Rajiv Dubey
Part 1
Monday mornings have a reputation for being soul-crushing. For Ramesh Tripathi, forty-two years old, rapidly balding, and spiritually bankrupt, this particular Monday was… something else.
He woke up at 6:45 a.m., precisely two minutes after his alarm, which he had snoozed in a half-dream state. The fan was whirring, the neighbours were already arguing, and Meenakshi, his wife of seventeen mostly silent years, was banging utensils in the kitchen like she was avenging her past life.
Everything was painfully normal. Until he walked into the bathroom and screamed.
There, on the cold, slightly cracked, blue-tiled floor, lay a corpse.
Wearing his shirt.
Sporting his trademark uneven moustache.
And worst of all — it looked exactly like him.
He didn’t scream a second time. He froze. Blinked. Rubbed his eyes. Looked again.
The body didn’t move. Its eyes were closed. The left hand was curled awkwardly, as if mid-sentence. There was a slight stain of dried toothpaste near its lips.
Ramesh checked his own reflection in the mirror — same drooping jawline, same tired eyes, same middle-aged mediocrity.
This was him. Dead.
“Ramesh!” Meenakshi shouted from the kitchen. “Did you brush or are you scrolling Instagram again?”
He cleared his throat, trying to sound alive.
“I… might be dead.”
“What?”
“Nothing!” he shouted louder.
He closed the bathroom door gently and locked it.
What does one do when one finds oneself dead?
Panic. That’s what. First, he paced. Then he hyperventilated. Then he Googled on his cracked phone:
“Found my own dead body. What now?”
The results were not comforting: conspiracy theories, Reddit threads, one link to a zombie fan forum, and a Quora question from someone in Odisha asking something eerily similar — but it had no answers.
Ramesh stared at the body again. It looked peaceful. As if it had been granted the one thing he never had — rest.
He kicked it lightly.
Still dead.
“Okay, okay,” he muttered. “I’m not going mad. This is real. Or not. Or I’m dead. Or… dreaming. Maybe this is sleep paralysis? What if I’m still in bed?”
He pinched himself. Hard.
“Ow.”
Still here.
He considered calling the police. But what would he say? “Hello, 100? I’ve committed suicide, but I’m still here to report it”?
They’d arrest him for his own murder. Worse, they’d put it on Twitter.
Instead, he called the one person in his life who would not only believe him but might actually enjoy this—Vinod Bakshi, his college roommate and longtime unemployed spiritual advisor.
Vinod had once tried to summon a demon using toothpaste, whisky, and a Hanuman Chalisa app. It hadn’t worked, but he’d claimed it gave him a ‘mild rash of enlightenment.’
Vinod picked up after three rings.
“Bro, it’s 7:15 a.m. Who died?”
“I did.”
A pause.
“…You mean emotionally?”
“No. Physically. I’m staring at my own body. On my bathroom floor.”
“I’m coming.”
Thirty-eight minutes later, Vinod arrived wearing sunglasses, track pants with an ancient hole in the crotch, and a T-shirt that read “I’m not lazy. I’m just in power-saving mode.”
Ramesh let him in. Vinod looked at the body, squatted beside it, poked the cheek twice, and said, “Huh. You look better dead.”
“This is serious,” Ramesh hissed.
Vinod nodded solemnly. “You’ve been duplicated. Classic dimensional error.”
“Or I’ve gone mad. Maybe I’ve snapped.”
Vinod sniffed the corpse.
“No smell. That’s rare. Most corpses smell like politics.”
Ramesh was pacing again. “Should we hide it? Burn it? Call someone?”
Vinod tilted his head. “Honestly? I’d suggest alcohol first. Decisions are better when you can’t feel your liver.”
They poured themselves some Old Monk with Thums Up and sat in the hall, the bathroom door still locked, the dead Ramesh inside, presumably not moving.
Meenakshi had left for her yoga class after throwing him a glare and muttering something about “wasting water and oxygen.”
Over drinks, Vinod became philosophical.
“Maybe this is symbolic. You’ve been dead inside for years. Selling life insurance to people who don’t want to live. Maybe the universe just made it literal.”
“That is not helpful.”
Vinod shrugged. “Why now though? Why not last week?”
“Because last week I paid my taxes. The universe doesn’t want dead defaulters.”
They sipped in silence.
Vinod stared at the half-empty bottle. “You know, there’s opportunity here.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve always wanted a break. What if… the body goes to work instead of you?”
Ramesh blinked.
“What?”
Vinod leaned in.
“Think. It looks like you. It doesn’t talk — which is a bonus in the corporate world. It doesn’t eat or pee. It won’t complain. It won’t question. You could finally be free.”
“That’s… insane.”
“It’s brilliant.”
“But how would I send it to work?”
Vinod grinned. “Wheelchair. Sunglasses. A little deodorant. People in your office are zombies anyway. Who’s going to notice one more?”
And that’s how it began — the idea that would spiral into moral chaos, philosophical crisis, and eventually, political unrest.
