The Case Of The Girl In Bolero

Prologue

Shrisha and Savita were playing ball in the garden. Shrisha was standing in front of an old well and her sister Savita on the other end. When it was Savita’s turn, she apparently flung the ball too high for poor Shrisha to catch it, and it landed with a splash in the well. Savita got so worked up, that in all her anger, she pushes Shrisha hard, and she too ends up in the deep hole along with her sister. What happens next is a mystery. Savita is whirled into a wild and magical adventure. This begins as soon as she finds the strange passage that looms in their house, which practically changes her life. Meet Zou Chen Zhang, an ancient Chinese man, who rescues her sister, bringing peace to the family of the Tappi Kottayi’s.

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Chapter One – The quarrel

It all happened one fine Saturday evening, when Savita and Shrisha were playing ball in the garden. All their brothers had gone to watch a pantomime, and both of them were not allowed to go, especially considering the last time that Shrisha had got lost. Oh dear, that was a dreadful story and makes for a new book in itself. 

That Saturday evening after a very satisfying lunch the two sisters decided to play in their back yard. Shrisha was standing in front of the well, and Savita in front of a great green bush. Whizz! Zoom! Plonk! Went the ball. The two sisters stood a far distance, never stopping, never dropping the ball, but simply going on and on, making the onlooker feel dizzy. The quarrel then began. The ball had been flung too high for poor Shrisha to catch it, and unfortunately, landed in their well.

“Oh dear!” said Savita in a scornful voice, coming near to her sister. “The unfortunate one lost again, and I must admit I am the queen of all balls. I control in what they do. And for some reason the darling ball missed your hand, and plunk… into the well?”

She smirked an infuriating smirk, which caused Shrisha to work herself up into a temper, and give a SLAP. What happened next was horrible. The two sisters stood against each other, like deadly enemies in war, each waiting for the other to start. Suddenly, Savita gave Shrisha a huge push, which very unfortunately made Shrisha topple over and back into the gigantic grey well. Savita gasped. She and her sister may have both been in fights at times, but she never wanted anything seriously bad to happen to her sister.

“WAIT!” cried out Savita, panicking all at once, and she ran up, jumped the emergency rope their Ma kept outside the house on the shoe rack and flung it into the deep well. The weight of her sister was too much for Savita to bear, and she too was flung into the well, shrieking with fear as she went down.

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The next thing that Savita knew was she smelled the sickly smell of hospital and the horrible waves of aroma and all those disgusting things. Ugh! Yuck! Where was she? Savita glanced around the white rectangle room with a small balcony and then she realized where she was, and what she had done. She jumped up in bed straight, opened the door and SPLAT!

She walked into a dignified nurse, now a cross one, with a needle in her hair, plasters on the floor, the tray upside-down on her lap and water splashed all over her. She glared at Savita and then flew into a rage.

“You stupid clumsy girl!” She yelled. “How dare you? Pick up my things at once! Oh, the state I’m in! Oh, the way you’ve soaked my hair! Just wait till I get you.” she said angrily, and rushed after Savita.

But Savita was quick and dived under a huge bed and ran for dear life from the dreadful hospital. The nurse had rushed after her, but had tripped over the huge bars of the bed, and went crashing into the floor, her arms flailing as she came down. She stopped, and rubbed her bruised legs, forgetting all about the mad chase she was assigned to be on.

What had happened to Savita? She had run all the way home, keeping a good sense of direction. She made way for the wooden doors, running in and bolting them as fast as she could. She stopped, and started to gasp for breath. “Ma..Ma!” she called. “Ma, where are you?” She checked all the rooms, and tried to open the doors that led outside.

They were all locked.

“Where is everybody?” shouted Savita. A cold shiver of fear swept through her body and she began to tingle and twitch. Savita burst into tears, howling loudly.

Just then a Knock… Knock… Knock…Came from one of the walls. Savita blinked her tears and looked around the room. There it was again! That unmistakable knock!

Knock…Knock…Knock…

Savita walked herself to the walls, the certain one were the knock seemed to be coming from. She pushed hard with all her might, and it opened up to reveal a long, wide passage with fire still burning away resulting with it looking ancient. 

