Rakshasi

She looks at me with black liquid eyes. Sniffing, wagging her miserable stump of a tail, she closely follows my every movement. She is scrawny, with one of her hind legs twisted out of shape and one front leg broken. She has a lean, rat-like face with black and brown skin and hardly any fur on her body. On cold and wet monsoon mornings, she shivers and shakes as she tries to stand up.



I remove my slippers by the shoe rack, but my eyes are fixed on her. Some days, when I have a supply of biscuits, I beckon to her. A slight nod of my head or a sign with my eyes, and she understands. She struggles to rise from her curled up position. A light shines in her eyes as she senses that there is something to eat.

She walks a couple of steps, tentatively, haltingly. She gauges whether what I have to offer is worth the effort. I drop a couple of milk biscuits on the floor. She comes closer, sniffs at them. On some days, she sticks out her tongue and tries to gather them up into her mouth. That’s when I take the time to notice her more closely. She has overgrown nails in all her paws and what is left of her teeth is crooked and dysfunctional. She struggles to bite and chew the biscuits. I make a note to break them up next time.

She isn’t always found there outside the gym beside the shoe rack. On days when she isn’t there, I feel a stab of pain in my heart. I notice the vacant space next to the shoe rack and the grey image on the wall traced by her body. I hope that she is alive and safe somewhere and will return to her spot the next day. I ask inside if they know what happened to her. They don't even realise that she is missing and flippantly reassure me of her return.




I have known her for over a year now. These days, the very act of standing up makes her whimper and shake. Her attitude has changed. She simply lies curled up with her head buried in her paws and her eyes closed. She hears me and opens her eyes, reluctantly. I break the biscuits into small pieces and throw them near her. It is an effort to get up. She sniffs disinterestedly, like she has concluded that it isn’t worth getting up. Some days, she eats a couple of pieces, other days, she leaves them untouched. They become ant food later. It makes me wonder how long she could pull through like this.

I don’t know if this is love. I miss her when she isn’t there. That vacant space on the wall haunts me. Sometimes I dream about her. They called her Rakshasi (she-devil), my son said. Why? She is anything but. So docile, she couldn’t hurt anyone even if she wanted to. But she has encroached my conscience enough to make me think of her often. Heck, she has even made me write this piece about her. Bewitching bitch. Rakshasi.

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