Ramesh Tripathi, a man who had once faked chest pain to avoid a conference call, was now considering sending his own corpse to work.
But first, he needed to iron a shirt.
Part 2
Tuesday morning came reluctantly, dragging its heels like a sulky teenager. Ramesh had slept poorly, haunted by dreams of his corpse attending performance reviews and outperforming him. Meenakshi had complained about his tossing and turning, muttering, “At least die quietly, if you must.”
At 8:00 a.m., Vinod arrived with two steaming cups of roadside chai and a wheelchair borrowed—without permission—from the nearby government hospital.
“This,” he declared, “is your new office commute vehicle.”
Ramesh peered into the bathroom where his corpse still lay, now dressed in a crisply ironed light-blue shirt and navy trousers. He’d taken great care combing its hair and even dabbed on some aftershave. The result was unsettling: it looked more confident than he ever had.
“We’ll say you had a minor stroke,” Vinod said, adjusting the body’s tie. “But you’re a hero, so you insisted on working.”
“This is absurd.”
Vinod raised an eyebrow. “So is your life.”
They loaded the corpse into the wheelchair with some difficulty—it was surprisingly heavy and limp, like a bored walrus. Meenakshi watched silently from the doorway, chewing her toast.
“Is that… your cousin?”
“Yes,” Ramesh said too quickly. “He’s had a… neurological incident.”
She sipped her tea without emotion. “Make sure he doesn’t drool on my good bedsheet.”
At the Metro station, Vinod created a human shield around the wheelchair and managed to get it inside coach number four, right between a man watching Bhojpuri TikToks at full volume and an auntie loudly praying to Sai Baba. No one noticed. Nobody cared. Ramesh had long suspected that Delhi-NCR was full of sleepwalkers in pantsuits; this confirmed it.
By the time they reached Ramesh’s office in Rajendra Place, the corpse had slipped slightly, head leaning forward like it was ashamed of capitalism. Vinod readjusted it.
At reception, the bored security guard looked up briefly.
“Sir, this is…?”
“Mr. Tripathi,” Vinod said smoothly. “Minor stroke. Still insists on working. National spirit, you know?”
The guard nodded solemnly. “True patriot.”
They wheeled the body in. At his desk, Ramesh gave his corpse a keyboard, placed a stress ball in its hand for authenticity, and left it surrounded by files.
Then he hid in the office storage room with Vinod, peering through the slats.
For four hours, nothing happened.
People came. People went. One junior employee whispered, “Sir seems intense today.” Another said, “He’s so still. Very focused.”
By 1:00 p.m., the manager—Mr. Malhotra—walked past, did a double take, and said, “Tripathi! Good to see you back. You’re a real fighter, eh? Don’t worry. HR has already filed for your medical leave.”
The corpse, unsurprisingly, said nothing.
Malhotra smiled. “Great attitude.”
Back in the storage room, Ramesh was chewing on a pack of stale peanuts. “I can’t believe it’s working.”
“I can,” Vinod said smugly. “People don’t look at people. They look at functions. You’ve been replaced by your own absence.”
That thought lingered with Ramesh long after they wheeled the body back home that evening. They kept the corpse in the study, propped up on a beanbag, surrounded by files for ambience.
Vinod slept over, claiming the house had a “ghostly resonance” he liked. Ramesh, lying awake next to Meenakshi, felt something stir in his gut. It wasn’t excitement. Or fear.
It was relief.
Wednesday, they repeated the routine. The body went to work. Ramesh stayed home. He made himself a decent breakfast. Took a nap. Watched three episodes of a Korean drama he didn’t understand but emotionally connected with.
By Friday, the corpse had been promoted.
“He’s more productive now,” Malhotra said in the elevator, addressing no one in particular. “Tripathi’s always been a quiet fellow, but lately… he has this quiet intensity.”
The HR lady added, “He doesn’t even use the washroom. Such efficiency.”
The corpse sat in the corner office now, facing the window, head tilted slightly as if deep in thought. It had been assigned two interns.
That evening, Ramesh stared at his doppelgänger over dinner and asked Vinod, “Do you think I’m… unnecessary now?”
Vinod, who was spooning Maggi into his mouth with a fork for no reason, said, “No, man. You’re free.”
Meenakshi raised an eyebrow. “From what?”
Ramesh looked at her for the first time in weeks—really looked. She had faint lines near her temples. Her hair was tied in a bun that was both functional and irritated. She used to hum while cooking. Now the silence was louder than the exhaust fan.
“From… being a puppet,” he said softly.
She looked at him like he’d spoken French. “You okay?”
He nodded. “I think I’m better than I’ve ever been.”
That night, Ramesh danced alone in the living room. Not well, not stylishly, just… freely. Vinod clapped. Meenakshi didn’t stop him.
By Saturday, Ramesh started writing poetry. Bad poetry, full of metaphors about tea and entropy. But he wrote.
By Sunday, he baked a cake from a YouTube tutorial. It collapsed, but he was proud.
