Why I prayed to heaven to save me from Owls #29

As far as superstition is concerned, I whole-heartedly agree with Michael Scott from The Office!

I’m not superstitious, but I am a little stitious.

Michael Scott, The Office

Most probably I was in 3rd standard when I found a book on horror stories- it was a 300-page-hardcover book written in Bengali. All the stories were short and meant for children. There were many things like black magic, ghost of pirates and so on but none of them had much impact on me as hard core horror. I read them and was convinced enough that they were purely fictional.

I don’t know why I happened to believe one of the stories of that book. In nutshell the story was: whoever hears owl’s hoot at midnight dies.

Owls always give me creeps, those the spooky looks and big round eyes of the nocturnal bird did no justice to prove its innocence to me. I never heard any owl to hoot. So I conveniently believed the story.

One night I heard a strange sound that I had never heard before, I thought that was the owl screaming. It sent chills down my spine. I could not feel my limbs, I could not breathe. I was praying to God, “I don’t wanna die now! Please save me.”
The sound continued for an hour or so and eventually I fell asleep. Later I came to know that it was the whistle blown by the night-guard in our place. As I went to bed early I never knew about him or the whistle. It was definitely not a regular whistle- I felt so stupid, yet relieved after knowing this.

Thanks for reading. Here’s my next story… 🙂