When the time decided to stop...

The tick-tick of the clock stopped suddenly...
I would not have really noticed the sound of the clock had I not been alone in the house ...reading in the silence...only the clock’s sound to lend me company.

Thinking that the batteries must have conked off....I took a deep sip from my coffee cup and flipped a page. Something made me look out of the window... I noticed that the wind had stopped blowing....even the trees that were swinging in the wind....were frozen in the positions that they had been in! The stray dog of the colony had stopped in its strides as if posing for a portrait...the still children in the park were looking at their ball in mid-air. Everything was stationary with a quiet stillness that I had only seen in movies or still photos!

Astonished, I stood up from my position and checked all my limbs...all seem to be working and moving....then what had happened here...? If I could move...why couldn’t the others? Confused and a bit scared, I helplessly looked around for a reason....is this doomsday...?? Did I do something that I am in this labyrinth? Is something going to happen that I am not aware of?

With the feeling that I am missing something drastically important, I decided to go and check on the other people....in the neighbourhood....Going out of the house, I pressed the bell of the apartment opposite to mine but no sound came...was there no electricity? But I could clearly see the light in the corridor...and in my own apartment....I tried my bell and there it went.... peeling loudly...making me jump out of my skin in the eerie silence surrounding me!

Why was it that everything that was mine was functioning ...while the rest of the world seems to have gone into a lull!!???

An idea struck me...and I rushed to switch on the TV...there to my shock.......the frozen images....kept changing...but only when I switched one channel after the other! All channels gone bad together?

Now I was really scared...what the hell was happening???? Was all this a big joke...was someone playing a prank on me!?? Or was this a divine intervention for paying me back for my sins??? Or had I gone crazy in the head??

Taking a deep breath....I sat down on the couch and tried to think what to do next...
I tried to recall if I had read or seen anything like this before...

Remembering Wells’ “Time Machine” that I had read in school...I also recalled many movies made on the same theme... But apart from a few scenes, in which people had travelled back and forth in time using the time machine....I couldn’t recall much......but what was happening here? There was no time machine...what did I have to do? What was the significance of all this? What am I expected to do?

I got up to tweak the hands of my clock...as I remembered people doing in movies...waiting for everything to go back in time miraculously and start moving!!! But still nothing happened....

Panicky and trying not to cry...I prayed hard for things to be normal again...but it seemed nothing was working....nothing was normal....or maybe I had become abnormal and was imagining all this??

Perplexed and helpless...I started pacing the room...thinking of my options...now that the world had literally stopped all around me...what was best possible in this scenario? What shall I do? Shall I read, write, pray, or go to sleep....could I ever fall asleep in such a situation!!! Was this going to last forever??

Questions raced in my mind….I picked up the book I was reading….went back to the coach and tried to concentrate on the printed words but everything blurred and I couldn't stop the tears of helplessness that started falling down my eyes…

Suddenly…I felt a strange stillness within myself…and I could hear my hear beat going thud-thud…and then missing a beat…and then almost vanishing…panicked …I tried to sit up but my feet, my back, my hands refused to move…as if they had been turned to stone….I could feel the tears that I had shed moments ago…turning hard on my cheeks...and not rolling anymore….

Oh! I thought…so its happening to me too…but then I started hearing the clock going tick-tick again….and I wanted to shout with joy…but couldn’t...the immobility had struck me...was it some sort of virus??

As I sat there like a stone…with the book clutched in my hand….and the pearls of tears sitting on my cheeks…I began noticing other sounds around me…yes, the children were shouting and playing again...and there...the dog was barking too...the images of my TV were moving again…a woman politician had attacked the microphone...of the speaker of the assembly and threw it as people ushered her out of door...I could even hear my neighbour's son shouting at his mother…

My cell phone started playing "Yeh Dooriyan"...my latest ring tone...and I just kept staring at my friend's number flashing on the screen paralysed....

Everything was back to normal...the only difference was...now I was the one for whom the time had stopped moving...