On Monday, he walked into the bathroom to brush his teeth and screamed again.
There was another body.
In a red saree. Wearing Meenakshi’s gold earrings. Smiling gently.
It was her.
Dead.
Part 3
Ramesh stumbled backward, clutching the sink. The toothbrush fell from his hand and clattered to the floor.
There she was—Meenakshi—perfectly still, propped against the toilet like she had sat down for a moment and never got up. Her eyes were closed. Her mouth was gently smiling. Her red saree had creases as if freshly ironed. She looked beautiful. Peaceful. And very, very dead.
“Vinod!” Ramesh screamed.
Vinod came running in his checked boxer shorts, a piece of toast hanging from his mouth. He glanced at the corpse, blinked, and muttered, “Whoa. Either you’re contagious or reality is breaking.”
“This is not funny,” Ramesh said, hyperventilating. “First me, now her? What is this, a couples’ discount?”
Vinod crouched beside the corpse. “Still warm. This one’s fresh. Also, her posture is better than yours.”
“Will you stop evaluating posture like this is yoga class?”
They both stared at her in silence. The bathroom had become a morgue again. The same cracked blue tiles. The same gentle ceiling fan hum. Only now, the dead seemed to arrive by appointment.
“Did she say anything last night?” Vinod asked.
“She grunted once when I overcooked the toast. That was it.”
“Maybe… maybe this is some kind of metaphysical balancing,” Vinod said, getting serious for the first time in years. “The universe took your body, so it took hers too.”
“Then where’s the real her?”
Vinod shrugged. “Could be living in a parallel dimension. Could be selling papads in Neptune. Who knows?”
Ramesh sat on the edge of the bathtub. “I was just getting used to being dead.”
“And now your wife’s dead-er.”
“Exactly.”
Vinod scratched his chin. “Well… we do what we did with you. We send her to her job.”
“She’s a freelance editor! She works from home!”
Vinod smiled. “Then she’s already winning. She doesn’t have to move.”
And just like that, by 10:00 a.m., the corpse of Meenakshi was sitting at her work desk in the study, laptop open, cursor blinking. Ramesh typed out emails on her behalf, filled with well-placed passive-aggressive comments and serial Oxford commas.
By lunchtime, she had completed two client edits, replied to six emails, and even received a “You’re brilliant as always” from a longtime author.
Ramesh stared at her motionless face.
“She’s getting more appreciation dead than she ever did alive.”
Vinod nodded. “Welcome to modern productivity.”
That afternoon, Ramesh and Vinod took a walk. The streets were alive with chaos—horns honking, paan stains drying in the sun, a street dog barking at a balloon. Life, Ramesh thought, was both absurd and oddly coordinated.
“Do you think,” he said, “we were ever really alive? Before this?”
Vinod threw a biscuit to a crow. “We followed routines. Did what was expected. Paid bills. Argued about discounts. That’s not life. That’s software.”
Ramesh looked up at the sky. It was the same dull grey as always, but today it felt… wider.
When they returned, Meenakshi’s corpse had received an editing assignment from a magazine in New York. $400. Immediate payment.
“That’s more than she’s ever made in a week,” Ramesh whispered.
“Dead people don’t negotiate,” Vinod replied.
That evening, they threw a small celebration in the living room—Old Monk, chips, and a YouTube playlist of 90s Indipop. Ramesh danced again. Vinod tried beatboxing. The corpses sat quietly, dignified as ever.
At midnight, Ramesh stood on the balcony, holding his glass to the stars.
“I think I’m free, Vinod.”
Vinod leaned on the railing. “You’re unemployed, legally nonexistent, and possibly hosting the start of a supernatural epidemic.”
“And yet,” Ramesh said, smiling, “I’ve never felt more myself.”
Suddenly, from the hallway, a crash.
They ran in.
The bathroom door, which had been slightly ajar, was now wide open.
The Meenakshi corpse was gone.
Vanished.
No footprints. No signs of struggle. Just a faint smell of jasmine and a single bindi stuck to the mirror.
Ramesh felt cold all over. “Where the hell did she go?”
Vinod swallowed hard. “We locked the main door. No one came in. She… got up. She walked out.”
“She’s dead.”
“She was dead.”
For the first time since Monday, the silence felt heavy. Dangerous. Like the calm before a metaphysical tsunami.
Ramesh didn’t sleep that night. He sat at the edge of the bed, corpse Ramesh still propped up in the study, a notepad in hand. He wrote things like:
What defines death?
Can a person re-die?
Is coffee still safe?
At dawn, he opened the fridge. A note fluttered out.
In Meenakshi’s handwriting.
“I’m going for a walk. Don’t wait up.”
No signature. No time. Just that.
He showed it to Vinod.
“She’s become a sentient corpse,” Vinod said, visibly thrilled. “That’s next-level. Like, post-post-life.”
Ramesh stared at the fridge door. “What if… she doesn’t come back?”
Vinod smirked. “What if she does… with friends?”
And just then, the doorbell rang.
