1

When Jonathan woke up that morning, he was in a room that he instantly felt a dislike for. The room looked the same, freshly whitewashed as if inviting someone, and the same white fan circled over his head. There was a window. But it was not the same through which he looked into something that no one understood. It was not his house.

2

Jonathan was a good man. A late silent generation candidate and cheerfully sunny. A devout family man, who earned his loyal dime for purpose rather than to maintain a reputation in his community. He was sober. His wife, Mary and son Neil, adored him. They were a happy family, remaining far from the maddening crowd that changed over eras.

Each day, from the time Neil wore nothing but diapers (and sometimes in his birthday suit showing his little willy), he waved at his son till the gate, on his way to the office. A custom that he followed until Neil had turned adolescent and kissed his first girlfriend. But he did not complain. He liked his dad, as every dutiful son would do.

Although his family meant his life to him, he would habitually scold Mary for being prudent or conscientious. It was not a show of male chauvinism, but it emerged from a trait seen in older traditions and that continued until his late 50s.

It was in 2019 that the first signs of dementia had struck Jonathan. Mary had died a year back, and that made Jonathan miserable.

While making simple decisions seemed overwhelming, he failed to follow basic instructions as heating food in the microwave, a task which he had done for years.

Neil did not notice this until one day when he barged into Jonathan’s room and found him standing and looking out of the only wooden window. Jonathan always believed he saw his loved one’s looking through the window, which was a remnant of their old house that had been renewed. He had forgotten to lift his pants up, and that surprised Neil that he felt something was not right. He could see tears in Jonathan’s eyes.

‘I saw Mary,’ Jonathan said.

3

The house they had stayed in for three decades was being demolished. It was Neil’s suggestion that they remodel their house. Mary said nothing. Nor Jonathan. But it was a painful feeling when they saw the same house being replaced by something alien, something they would want to call home. Neil felt it was a matter of time and they would settle. Mind settles sooner than we perceive, and emotions are without the benefit of the intellect.

Of all the things that they would not let go was a certain window of the chamber where Neil’s grandfather had stayed. Grandfather was long gone, and Neil did not find it necessary to store it as an artifact. Jonathan suggested an alternative. Fix this window in our room.

Hence, the window stayed. It only opened when they wanted fresh air to come in from the woods that it was facing. There was a pond separating the woods and his house.

4

Jonathan remembered looking through this window, the first time, after doctors diagnosed Mary with an incurable illness. She was dying fast.

Opening the window, he saw someone in white near the pond facing the woods. He was without his spectacles but could still see it, as if an apparition. He picked up his glasses from the table to get a better view, and then the thing, or whatever it might have been, walked into the woods. The woods connected to the main road going to the city.

The following night, Mary died.

Grief settles in deep, and it is the memories that haunt the miserable. Although Mary was a good wife, Neil would see an outburst against his mother for minor errors. Neil did not know why, but Mary would keep quiet and utter nothing in defense. She knew her husband well, and she knew he loved her.

On days Jonathan was sad; he would open the window and stare outside. He was there, and so was the apparition.

The grief showed elsewhere. From changing moods and judgement, there was a rapid interference in Jonathan’s daily memory. Once he had called Neil to his room and asked him if he had seen Mary. When Neil tried to pacify him, he protested and told him that she was at the pond and enquired what she was doing out there in the pouring rain. That was when Neil felt something was not right.

It rained every day. Jonathan was becoming restless. He wanted to go out to the pond and bring Mary back. While he was walking out of the house with an umbrella, Neil objected.

‘I will bring her Papa,’ Neil said.

‘No, she will not heed your saying. I need to scold her.’

Jonathan cried.

5

As they were going to the hospital, Jonathan did not see the apparition near the pond.