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Chapter Two – The Chinese man

Savita shuddered, frozen to the spot. Dared she go in there? Slowly, she walked herself into the passage. The door hissed behind her, and she cautiously walked further on, her pace steady. Suddenly, the passage curved downwards, and she lost her balance, tripped stumbled and whizzed down, wondering what she’d see next. When Savita opened her eyes, she saw an old man, with a thin wiry moustache, sitting on an old spinning wheel. There was a trace of recognition in his face that Savita fought to identify.

“Greetings, my friend!” He exclaimed. “Well, well, this certainly is a surprise. After all these long centuries, I’ve at last got another somebody to keep me in company! My first was my spinning wheel, but oh, now I’ve got somebody nice and fat to play with!” He chuckled, prodding Savita in the tummy, hard.

 “OUCH!” yelled Savita, her expression turning blue to grey. “You bungle of a man! I’ve just arrived here and for some reason I see an old man, prodding me hard? Is there any decent part of you? I’m STUPIFIED!”

The man stopped, and looked sadly at her. “I’m awfully sorry,” He began, “But you see, I’m a very peculiar person, I even notice it myself most of the time. Let me introduce myself to you. My name is Zou Chen Zhang, and I’m Chinese. I am the most powerful man living, because, I, Zou, is a person that can make a lot of changes to a human body. Destroy it, unite it back to life, change its ability for a talent, make it look completely different, or…” Zou lowered his voice to a whisper. “But most importantly of all, to make that certain person change completely, into a new soul.”

An ice cold shiver ran through her spine and Savita trembled.

“Well,” Snapped Zou. “What are you waiting for? What option do you choose?” he asked. His moustache jumped up and down like a worm slithering away.

“Um… I’m not very sure, actually.” said Savita. “You see, Shrisha, my sister was pushed into the well today and…”

“INTO THE WELL?” Zou exploded. “In my mastery of “Wǒ de mófǎ shū” (我的魔法书) which means ‘my magic book’, it says that any one who tries to kill another one of its kind is an unknown sacrament for us. Which in your understanding means that none of us people who can change a human body never helps the one who tried to kill the other. Savita nearly burst out laughing. Here was a man who said that he would never help some one who killed the other when she was actually the killer!

“Here’s what you do now.” said Zou. “Drink this powder. By midnight you will turn into Shrisha.” He glanced at something strapped onto his hand and said, “I’m late for an appointment. Got to fly!” and he vanished in an instant. Suddenly, the walls in the room began to open until Savita found herself back home. But the curtains were all drawn, and a lovely smell of something frying in the kitchen wafted in the air and creepily made its way into Savita’s nostril.

 “Ma! Ma!” Savita burst into the kitchen.

“We’re have you been?” Asked the cross dame. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere!”

Savita shimmered down, and suddenly her mother looked less fierce. “Go and do your chores, Savi. Pick off the dry clothes in the back garden. And don’t drop any one of them!” So Savita hurried off, tightly clutching the bottle that Zou had given her. As soon she got outside she tipped the contents of the bottle into a tiny plant. Then hastily she sprinkled water on top of it.

“I don’t believe anything that the silly Zou said.” muttered Savita quietly to herself.

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Chapter Three 

It was quarter past midnight, and Savita was fast asleep on the couch that belonged to their living room, trussed up inside the snow white duvet. The sound of rapid footsteps parading about in the garden woke Savita up. Drowsily, she made way for the front door to check what the sound was, and then almost lost her balance as she understood who was making the sounds. It was Shrisha! She was wearing Savita’s favourite blue bolero, and fancy chic sunglasses to suit, with her special black pants, bought by her late relative. Savita ran forward, and hugged Shrisha, but to her surprise her arm went completely through! Shaking her head, Savita tried again hugging her. But her arm went through yet again! Stepping back, Savita peered at her, and realised that her sister was an inch away from the ground. 

Her sister, had come to haunt her in the form of a ghost! Savita ran for safety back to bed, and then noticed that her mothers rarest flower in her garden - the Chocolate Cosmos had disappeared. But what troubled her was that it was exactly the same plant that she had tipped the powder that Zou had given her.

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To be continued...