as wrinkled as a raisin asked what kind of favor they were asking for. The boys told him about their incident in the woods and knew they would get their answer when they saw the man staring into the night sky with a knowing face. He then turned and asked if they had been to the side of the swamp where she was. When the boys said no they became more curious with his answer. The hermit looking at Ayaan said "It's definitely a good thing you didn't go to the side she was at especially if you are as squeamish as your actions suggest." He then went on to tell the boys the story of the ghostly woman they had seen in the forest. Many years ago a woman became engaged with a man named Ghafoor who was bankrupt but both of them believed that their love was enough for them to live their lives happily. Everything was going as planned until three days before the wedding when the woman, Razia, got another proposal from a man who had accumulated tons of wealth in the last few years by bootlegging. The woman thought about the second proposal for only a few minutes as she suddenly realized how much happier she might be if she had the money to do things that she had always dreamed of and broke of her engagement with Ghafoor. He was devastated that she had left him only days before their wedding so he began to follow Razia around wherever she went. On the day that they had planned their wedding Ghafoor followed Razia in his car as she drove down a deserted road and just as a thundergust appeared Ghafoor lost control of his car and collided with Razia'a car killing her instantly. Then came the most haunting part a week later as Ghafoor was driving down the same road in the middle of the night he saw a woman dressed in white standing in front of his car. He tried to get a closer look and when the woman moved the hair off of her face Ghafoor let out a startled gasp and lost control of his car again and hit a tree and died painfully as a huge shard of glass from the windshield dug into his heart. Asad snorted when the man went on to say that after that any young man driving alone on that street ended up hitting the same tree and dying the same death. Asad declared "I'm going to prove that's not true. Tonight I will take Dad's car when he goes to sleep and go down the street and I will come back here tomorrow and show you that the story in not true." Ayaan's stomach tightened as he heard Asad's statement because he believed the story with all his heart and did not want his brother to go out and try to aggravate the ghost. He told Asad how he felt but Asad just got angry and yelled that he did not have to go with him and that he would go out on this adventure on his own. That night Ayaan awoke to the sound of a car being started and realized that Asad was really going to go through with his crazy idea. He began running as fast as he could behind the car and kept on going until he tripped over a tree root and sprained his ankle. He got right back up and began to gallop like a horse chasing after his father's car until he saw a ditch full of skeletons no doubt from all the men who had died crashing into the tree. Asad did not see his brother running behind him and felt very smug because he was almost down road and had not seen any ghost. Suddenly the woman appeared in front of his scar with an angry look on her face which startled him so badly that he like the men before him lost control of his car and crashed into the tree. He had only a few seconds to feel the pang of regret as a huge piece of glass as sharp as a butcher's knife cut into his chest. Ayaan made his way as fast as he could to his brother and it only took him a few seconds to see that his brother Asad Khan was no more. He picked up his brother's body and carried him back home without noticing the lady ghost who gave him a menacing stare and vowed that he would be her next victim.