THE WOMEN WHO CAME BACK WRONG
Two Bengali girls came to Germany to build a future. The dead had been waiting for them to remember the past.
PART ONE
THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW
Rinky saw the woman before the train stopped moving.
She was standing in an upstairs window of a ruined castle.
Impossible, of course.
The train was moving too fast, the castle was too far away, and the rain had turned the glass into a trembling grey mirror. Yet for perhaps three seconds—no more—Rinky saw her clearly.
A tall woman.
A long grey dress.
A white face.
And one hand raised against the window.
Watching the train.
Watching her.
Rinky jerked backwards so violently that the elderly man beside her woke with a grunt.
“What happened?” Moupriya asked.
“Nothing.”
“You jumped.”
“I thought I saw someone.”
“Where?”
Rinky looked again.
The castle had vanished behind wet trees.
She pressed her palm against the cold glass.
“Nowhere.”
Moupriya stared at her for a second and returned to her phone.
Outside, Germany rushed past in fragments: black firs, wet roofs, church spires, fields sinking into mist. Rinky had imagined this journey for years. She had imagined sunlight on European streets, photographs outside cafés, lectures, independence, snow.
Not this rain.
Not the forests.
Not the feeling that something had recognized her.
She pulled her hand from the window.
Five faint lines had appeared in the condensation beneath her fingers.
Not outside.
Inside.
As if another hand had been pressed against the glass first.
Rinky wiped them away.
The train entered a tunnel.
The darkness came down like a slammed door.
And somewhere in the black glass beside her, a woman whispered:
“Late.”
Rinky screamed.
The lights came back.
Everyone turned.
Moupriya grabbed her wrist.
“What is wrong with you?”
Rinky stared at the empty seat reflected beside her.
Nothing.
No woman.
No grey dress.
Only herself.
Except, for one sickening instant, her reflection was smiling.
Rinky was not.
PART TWO
DO NOT ASK WHO LIVED HERE BEFORE
Their apartment was on the third floor of an old building with narrow stairs and a courtyard that never seemed to receive sunlight.
The landlord gave them two keys.
Then he gave them a warning.
“Do not force the bathroom window.”
Moupriya laughed. “Why?”
“It sticks.”
“That is all?”
The landlord looked at Rinky.
“Yes.”
He left quickly.
The apartment was small but beautiful in the way old European apartments seemed beautiful to people who had never lived in one: sloping ceilings, wooden floors, deep windows, heavy doors.
The first night, they celebrated.
Instant noodles.
Cheap pastries.
Video calls home.
Photographs.
Laughter.
At midnight, Moupriya fell asleep.
At 12:17, Rinky heard footsteps in the corridor.
Slow.
Dragging.
One.
Pause.
Two.
Pause.
Three.
They stopped outside her bedroom.
Rinky sat up.
The apartment was silent.
“Mou?”
No answer.
The handle moved.
Once.
Twice.
Then stopped.
Rinky held her breath until her chest hurt.
“Moupriya?”
A voice answered from behind the door.
“Yes?”
It sounded exactly like Moupriya.
Rinky reached for the handle.
Then she heard snoring from the room across the corridor.
Her hand froze.
The voice behind the door whispered again.
“Yes?”
Rinky backed away.
The handle turned.
The door opened perhaps two centimetres.
A grey eye appeared in the gap.
Rinky could not scream.
The eye stared at her.
Then the door slammed shut.
She remained against the wall until dawn.
At breakfast, Moupriya listened without laughing.
That frightened Rinky more than laughter would have.
“You saw an eye?”
“Yes.”
“What colour?”
Rinky hesitated.
“Grey.”
Moupriya dropped her spoon.
For several seconds neither girl moved.
Then Moupriya said, “We should go somewhere today.”
“Where?”
“Baden-Baden.”
“Why?”
Moupriya looked confused.
“I don’t know.”
PART THREE
THE CASTLE REMEMBERED HER
The climb to Altes Schloss Hohenbaden was steep.
Rinky hated it immediately.
Not because of the climb.
Because she knew where the path turned.
She knew where the trees would open.
She knew where the broken walls would appear.
She knew there would be a stone passage to the left.
And there was.
Rinky stopped walking.
Moupriya nearly collided with her.
“What?”
“I’ve been here.”
“You haven’t.”
“I know.”
“You’ve never been to Germany.”
“I know.”
Tourists passed them.
Children shouted.
Somebody laughed.
Rinky stared at the ruins.
The castle rose above the forest like the remains of an enormous dead animal. Broken walls. Empty windows. Towers opened to weather.
Something tightened inside her chest.
Not fear.
Recognition.
