Terrible Black Cat

The SSC exam is over, so now I’ll have a long holiday. I started planning where to go. After much thought, I decided to visit my village. I requested my dear friend Suman to come with me to my village, and he agreed. On the scheduled day, Suman and I reached my village by bus. Since we traveled on a Tuesday, there wasn’t much crowd.

The day after we arrived, something strange happened. Sharif Ali from the village had died, supposedly by suicide. I felt somewhat sad. The police investigation revealed that he had jumped from the roof. I couldn’t understand why a man like him would need to commit suicide. He had married off his two daughters and even had grandchildren. He should have been happy. Anyway, that day passed by with me thinking about him while visiting his house, and night fell without me realizing it. After a day of running around, Suman and I went to bed after eating. Still, I couldn’t sleep at night. Despite trying, I lay awake.

By the time I woke up in the morning, it was nearly ten o’clock. I woke up to find Suman was not beside me. Going to the inner room, I saw that except for my two aunts and two sisters, no one was home. When I asked my aunt about the others, she said that everyone, including Suman, had gone to Uncle Jasim’s house. Uncle Jasim had died the night before.

Then, without delay, I ran to Uncle Jasim’s house. Upon arriving, I heard that Uncle Jasim had hanged himself. People started saying that the village must be cursed, which is why people are dying one after another. They became so scared that they stopped going out at night. Then Suman and I decided that we would go out at night. Whatever happens to us, we will uncover the mystery behind the villagers' deaths. At dinner, this was the only topic of conversation. At one point, my uncle suggested that the villagers should go to a sage or priest the next day to see if they could provide a solution. After dinner, everyone went to sleep. Suman and I pretended to sleep and then quietly opened the door and went outside.

After walking a bit, we saw our neighbor Anwar uncle going towards the pond. I didn’t understand anything and called him, but he didn’t respond. Suddenly, I remembered that he didn’t know how to swim. Then I realized he might be going to drown himself in the river. Suman and I immediately ran and stopped him. After a while, he regained his senses. When I asked him, he said he didn’t know how he got to the pond. He only heard the sound of a cat crying and remembered nothing after that.

At that moment, the cat in front of me started to run. Suman and I ran and blocked its path. Then, taking a matchbox out of my pocket, I said, Tell us who you are, or I'll set you on fire. The cat said, 'No, no, don’t kill me. I will tell you everything. The cat transformed from its feline form into a beautiful woman. Suman said she was Akash Ali’s wife. Akash Ali would come home drunk every day. At home, he would beat her and their daughter. The daughter would only ask, 'Mom, why is dad beating us?' She never had an answer. After this went on for some time, one day she met a sage and told him everything. She then asked him how she could keep her daughter with her without anyone seeing her. The sage said he would cast a spell to put her daughter into a cat so no one would understand.

The next day, she took her daughter to him along with their pet cat. He cast the spell and completed the task. A few days later, Akash Ali’s wife went out for some work and forgot to take the cat, which was her daughter, with her. That day, Akash Ali got angry and, finding no one else around, took out his anger by killing the cat for no reason. As soon as he killed the cat, his daughter emerged from it. When Akash Ali's wife returned, she saw that her husband had killed their daughter. A few days later, Akash Ali remarried. Grieving for her daughter, Akash Ali's wife committed suicide. After her death, her spirit entered the cat. Since then, whenever the cat cried, people who heard its cries would commit suicide. Akash Ali's wife told us that her spirit would not find peace until Akash Ali was punished. I promised Akash Ali's wife that we would definitely punish Akash Ali. Then her spirit left the cat's body, and the cat died.

The next day, my friend Suman was found dead. I wondered how my friend could die even after the spirit had left. I went to a priest and told him everything. He said that an evil spirit had entered your friend's body with the intention of killing you. He advised me to leave as soon as possible. He tied a thread around my hand, telling me never to remove it, or I would be in danger. I bought a bus ticket and returned home that day. To this day, I still don’t understand what happened to me that day.