Part 4
Ramesh and Vinod stood frozen, staring at the door like it was the gateway to hell or a particularly annoying insurance salesman.
The doorbell rang again. This time, longer. Impatient.
Vinod whispered, “If it’s her, do we hug her or spray Dettol?”
Ramesh inched forward, barefoot, a rolled-up yoga mat in one hand as a weapon and last night’s rum courage in his veins. He opened the door.
It wasn’t Meenakshi.
It was Mr. Dubey from flat 402, holding a casserole dish.
Dubey looked cheerful, overly so. “Hello, Tripathi ji! Just came by to say thanks for the life insurance tip. My wife’s been saying I’m worth more dead than alive, and thanks to you, that’s finally true! Also… try this mutton. It’s almost as good as her disappointment.”
He handed over the dish, waved, and left before either of them could say a word.
Vinod shut the door and muttered, “That man is ten percent humour, ninety percent unresolved trauma.”
They placed the casserole on the table and stared at it like it might contain a liver.
“You don’t think he knows?” Ramesh asked.
“Knows what? That we’re harboring two corpses, one of whom just went for a walk?”
Ramesh poured himself some tea. “One corpse. The other is apparently freelancing.”
“Right,” Vinod said, nodding slowly. “Also, you’re technically a corpse too.”
“Correction. I’m redundant.”
They were halfway through breakfast when Meenakshi walked back in.
Not zombie-Meenakshi. Not ghoul-Meenakshi. Just… regular dead Meenakshi, moving with quiet grace, her red saree now paired with a pair of Skechers and a jute bag over one shoulder.
She didn’t say a word.
She walked straight into the kitchen, opened the fridge, pulled out the bottle of Yakult, drank it, wiped her mouth, and sat at the dining table.
Ramesh’s jaw hung slightly open.
Vinod slowly pulled out his phone and whispered, “Can I livestream this?”
“No.”
Meenakshi looked at them both and said, in her calm, slightly nasal voice, “We have visitors coming at 4. Please don’t make the house smell like rum and metaphysics.”
Ramesh blinked. “You’re… back?”
She nodded. “I took a walk. Park’s nice in the morning. The crows are very expressive.”
“YOU’RE DEAD!” he shouted.
“Don’t shout,” she said firmly. “It’s vulgar.”
Vinod leaned forward. “Where did you go? What happened? Are you—”
She raised a finger. “One question at a time. And no silly remarks.”
Ramesh sat beside her, heart pounding. “Are you… alive?”
“No,” she said, calmly chewing a slice of stale bread. “But I’m not unavailable either.”
Ramesh ran a hand through his thinning hair. “That’s not how life works.”
Meenakshi looked him in the eye. “Life hasn’t worked in years. I just got tired of waiting for change. So I changed direction.”
Vinod, half-joking, half-awestruck, said, “You… chose death?”
She smiled. “I chose silence. Stillness. Peace. And then I woke up. But differently.”
Ramesh couldn’t stop staring. “You’re walking around. Talking. Drinking Yakult. You’re more functional than I am.”
“I always was,” she said, standing up and brushing crumbs off her lap. “I just played dead to match the house.”
That stung. Even Vinod winced.
“Who are the visitors?” Ramesh asked, trying to shift topics.
“They’re like me,” she said cryptically, placing the empty Yakult bottle precisely in the recycling bin. “You’ll see.”
At 3:58 p.m., the doorbell rang again.
Ramesh opened the door slowly. This time, it was three women. One in a tracksuit, one in a bridal lehenga, and one in full corporate formal wear, badge and all. All three were perfectly poised. All three were obviously dead.
Meenakshi greeted them with a namaste. “Welcome. Come in.”
They entered like they owned the place.
Tracksuit Lady sat cross-legged on the sofa. Corporate Ghost pulled out a laptop. Bridal Dead Girl adjusted her dupatta and asked for green tea.
Ramesh whispered, “What in the name of Kafka is happening?”
Meenakshi turned to him. “We’re forming a collective.”
Vinod asked, “Of… corpses?”
“Not corpses. Survivors of expectation.”
The women nodded in eerie unison.
Meenakshi continued, “We’re done living lives other people wrote for us. Done pretending to be alive for the sake of duty, marriage, tax forms, and WhatsApp groups.”
Corporate Ghost added, “We now freelance as dead consultants. We review resumes, proofread break-up texts, and occasionally haunt ex-boyfriends.”
Tracksuit Lady said, “I specialize in passive resistance and air fryer recipes.”
Bridal Ghost beamed. “And I’m a wedding content dissuader.”
Vinod clapped slowly. “This is either the start of a revolution or a very niche startup.”
Ramesh sat down, overwhelmed. “What about me?”
Meenakshi looked at him, not unkindly. “You can choose too.”
“Choose what?”
“How to die properly.”
Vinod whistled. “That’s deep.”
The women stayed till 7. They discussed philosophy, decentralization, yoga, Netflix algorithms, and existential migraines. They left with polite smiles and vague promises to “connect on the astral plane.”
