I was five years old when an older cousin showed me my first horror movie – Demons.
A woman in a bathroom stall. Her friend looking for her, unaware that she is turning into a monster. The cheek oozing green goop, eyes and teeth changing slowly and the build up to the attack - my eyes never left the screen.
I was also feeling smug because my sister and brother, who were four and five years older to me, kept running away at the scary scenes. I am still smug about it. :P
The movie ended, we played a few games and the cousin dropped us home. I fell asleep in an instant. Then, came the nightmares. I soiled five beds that night. My mother kept moving me like a game of musical chairs, but the demons followed me to every mattress. By sunrise, my cousin wasn’t just in trouble with my and his parents—he was being shouted at by the entire neighbourhood.
I was strictly forbidden to watch any more horror movies.
We watched another that weekend. I can’t remember which one but I do remember watching a man climb a staircase in an abandoned house. The camera zoomed out and there was NO STAIRCASE. It blew my tiny mind!
Until then, barring the bedwetting incident, I was alright. The terror within me was being gently nudged. That changed when we watched Demons 2 – that dialed my fear from a five to a hundred. It begins with a girl called Sally who gets infected on her birthday. Sally remained with me for a very, very long time. Every night, I could feel her presence, standing at my door, her creepy eyes boring into me.
It was during that time, a minor earthquake hit Mumbai. I was five. I didn’t know what earthquakes were.
I didn’t think. I launched.
I missed Dhaval bhai and landed, full force, on Kshitij bhai’s stomach. His eyes flew open as I grabbed his collar and screamed.
“GHOSTS ARE SHAKING THE WALL! GHOSTS ARE SHAKING THE WALL!”
My cousin’s video cassettes were confiscated. But it was too late. I had turned over to the dark side.
Every week I would sit in front of my T.V., one hand holding onto my brother and the other covering my face, to watch Zee Horror Show. That opening music – it was legendary. It still gives me chills!
More horror poured in from Aahat and Mano Ya Na Mano with the nimbu mirchi stories and undead, headless corpses and the milder stuff like Goosebumps and Ghostbusters. And of course, movies were a staple, courtesy my cousin.
I made life hell for Khsitij Bhai – he would be the one with his hands clutched in mine, unable to move the entire night. He would hug me after every nightmare and switch on the lights if I needed to use the washroom in the middle of the night.
Dhaval Bhai was entertained – jumping out of the shadows wearing plastic vampire teeth and staring at me with a creepy smile in the dark. He once told me that every once in a while, a white cloth flew in through our window, circled around our fan, slowly turned red with blood before flying out.
I consumed horror from any source I could find – books, movies, and of course, true accounts of people who had a brush with the supernatural. This constant barrage of terror did a number on my mind. It began to create its own creepy tales which I am now unleashing upon you.
I don’t see this obsession dying anytime soon. Unlike my traitor cousin, who now swears by mindfulness videos and positive affirmations. He is appalled that he once showed a five-year-old a horror movie.
Being a true horror fan, I will haunt him with that fact forever.