The Vermilion Thumbprint

I never used to believe in ghosts, not really. Even after everything, I still tell myself there must be a rational explanation. But some things leave a mark that can’t be scrubbed away, like a thumbprint of vermilion on a white marble floor.

We lived on the top floor of a three-story walk-up in a crowded neighborhood in Jaipur, not the old city, but a newer colony where the streets were narrow and the buildings pressed close together. Our apartment had two balconies, one facing the street and one over a courtyard where the neighbors hung laundry. It was a rented place, but we’d been there for six years, and I knew every crack in the plaster, every squeak in the wooden floorboards.

My name is Harpreet, and I’m a Sikh. I’ve always been devout, but my faith was tested in a way I never expected. In our tradition, the ambrosial hours of the early morning, between three and four-thirty, are the most sacred for prayer. I would wake at three, wash my face and hands, and sit on a woolen rug in the corner of my room, reciting the Guru Granth Sahib. The rest of the family slept, and the world was silent except for the occasional stray dog barking or the rumble of an early truck.

One morning, about five years ago, I noticed a black cat sitting beside me as I prayed. I didn’t think much of it. Stray cats often wandered in through the open balcony doors, especially in summer. This one was sleek and silent, with eyes that caught the dim light of my lamp and reflected like dark mirrors. It watched me for a few minutes, then slipped away into the shadows of the hallway.

It happened again the next morning, and the next. The cat would appear, sit a few feet away, and just watch. I’d pause my recitation to shoo it away, but it would slink off only to return the next day. My wife, Neha, said she’d seen it too, but she seemed uneasy. ‘It’s just a cat, Harpreet,’ she said, but she crossed the courtyard quickly after saying it.

The unease grew when I noticed a pattern. The cat would always be there when I started my prayer, and it would vanish exactly at the moment I finished. Not before, not after. It was as if it was keeping time.

Then the trouble began. Small things. A thali that had been stacked neatly would be found shattered in the morning. A framed photo of my parents would be mysteriously knocked off the shelf. At first, I blamed the wind or our own carelessness. But then Neha woke me one night, her face pale. ‘Someone was standing at the foot of our bed,’ she whispered. ‘I saw a woman in a white saree, but her face was in shadow. She pointed at you.’

I checked the whole apartment, but there was no one. I couldn’t sleep, and when I went to pray at three, the cat was there, but now it had a red mark between its eyes, like a smear of kumkum. That unnerved me more than the woman, because our neighbor on the ground floor, an old widow named Lakshmi, was rumored to practice things no one spoke about. The neighborhood said she had cursed her husband to his death, and they gave her a wide berth. I had never thought much of it, but the mark on the cat was exactly the kind of vermilion she wore every day.

I tried to ignore it, but the occurrences escalated. On a Friday, I found my prayer rug turned the other way, facing the wall. On the following Tuesday, a small idol of a deity I kept was found broken in the courtyard, as if thrown from the balcony. My mother, who lived with us, began to have nightmares. She said she heard a woman crying in the middle of the night, coming from the storage room.

My rational mind kept saying it was all a series of coincidences, stress, a restless cat. But the fear was becoming a physical weight in my chest. I decided to confront Lakshmi. I went down to her apartment, a cramped space with the shutters always drawn. She opened the door to my knock, and when she saw me, her eyes narrowed. ‘You’ve seen it, haven’t you? The cat?’ she asked before I could speak.

I was taken aback. ‘How did you know?’

‘I sent it,’ she said, with a strange smile. ‘You’ve been praying too loudly, disturbing the spirits that rest during those hours. They don’t like it. They’ve complained to me. I tried to warn you with the cat. But now they’re angry.’

I didn’t know what to say. I had never believed in such things, but the coldness in her voice made me shiver. ‘I’m just doing my duty,’ I managed.

‘Your duty is waking the dead?’ she laughed, a dry rasp. ‘Leave this place if you want to be safe.’

I returned to my apartment in a daze. That night, I didn’t pray. I lay awake, listening. At exactly three in the morning, I heard a soft scratching at my door, like claws on wood. Then the sound of a woman singing, a lullaby, but off-key, in a language I didn’t recognize. It came from the balcony. I got up, my heart hammering, and peered through the window. The black cat sat on the railing, its red-marked forehead glowing faintly in the moonlight. It looked at me, and I swear it spoke. Not in words, but in a voice that entered my mind: ‘Why did you stop?’

I slammed the shutters and pulled the curtains. I didn’t sleep that night. In the morning, I found a small clay bowl on my doorstep filled with what looked like dried blood and ash. I kicked it away, but the dread only grew.

We tried to move. We looked for other apartments, but every deal fell through at the last moment. Neha’s mother fell ill, and she had to go to her village. My mother refused to spend the night alone. I was alone in that apartment for one weekend, and that’s when it reached its peak.

On Saturday night, I decided to pray again, hoping to find some peace. I set up my rug, facing the wall, and began the hymns. As I recited, the cat appeared, purring loudly, walking around me in circles. I tried to concentrate, but the room grew cold. The light from my lamp flickered. Then, in the mirror on the opposite wall, I saw a reflection behind me: a woman in a white saree, her face hidden by long black hair, but on her forehead, the same vermilion mark. She was reaching out, her fingers inches from my shoulder.

I froze, my voice catching in my throat. The cat started to hiss, and then it jumped at the mirror, shattering it into a thousand pieces. The sound was like a thunderclap. When I opened my eyes, the cat was gone, the mirror was a mess of shards, and the room was silent.

I packed a bag and went to my brother’s house in another part of the city. I stayed there for a week. When I returned, I found the apartment empty, except for a single black hair on my prayer rug, and a thumbprint of vermilion on the wall above where I used to sit. I tried to wash it off, but it wouldn’t budge, as if it were stained into the plaster.

We moved out within the month. We found a new place without any trouble. I still wake up at three sometimes, but I pray in a different room. The cat never came to the new house. My mother stopped having nightmares. But for months, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had been marked. Even now, when I close my eyes during prayer, I see that woman in the mirror, and I hear the cat’s hiss. I don’t know if it was a ghost, or something else, but I know one thing: that thumbprint is still there, on that wall. And I wonder if the next person who moves in will see the cat.

I still don’t believe in ghosts, not really. But I’ve started to lock my balcony doors at night.