That was worse.
She walked forward.
“Rinky?”
She did not answer.
The others followed established paths.
Rinky did not.
She turned beneath an archway, descended several worn steps and entered a narrow stone space.
Moupriya caught up.
“How did you know this was here?”
Rinky touched the wall.
Her fingers trembled.
“I didn’t.”
A smell filled her nostrils.
Cold ashes.
Wet wool.
Blood.
She snatched her hand away.
For one instant, the stone had been warm.
Someone screamed above them.
Both girls spun around.
Nothing.
Tourists continued walking.
“Did you hear that?” Rinky whispered.
Moupriya nodded.
A woman’s scream came again.
Closer.
Rinky’s stomach contracted.
She looked toward the staircase.
A woman in grey stood at the top.
Her face was hidden.
Her dress moved although there was no wind.
Moupriya whispered, “Rinky.”
“I see her.”
“No.”
Rinky looked at her friend.
Moupriya was staring at Rinky’s hands.
“What?”
“Your fingers.”
Rinky looked down.
There was blood beneath her fingernails.
She screamed and scrubbed them against her jeans.
The woman at the top of the stairs began descending.
One step.
Then another.
Rinky ran.
She pushed past Moupriya and fled through the ruins.
But every corridor was familiar.
That was the horror.
Not that she was lost.
That she knew exactly where she was.
She turned left.
Down.
Right.
Through an opening.
Across a courtyard.
She stopped before an empty window.
The same window she had seen from the train.
Rinky approached it slowly.
“No,” Moupriya said behind her.
Rinky touched the stone ledge.
A memory struck her.
Not an image.
A sensation.
Someone kneeling.
Someone crying.
Her own hand gripping hair.
A woman begging.
The satisfaction of not listening.
Rinky staggered backwards.
“No.”
Another sensation.
A locked door.
Fists striking wood from the other side.
Children crying.
Her own voice saying:
Let them cry.
Rinky vomited.
Moupriya held her shoulders.
“Come on. We’re leaving.”
But Rinky was staring at the window.
A woman stood in it.
Grey dress.
White face.
Rinky finally saw her clearly.
The woman had Rinky’s eyes.
PART FOUR
MAGDALENA IS NOT DEAD
Moupriya changed three days later.
At first, it was almost funny.
She became obsessed with Baden-Baden’s Historische Altstadt.
She read about old streets.
Old houses.
Old names.
Especially one.
Magdalena Bollmann.
She searched for the name late at night.
She wrote it in notebooks.
She whispered it while sleeping.
Once, Rinky woke at 3:11 a.m. and found Moupriya sitting at the kitchen table.
No lights.
A candle burning.
“What are you doing?”
Moupriya looked up.
Her face seemed older in the candlelight.
“Waiting.”
“For what?”
Moupriya smiled.
“For myself.”
Rinky turned on the light.
The candle went out.
Moupriya blinked.
“What am I doing here?”
“You tell me.”
“I was asleep.”
“No, you weren’t.”
“I was.”
“There was a candle.”
“What candle?”
Rinky pointed.
There was no candle.
Only a puddle of wax.
Moupriya touched it.
The wax was hot.
After that, things happened quickly.
Moupriya began disappearing.
She would leave lectures and return hours later with mud on her shoes.
She bought an old-fashioned black dress from a second-hand shop and claimed she did not remember buying it.
She began speaking German in her sleep.
Not modern German.
The words sounded harsher.
Older.
Rinky recorded her once.
When she played it back, there were two voices.
Moupriya’s.
And another woman speaking underneath her.
The second voice was laughing.
Rinky deleted the recording.
It returned the next morning.
The file name had changed.
MAGDALENA.
Rinky threw the phone across the room.
The screen shattered.
The laughter continued.
PART FIVE
THE HOUSE WITH NO NUMBER
On Friday evening, Moupriya did not come home.
At nine, Rinky called her.
No answer.
At ten, she called again.
At eleven, the phone connected.
“Mou?”
Silence.
Then footsteps.
“Moupriya, where are you?”
A woman breathed into the phone.
Rinky’s skin tightened.
“Mou?”
The woman whispered an address.
Then the call ended.
Rinky stared at the screen.
The address was in the old town.
She should have called the police.
She should have called someone.
Instead, she put on her coat and left.
Rain had emptied the streets.
The old town looked diseased beneath yellow lamps.
Rinky followed the address.
The numbers ended.
The house was not there.
She checked the map.
The blue dot showed her standing directly in front of it.
But there was only a narrow passage between two buildings.
“Moupriya?”
A shadow moved inside.
Rinky entered.
The passage led to a courtyard.