By 8:00, the house was quiet again.
Meenakshi retreated to the study and resumed editing. The corpse Ramesh continued to sit in the corner, slightly slouched but still very much employed.
Vinod poured himself a drink. “You’ve got options, bro. Stay redundant. Stay hiding. Or… evolve.”
Ramesh looked at his notebook. On the last page, he wrote in shaky letters:
I think my wife is more alive dead than I ever was alive.
Then he added:
Tomorrow, I start dying better.
Part 5
Tuesday dawned with an overcast sky and a faint smell of existential dread in the air. Ramesh brewed himself a strong black coffee and stared at the corpse in his study, who was now wearing reading glasses and had a Post-it on its forehead that read: “Meeting with Procurement at 3 PM.”
“Efficient even in death,” Ramesh muttered.
Meenakshi was already up, dressed in an elegant cotton kurta, brushing out her hair in front of the mirror. She looked radiant in a way he hadn’t seen in years—not glowing with life, but with absolute detachment, which in some ways was more dazzling.
“Did you sleep?” he asked, sipping his coffee.
She shrugged. “I don’t really need to. I meditate between dimensions.”
“Is that code for napping?”
“No. Napping is what you do when the soul gives up halfway. I… travel.”
“To where?”
“Places where the living don’t ask such pedestrian questions.”
He gave up. There was no defeating a woman who had posthumously discovered purpose.
Vinod wandered out of the guest room, wrapped in a blanket, hair a perfect cyclone of bad decisions. “I had a dream where I married a ghost and she made me fill out insurance forms every night.”
“That sounds accurate,” Meenakshi said, checking her email.
They ate breakfast in silence—Ramesh chewing toast with the intensity of a man trying to digest the meaning of death, Vinod alternating between jam and philosophical muttering, Meenakshi typing at an inhuman speed.
At 11 a.m., the doorbell rang.
This time, it was a delivery boy with a large rectangular package labeled:
TO: MEENAKSHI TRIPATHI
FROM: THE AGENCY FOR POST-MORTAL ADVANCEMENT.
“Did you order something?” Ramesh asked, watching her slice open the cardboard.
“It’s my welcome kit.”
Inside was a black blazer, a silver badge that said FRACTURED-REALM CONSULTANT, a collapsible ouija board, and a manual titled “So You’ve Decided to Remain Dead: A Beginner’s Guide.”
Ramesh held the book like it might explode. “This is real?”
“Of course it is,” she said, pinning the badge to her kurta like a bureaucratic warrior. “Do you think the afterlife is chaos? No, my dear. It is admin.”
Vinod took the blazer and tried it on. It fit perfectly. “Do they accept interns?”
“You’re still alive,” she said, “which is highly discouraged.”
That afternoon, Meenakshi conducted her first session with a recently dead teenager who had been ghosting his ex—literally. She sat cross-legged on the carpet with the ouija board, laptop open, and the boy’s spirit hovering faintly near the ceiling fan.
Ramesh peered into the room, then walked away, muttering, “My wife is now a spectral relationship counselor.”
Meanwhile, his own corpse continued climbing the corporate ladder. By 5 p.m., HR had emailed him (technically the corpse) to inform that he was shortlisted for “Leadership Shadow Program.”
“I was never even nominated for Employee of the Month!” Ramesh shouted.
“Exactly,” Vinod said, chewing on a cucumber. “Because you blinked. Your corpse doesn’t.”
By evening, Ramesh was sitting on the balcony, staring at the grey skyline of semi-dreams and unfinished flyovers. The city was unchanged, and yet he was not the same man who had screamed at a mirror a week ago.
He lit a candle. Not for prayer. Just to have some fire near him.
“Vinod,” he said, as his friend joined him, holding a paper plate of dal chilla. “What if I want to die better?”
Vinod didn’t blink. “Then stop pretending to be dead.”
“I’m not pretending.”
“You are. You gave up and called it peace. But the real dead—they get stuff done.”
Ramesh thought of Meenakshi’s confidence, her ghost clients, her quiet power. His corpse was still being praised in office emails.
“I want out,” he said. “I want back in. I want to start over.”
Vinod grinned. “Good. Step one: retrieve your body.”
That night, dressed in black with a duffel bag and a crowbar, Ramesh and Vinod broke into his own office building.
“We could have just walked in,” Ramesh hissed as they crept past a snoring security guard.
“This is about symbolism,” Vinod whispered. “You’re reclaiming yourself.”
They found the corpse sitting in the corner office, alone under a flickering tube light, tie slightly askew, but still composed.
Ramesh walked up to it slowly, like confronting a version of himself he’d buried long ago.
“It’s time,” he said.
Vinod helped him lower the corpse into the duffel bag. They zipped it up gently, like tucking in a child who had overachieved in quietness.
As they walked out, Vinod said, “Feels good?”
“No,” Ramesh replied. “It feels terrifying. But that means it’s real.”
Back home, Ramesh laid the corpse on the bed and stared at it.
