The Locket of Stone

I had never believed in the supernatural. Not really. As a child, I wore a silver cross my grandmother pressed into my palm, insisting it would keep me safe from anything that lurked in the dark. But I grew up, shed my faith like a snake sheds its skin, and the cross ended up in a drawer, tarnished and forgotten. Then came the summer of ’94, in the sweltering heat of Visakhapatnam, a coastal city that felt like a furnace. I was seventeen, home for the holidays, with nothing better to do than read novels and argue with my sister, Meera, who was two years younger.

Our house sat near the outskirts, close to an old, abandoned colonial cemetery called St. Anne’s. It was a forgotten place, overrun with weeds, its headstones leaning like crooked teeth. Locals whispered it was cursed, that the spirits of those buried there never rested. But I paid no attention. To me, it was just a gloomy patch of land I passed on my cycle to the market.

One steaming night in May, the sky was a velvet blanket of stars. My father, a portly man with a booming laugh, was out with friends. My mother had retired to her room, complaining of a headache. Meera was glued to the radio, listening to film songs. I was sprawled on the floor, reading a dog-eared copy of H.P. Lovecraft, when the knock came.

It was not a gentle tap, but a frantic, desperate pounding that shook the door. I jumped, and Meera gasped. My mother’s voice from her room, ‘Who is it at this hour?’ I peered through the peephole and saw a man I recognized: Mr. Raman, my father’s colleague. His face was slicked with sweat, his eyes wild. I opened the door, and he burst in, panting, barely coherent. ‘Your father—call him. It’s urgent. Ramesh’s sister—she’s dead. They need help.’ I fetched my father. When he heard, his face went grim. Ramesh was a close friend from work. His sister had a history of mental illness, and tragedy was not unknown to the family. Dad grabbed his jacket and said, ‘I’m going. Stay here, look after your mother and sister. Don’t open the door for anyone.’

I nodded, but as he stepped out, Raman lingered in the doorway, his eyes darting toward the old cemetery visible down the road. ‘Be careful,’ he muttered, almost to himself. ‘That place… it’s not safe at night. Something happened there tonight. Ramesh said his sister was seen walking toward it before she…’ He didn’t finish, just shook his head and followed Dad into the dark.

The clock struck midnight. Meera had fallen asleep on the sofa, the radio humming static. Mother’s room was silent. I turned off the lights, but the dark didn’t feel comforting. Something felt off. I couldn’t shake Raman’s words. The cemetery. It was a kilometer away, but I felt a pull, an inexplicable dread that prickled my skin. I sat in the living room, staring at the window, when I heard a sound—faint, rhythmic, like a hammer on stone.

I told myself it was a construction site, but this time of night? No. I grabbed a flashlight and, against my better judgment, slipped out the back door. The air was thick and humid, and the streetlights flickered, casting dancing shadows. I walked toward the cemetery, my heart hammering. The gate was a rusted iron monstrosity, half off its hinges. I slipped through and shone the light across the tombstones. There, near the far wall, under a gnarled old banyan tree, I saw a figure crouching, its back to me. A woman in a white sari, the fabric stark against the dark earth.

My breath hitched. I wanted to run, but my feet were rooted. She seemed to be scraping at the ground, digging. Then she stopped, and her head turned slowly—too slowly—over her shoulder. Her face was pale, gaunt, with hollow cheeks and eyes that were deep black pits, like empty sockets. She smiled, and her teeth were stained red. ‘You came,’ she said, her voice a dry rasp. ‘I knew you would. You have the locket, don’t you? The one from your grandmother. It belongs to me.’

I stepped back, shaking my head. ‘I don’t have it. It’s lost. I lost it years ago.’ She let out a laugh that was more like a choked sob. ‘Liar. You dropped it here. Don’t you remember?

I didn’t remember any such thing. But my hand instinctively went to my chest, where a small bump pressed against my shirt. I had forgotten—yesterday, while rummaging through old drawers, I’d found the silver cross, and for some reason, I’d put it on. It was a habit from childhood, a comfort. I clutched it now, feeling its cool metal. ‘I have this,’ I said, holding out the cross. ‘It will protect me from you.’

But the woman—or whatever she was—rose to her feet slowly, and the air around her shimmered with heat, like a mirage. ‘That is not what protects you,’ she said. ‘Your own fear is your only curse. But you already know what I want.’ And she began to walk toward me, her bare feet leaving no print on the dusty ground.

I turned and ran, my legs pumping, my breath ragged. I didn’t stop until I reached my front door, slamming it shut and locking it. Meera stirred, mumbling, and my mother called out, worried. I leaned against the door, panting, the cross still in my hand. It felt warm, almost burning. I looked down—the silver surface was now tarnished a deep black, and engraved on it, instead of the image of St. Michael, was a symbol I had never seen—a twisted knot.

From outside, a soft tapping on the window. I didn’t dare look. But I heard her whisper, ‘You can’t outrun what you carry. It has always been with you.’

Dawn came, and my father returned, his face haggard. He told us Ramesh’s sister had died, but they had recovered her body from the cemetery. She had apparently taken poison, but the strange thing was, she had clutched in her hand a small, silver medallion—identical to the one I had thought lost. When I asked my father about it, he stared at me grimly and said, ‘That was Ramesh’s sister’s. She always wore it. But she gave it to your grandmother years ago, before she died. It was supposed to be a gift for you.’

I felt the world tilt. I remembered now—my grandmother had given me that medallion when I was a child, and it had been in my possession until I misplaced it as a teenager. But I had never seen the woman before in my life. Or had I? The memory came flooding back—during a family trip to the cemetery when I was eight, I had seen a woman weeping by a grave, and I had dropped the medallion in fright. She had picked it up and promised to return it, but she died before she could.

That woman’s spirit, trapped between worlds, had been waiting for the return of her talisman. And now, by putting on the cross, I had somehow bound her to me. Or perhaps she had been bound to me all along.

I never went back to St. Anne’s Cemetery. I moved far away, changed my name, tried to forget. But sometimes, even now, I’ll catch a glimpse of a white sari in my peripherals, or hear a whisper in the rustle of leaves. And I know she is still waiting, patient as the dead, for the moment I let my guard down. I keep the cross—now black, in a box at the bottom of my drawer, but I never wear it. Some things you don’t tempt twice.