At its end stood a house.
No number.
No lights.
The front door was open.
Rinky stepped inside.
The smell hit her first.
Wax.
Damp wood.
Something rotten.
“Mou?”
A floorboard creaked upstairs.
Rinky climbed.
The staircase seemed too long.
At the top was a corridor.
At the end stood Moupriya.
She wore the black dress.
Her hair was loose.
Her face was pale.
“Mou.”
Moupriya smiled.
“You came.”
“What is this place?”
“You know.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Moupriya, we need to leave.”
Moupriya’s smile disappeared.
“Don’t call me that.”
Rinky stopped breathing.
“What?”
“That is not my name.”
“Mou—”
“Don’t.”
Her voice changed.
Deepened.
Not dramatically.
Only enough.
Rinky backed away.
Moupriya walked towards her.
“Do you remember the smell?”
“What smell?”
“Burning fat.”
Rinky’s stomach heaved.
“Stop.”
“You remember.”
“No.”
“You remember the screaming.”
“Stop.”
“You remember the doors.”
Rinky began crying.
“Stop.”
Moupriya came closer.
“You remember what you did when they begged.”
Rinky slapped her.
The sound cracked through the house.
Moupriya slowly turned her face back.
A red mark appeared on her cheek.
She smiled.
“Welcome back.”
Every door in the corridor slammed open.
Rinky ran.
PART SIX
TWO WOMEN WALKED BEHIND THEM
They returned to the apartment before dawn.
Neither remembered how.
Rinky locked the door.
Moupriya stood in the kitchen.
They did not speak.
At 5:30, someone knocked.
Three slow knocks.
Rinky looked through the peephole.
No one.
She opened the door.
A photograph lay on the floor.
Black and white.
Old.
Two women stood before a stone building.
One wore grey.
The other black.
Their faces had been scratched away.
On the back, someone had written:
YOU WERE ALWAYS TOGETHER.
Rinky dropped it.
Moupriya picked it up.
Her hands began shaking.
“I remember her.”
“Who?”
“You.”
Rinky stared at her.
“What did you say?”
Moupriya began crying.
“I remember hating you.”
“Mou—”
“I remember being afraid of you.”
“Stop.”
“And I remember loving what you did.”
“Stop.”
“I remember helping.”
Rinky slapped both hands over her ears.
Moupriya screamed.
“I REMEMBER BURYING THEM!”
Silence.
A neighbour’s television murmured through the wall.
Rinky lowered her hands.
Moupriya was staring at her.
“I don’t know why I said that.”
Rinky whispered, “Neither do I.”
Someone knocked on the window.
Third floor.
Both girls turned.
A woman in grey stood outside.
Floating.
Her head bent at an unnatural angle.
Beside her floated another woman.
Black dress.
No face.
Rinky screamed.
The glass shattered inward.
PART SEVEN
THE FOREST DOES NOT LET GO
They fled Germany the next morning.
Or tried to.
At the railway station, every departure board showed the same destination.
BADEN-BADEN.
Rinky stared.
“That’s impossible.”
Moupriya grabbed her arm.
“Come.”
They took a taxi.
The driver asked where they were going.
“The airport.”
He nodded.
Twenty minutes later, Rinky looked out.
Forest.
Dark fir trees.
Mist.
“Where are we?”
The driver did not answer.
“Where are you taking us?”
No answer.
Moupriya leaned forward.
“Stop the car.”
The driver looked at them through the mirror.
He had no eyes.
The girls screamed.
The car swerved.
Metal screamed.
Glass exploded.
Darkness.
Rinky woke in mud.
Her mouth was full of blood.
“Moupriya!”
No answer.
She crawled from the wreck.
The forest surrounded her.
Too silent.
Then she heard humming.
A woman’s voice.
Rinky followed it.
She found Moupriya standing among the trees.
Barefoot.
Black dress.
“Mou.”
Moupriya turned.
Her face was calm.
“We’re home.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“This isn’t home.”
Moupriya tilted her head.
“Then why do you know the way?”
Rinky looked around.
Her heart stopped.
She did know.
A path led through the forest.
She knew where it ended.
“No.”
Moupriya took her hand.
Rinky tried to pull away.
Could not.
They walked.
The trees opened.
The castle waited above them.
Altes Schloss Hohenbaden.
No tourists.
No lights.
No sound.
Only the ruins.
And dozens of women standing along the walls.
Grey dresses.
Black dresses.
Faces hidden.
Rinky began sobbing.
“What do they want?”
Moupriya whispered:
“To see if we remember.”
PART EIGHT
THE ROOM THAT WAS WAITING
Deep inside the ruins, they found a door.