“Any last words?” he whispered to the body.
It did not answer.
He didn’t expect it to.
He sat beside it, closed his eyes, and whispered:
“You did your job. Now let me try mine.”
At dawn, he burned his own resume.
Then he started writing a new one.
Part 6
By Wednesday morning, Ramesh had decided to reclaim his life—or at least the compostable remnants of it. The corpse version of him had been neatly stored in the guest bedroom, wrapped in a floral bedsheet and surrounded by potpourri for aesthetics. Vinod called it The Mausoleum of Middle-Class Ambition.
Ramesh sat at the dining table with a notepad, chewing the end of a pen like it was his last contact with meaning. Across from him, Meenakshi was conducting a Zoom call with a spirit from Manipur who wanted to haunt his own pet parrot. She looked effortlessly professional, even as the candle at her desk flickered and the ouija board rattled faintly beneath her elbows.
“I think I’ll start a blog,” Ramesh announced.
Vinod, who was busy blending a banana with protein powder and regret, asked, “About what?”
“About being… a man who used to be dead but decided not to be.”
Vinod blinked. “That’s either very brave or deeply niche.”
“Exactly.”
He opened a blank WordPress page and typed:
THE DAY I STOLE MYSELF BACK
A blog by a formerly alive man.
He stared at the blinking cursor. It stared back, judgmental.
“I don’t have an audience,” he mumbled.
“You never did,” said Meenakshi without looking up. “That didn’t stop you from posting vacation selfies.”
Ramesh ignored her and wrote a 600-word piece about how dying without dying had given him clarity. He ended with:
“Maybe the problem was never life or death. Maybe it was compliance. I complied too much. Now I won’t.”
He hit publish and immediately received a spam comment: “Want to grow your blog fast? Click here for nude investment tips!”
Encouraged nonetheless, he posted the link in the society WhatsApp group. Only one blue tick appeared. It was Dubey from 402. He responded:
“Interesting read. Also, water tank not cleaned. Pls check.”
At noon, Ramesh received an email.
Subject: We read your blog. You might be a perfect fit.
From: The Ministry of Existential Affairs.
He blinked twice, clicked the link, and was redirected to a job application titled:
“Consultant – Transitional Realities Division.”
Under “Previous Experience,” he wrote: Successfully replaced own life with corpse. Now seeking promotion.
He submitted the form.
Meenakshi leaned over his shoulder and read the screen.
“They’ve reached out to you?” she asked, suddenly serious.
“Who?”
“The Ministry,” she whispered, as if naming a powerful ex. “They don’t contact just anyone. They must’ve sensed you’re… shifting.”
“What do they do?”
“They help people cross thresholds—life, death, identity, marriage, office politics. All of it.”
“Sounds vague.”
“Because it’s vast.”
Later that evening, a portal opened in their bathroom.
One minute, Vinod was brushing his teeth; the next, the mirror melted, and a man stepped out wearing a kurta made of blinking pixels. He had no eyes, just two elegant eyebrows floating where eyes should’ve been.
“I’m Sinha,” he said. “Recruitment.”
Ramesh emerged from the kitchen holding a half-eaten samosa. “You’re from the Ministry?”
“From Field Ops. We saw your blog. You’re unstable, self-aware, disillusioned, and mildly literate. You’re perfect.”
Vinod raised a hand. “What about me?”
Sinha stared at him. “You peaked in 2012. Let it go.”
Ramesh felt lightheaded. “What’s the job?”
“Reality chaperone. You’ll help new members adjust to their… shifts. Some are newly dead. Some are just emotionally exfoliated. Your blog struck a chord in the liminal spaces.”
Ramesh blinked. “Do I get health insurance?”
“You are the health concern now.”
Meenakshi walked in, holding a tray of biscuits.
“Offer him lemon tarts,” she said. “They prefer citrus.”
Sinha smiled. “Good instincts. She’s senior-tier already.”
“Do I get a trial period?” Ramesh asked.
“Every moment after your fake death is a trial. Congratulations. You’re hired.”
And just like that, Ramesh was handed a badge—hexagonal, glowing faintly—and a manual titled:
“So You’ve Been Selected: A User’s Guide to Unanchored Employment.”
Later that night, he sat on the roof with Vinod, the city lights shimmering like soft hallucinations.
“I think I’m becoming… something else,” Ramesh said, sipping black tea.
“You’re evolving,” Vinod replied. “Or mutating. Either way, it’s more interesting than spreadsheets.”
Ramesh watched a plane blink across the smog.
“Do you think I’m crazy?”
“I think you’re finally paying attention.”
Downstairs, Meenakshi was conducting a séance over Zoom with a deceased motivational speaker who had never stopped talking. In the study, Ramesh’s corpse was now repurposed as a bookshelf, holding Meenakshi’s tax files and several jars of homemade chutney.
At midnight, the toilet flushed on its own. No one reacted.
The house had accepted its state of flux. So had its inhabitants.