Rinky had never seen it before.
Yet she had dreamed of it since childhood.
A red door.
Iron handle.
Scratches near the bottom.
Small scratches.
Made by fingernails.
“No,” Rinky whispered.
Moupriya opened it.
Behind the door was a room.
Not a ruin.
A room.
Candles burned.
A fire crackled.
The walls were covered with portraits.
Rinky entered.
Every portrait showed a different woman.
Different century.
Different clothing.
Different country.
But the same eyes.
Her eyes.
Grey.
Cold.
Waiting.
Moupriya stood before another wall.
Her portraits were there too.
Different faces.
Same smile.
Rinky whispered, “We have to leave.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re not them.”
Moupriya turned.
“Aren’t we?”
“No.”
“Then why are you angry?”
Rinky blinked.
“What?”
“You’re not frightened anymore.”
Rinky realized she was right.
The fear had disappeared.
Something else had replaced it.
Irritation.
No.
Rage.
Moupriya’s crying annoyed her.
The weakness in her voice disgusted her.
Rinky wanted her to stop.
Wanted silence.
Wanted obedience.
The thought was so natural that she nearly missed it.
Rinky stumbled backwards.
“Oh God.”
Moupriya smiled.
“There you are.”
“No.”
Rinky ran.
The door slammed.
She pulled the handle.
Locked.
Behind her, Moupriya laughed.
Rinky turned.
Moupriya’s face was changing.
Not physically.
Something beneath it was coming forward.
Recognition without transformation.
Memory without explanation.
“Magdalena,” Rinky whispered.
Moupriya’s smile widened.
“Say your name.”
“No.”
“Say it.”
“No.”
The portraits began whispering.
Say it.
Say it.
Say it.
Rinky covered her ears.
The voices became louder.
Then came the screaming.
Children.
Women.
Men.
Behind walls.
Beneath floors.
Inside locked rooms.
Rinky collapsed.
Memories tore through her.
Hands.
Keys.
A staircase.
A punishment.
Someone begging.
Her own voice.
Cold.
Bored.
Cruel.
She screamed until blood filled her mouth.
“I AM NOT HER!”
Everything stopped.
Moupriya stood over her.
“No,” she said softly.
“You’re worse.”
PART NINE
RINKY DIED FIRST
Police found the wrecked taxi two days later.
The driver was alive.
He remembered nothing.
There were no passengers.
Search teams entered the forest.
Dogs found clothing.
A broken phone.
Blood.
No bodies.
In Kolkata, two families waited for calls that never came.
University records showed that Rinky and Moupriya had attended classes.
Their landlord insisted they had left the apartment voluntarily.
But the neighbour across the courtyard told police something strange.
For three nights after the girls disappeared, she saw two women standing in their apartment window.
One wore grey.
One wore black.
Neither moved.
The police searched the apartment again.
Empty.
Except for a photograph on the kitchen table.
Black and white.
Very old.
Two women stood before a ruined castle.
Their faces were visible now.
One was Rinky.
One was Moupriya.
The photograph was dated long before either girl had been born.
On the back were six words:
THEY ALWAYS RETURN WHEN CALLED HOME.
The photograph disappeared from evidence the next day.
No one admitted removing it.
PART TEN
THE LAST TRAIN INTO THE BLACK FOREST
Months later, an Indian student named Trisha arrived in Germany.
She was twenty years old.
Nervous.
Excited.
She sat beside the train window, watching rain crawl across the glass.
Her mother called.
“Yes, Ma. I’m fine.”
She laughed.
“No, I’m not scared.”
The train passed through the forest.
Trisha looked outside.
A ruined castle appeared above the trees.
Two women stood in an upstairs window.
One in grey.
One in black.
Trisha frowned.
The woman in grey raised her hand.
Trisha raised hers without knowing why.
Her palm touched the glass.
Five fingerprints appeared beneath it.
From the other side.
Trisha stopped smiling.
The train entered a tunnel.
Darkness swallowed the carriage.
A woman sat down beside her.
Trisha smelled wet wool.
Cold ashes.
Blood.
She turned slowly.
The seat was empty.
Then someone whispered directly into her ear.
“Do you remember us?”
Trisha screamed.
The lights returned.
Passengers stared.
The castle was gone.
Her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
At first, there was only breathing.
Then two young women began laughing.
Far away in the Black Forest, beneath a moonless sky, two figures descended from the castle ruins.
One wore grey.
One wore black.
They walked towards the railway tracks.
They were no longer running from the dead.
They were looking for someone new.
And behind them, inside the empty castle, hundreds of locked doors began to shake.
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