Ramesh opened his laptop and began typing his next blog post:
HOW TO DIE IN A MEETING AND STILL GET PROMOTED.
Part 7
Thursday morning arrived dressed as a Tuesday. That is to say, it wore too much deodorant, carried an air of misplaced urgency, and pretended to matter.
Ramesh sat at his desk wearing his new badge — “Reality Chaperone, Transitional Realities Division” — which pulsed gently like a worried firefly. He had received his first assignment via encrypted dream at 3:47 AM:
SUBJECT: BIPIN MALHOTRA, AGE 52
STATUS: DEAD (UNWILLING TO ACCEPT)
LOCATION: SECTOR 13, GURGAON
INTERVENTION WINDOW: 4 HOURS
He hadn’t even had breakfast.
Vinod, still wearing a T-shirt that said “Sarcasm Loading…”, peeked in. “You’re going out?”
Ramesh nodded grimly. “First soul retrieval.”
“Should I bring a stick?”
“Why would I need a stick?”
“You’re walking into the home of a delusional dead man in Gurgaon. A stick sounds optimistic.”
Ramesh ignored him and turned to Meenakshi, who was sharpening a mechanical pencil over a small fire.
“Any advice?”
She blew on the pencil tip. “Dead men lie to themselves first. Listen to their lies carefully. They’re clues in disguise.”
“Thanks. That sounds like something you’d say before pushing someone off a cliff.”
She shrugged. “You married me.”
11:30 AM. Sector 13, Bipin Malhotra’s apartment.
The door opened with the sound of a cough that had lived too long.
Bipin stood in his lungi and banyan, eyes bleary, hair sculpted by insomnia. Behind him: unopened Amazon packages, four months of newspapers, and a large photograph of Bipin shaking hands with an HR manager under a banner that read: “Employee of the Decade.”
Ramesh flashed his badge.
“I’m here about your… situation.”
Bipin frowned. “Which situation? The landlord, the tax thing, or the fact that I haven’t exhaled in 36 hours?”
Ramesh stepped inside.
“No, Mr. Malhotra. I’m here because you died last Sunday in your sleep.”
Bipin sat down slowly, as if his knees had to process the statement separately.
“I knew something was off,” he murmured. “My wife hasn’t yelled at me since Sunday. Not even once. I thought it was menopause.”
“No, Bipin. It’s post-you.”
Ramesh gently pulled out a small mirror and handed it to him. Bipin held it up. No reflection. Only the word “DECEASED” slowly fading in like credits after a badly reviewed movie.
“So I’m dead?” he asked.
Ramesh nodded.
“But I don’t feel dead.”
“No one does, at first. Death is subtle. It begins with being ignored.”
Bipin looked around at his dusty house. “What now?”
“You transition.”
“To what?”
“That depends. Some go freelance. Some move on. Some start eco-tourism companies for ghosts.”
“I was in middle management.”
“Then you’re uniquely equipped for bureaucratic eternity.”
Bipin looked lost, like a man who had forgotten why he entered a room.
Ramesh sat beside him. “Tell me what you’re afraid of.”
Bipin didn’t speak for a full minute.
Then he whispered, “That my life didn’t matter. That I filled forms and paid EMIs for nothing. That when the Wi-Fi cuts out, I vanish too.”
Ramesh nodded. “That’s a fair fear. It means you’re ready.”
“For what?”
“To write your own obituary.”
Back home, Meenakshi had converted the balcony into a floating desk and was editing a ghost memoir titled “Why I Haunt Only Weekends.”
Vinod had created a LinkedIn profile for “Formerly Alive – Currently Consulting,” and already had two recruiters from Bangalore message him with:
“Are you open to roles in the afterlife analytics sector?”
Ramesh returned at 3 PM, weary but proud. He had escorted Bipin to the Ministry’s “Existential Shuttle Stop,” which looked suspiciously like a FabIndia outlet with better lighting.
“How was it?” Meenakshi asked, handing him a cup of tea.
“Like dropping off a nervous intern to his first orgy,” he said.
She smiled. “That’s the job.”
Ramesh sat on the sofa. “He was terrified that his life was meaningless.”
“Everyone is,” she said. “The trick is not avoiding that fear, but offering it a seat at the table.”
Ramesh stared into his tea. “Is it bad that I envy him? At least he didn’t have to file quarterly tax returns.”
Meenakshi leaned forward. “You could still go.”
“Where?”
“To the other side.”
He looked at her. “You want me to leave?”
“No,” she said gently. “I want you to choose. Staying out of habit isn’t the same as staying out of love.”
That night, Ramesh stood on the roof again.
He stared at the blinking horizon of Gurgaon, where office towers looked like depressed toasters and the sky hung like a paused YouTube video.
Vinod joined him with a flask of something illegal and two paper cups.
“You thinking about going?” he asked.
“Maybe. Maybe not yet.”
“Because of her?”
Ramesh shook his head. “Because of me.”
He looked down at his hands. They were no longer trembling.
“I finally feel real again,” he said.
Vinod grinned. “That’s dangerous. You might start living.”
Somewhere below, the corpse in the guest room turned slightly.
Or maybe it was just the wind.
Part 8
Friday began not with an alarm clock but with the polite knock of inevitability.
Ramesh opened the door to find a delivery man holding a box labeled:
“TIME-SENSITIVE: HANDLE WITH EXISTENTIAL CARE.”
Inside was a letter printed on ancient-looking parchment, smelling faintly of sandalwood and compromise.
Dear Ramesh Tripathi,
Your probation period has concluded.
The Ministry of Existential Affairs hereby offers you a permanent contract.
Perks include: – Partial immunity to dread
– Early access to detachment
– 24/7 support from the Universal Helpline (terms and conditions apply)
Please report to Orientation Room 404 by sunset.
P.S. You may bring one companion.
Ramesh read the letter three times.
Vinod, mid-toast, peered over his shoulder. “Room 404? Doesn’t that mean… not found?”
“Exactly,” said Meenakshi, stepping in, already dressed in a crisp white sari with silver borders. “That’s the whole point. They test your readiness by making you find a room that shouldn’t exist.”
Ramesh looked at her. “Did you ever go?”
“I did. Long ago. But I turned around.”
“Why?”
“Because I realized I wasn’t done living in disguise yet.”
By 5 PM, Ramesh stood outside his front door, badge clipped to his chest, clutching an umbrella, a notebook, and a very stale samosa (in case bureaucracy took longer than expected). Vinod stood beside him, holding nothing but blind optimism.
“You sure you want me to come?” Vinod asked.
“You’ve been here since the beginning,” Ramesh replied. “Even my corpse respects you. That’s rare.”
They took a shared auto to the Ministry’s Annex, disguised as an abandoned coaching center for NEET repeaters. Inside, a receptionist with glowing fingernails and no mouth handed them a visitor token that hummed softly.
“Room 404?” Ramesh asked.
The receptionist pointed to a blank wall.
“I knew it,” Vinod muttered. “It’s a metaphor.”
They walked into the wall. It gave way like a sigh.
Inside was… a conference room.
Long fluorescent lights. Coffee machine emitting steam and regret. Whiteboard with the words: “You are here because you weren’t elsewhere.”
Three people sat at the table, each wearing a slightly different version of Ramesh’s old office clothes.
The one at the head of the table spoke first.
“Congratulations. You’ve successfully transitioned from unwilling participant to conscious absurdist.”
Ramesh blinked. “That’s my new title?”
“No, your title is ‘Intermediate Layer Facilitator, Level 2-A.’ But we thought you deserved a compliment.”
Vinod sat down, uninvited. “So what does he actually do now?”
“You guide people stuck in the same place you were. The living-dead. The emotionally unemployed. The spiritual freelancers. Your blog has already inspired three minor hauntings and a podcast.”
Ramesh scratched his chin. “And if I say no?”
The man at the head of the table shrugged. “You return to your apartment. Resume pretending. Pay bills. Complain about Wi-Fi.”
“And if I say yes?”
“You start living… more honestly. Slightly less comfortably. But more honestly.”
There was silence, broken only by the coffee machine sputtering a final existential cough.
Ramesh thought about his corpse, still wrapped in a floral bedsheet. He thought about Meenakshi, now part oracle, part consultant. He thought about Vinod, who never expected to be a sidekick but became one anyway.
He looked at the man across the table.
“I accept,” he said.
The room applauded. Quietly. Like HR staff clapping at a farewell they don’t care about.
As they left Room 404 (which immediately vanished), Vinod turned to him. “So what happens now?”
“I don’t know,” Ramesh said, stepping into the pink smog of Gurgaon dusk. “I think I keep showing up. That’s all any of us ever really do.”
They walked home.
At the entrance, the security guard gave them a slow nod, the kind usually reserved for slightly famous people or those who had recently died and come back more focused.
Back inside, Meenakshi was lighting incense.
“How was it?” she asked.
“Surreal,” Ramesh said. “But structured.”
She handed him a folder. “Your onboarding schedule.”
He opened it. The first task:
“Help someone else survive their own life.”
He smiled.
Later that night, he went into the guest room, unwrapped his corpse, and sat beside it.
“I’m moving on,” he whispered. “But thanks for holding the place.”
He kissed the forehead of his own dead self, folded the bedsheet, and stored it in the cupboard next to old birthday cards and expired warranties.
Saturday morning.
Ramesh logged into his blog.
Title: WHAT TO DO WITH THE DEAD VERSION OF YOURSELF
Subtitle: Keep it. It might make a great shelf.
As he clicked “Publish,” he heard Meenakshi on another call, helping a poltergeist navigate long-distance relationships.
Vinod was in the kitchen making tea, reading a book titled “Marketing Yourself to the Recently Departed.”
And Ramesh?
He sat down, took a deep breath, and opened his notebook to a blank page.
Above it, he wrote:
Chapter One: Life Begins After the Obituary.
THE END
