Sleeping With The Corpse Of The Beauty
USA
December 2007
This story was told by one of my close friends. He is a worker at a port. I don't know if his story was real or imagination, but it is an interesting story.
He told me like that, you know friend, I am a worker in a port. My daily duty is to discharge or to load cargo to the vessels. Three years ago, I lived in a suburb of Yangon where all was quiet and it was a poor neighborhood. My house was made of wood and its walls were covered by bamboo sheets. This is a small house you know. There was two rooms in this house. I lived in a room of only twenty feet wide. I think the other room was a same size like my room. Actually, I rented this room from a young man who was about twenty six years old. He was a taxi-driver. His parents were working in Singapore and he was their only son. He and I had a good relation. He was a gentle young man and had a soft voice. Our two rooms were divided by bamboo sheets as most of the houses are in the countryside of Burma.
We sometimes met in a small restaurant where some alcohol was being sold. At that time he told about his family and his girlfriend.
He said the parents of his sweetheart were not agreeable to recognize him as their son-in-law because of his bad habits in drinking. Another one point was that they were a rich family and they did not want to give their daughter to the hands of a taxi-driver. He said he was sorry for this and he must catch his girl without the consent of the parents as soon as possible. He said he will take her within three days to his home. These were his words while we were in the restaurant two days ago.
One night,I came from my work. The time was about 9:30pm. I went to my bed as usual. I needed to go bed early because I was a worker who worked the whole night. When I lay down, soon I fell asleep. Suddenly, I was awaken by a voice. It came from the room behind my head. I was sure it was a voice of a girl singing a song. I know the song that she was singing because it was a very popular song in Burma. It was sung by a famous woman vocalist. I was surprised because I realized that the room where the voice was coming from was a room of only one person. There were no other people, only the taxi-driver. But later, I remembered the words of the taxi-driver that he was planning to steal his sweetheart from the hands of her parents. I thought this was his girlfriends voice who was taken by him sometime ago.
Suddenly, I smelt a bad smell that was like the smell of a dead mouse. But soon, it disappeared on the breeze.
I fell asleep because my body was tired by many hours of work. The next morning, I prepared to go to work and I glanced to the taxi-drivers room to ask him about the girl. The room was locked as usual. The young man always went outside with his car at the early morning. My question was forgotten the whole day because I was busy with my work. I worked the whole night at my port and the next morning I came back home. I took a sleep at home and I got up at noon and went outside to visit somewhere in the suburb.
I came back home when the time was about nine. I went to bed and tried to sleep. Suddenly, I heard the voice of the girl singing a song as the previous night. I thought the taxi-driver was home yet and his sweetheart was doing housework. At that moment, I smelt that bad smell like the previous night. I thought a mouse was dead somewhere and this smell was coming from it. Soon, I fell asleep.
I spent three nights like the same.When I looked for him, his room was locked and I had not found even his shadow.
One morning, I got up from bed hearing the noise of the people. I found many people were in front of the taxi-drivers house and there was an ambulance. I went towards them and asked what was happening?. One of the neighbors said it was a corpse of a girl in the taxi-drivers room that was found by a child. I was amazed by his words and frightened. I felt as I was at the gate of death because the corpse of the girl was lying behind the walls where I was lying and sleeping. It was only three or four feet between us.
Then, I realized that who was the owner of the voice that was singing the previous nights.
This question was a mystery for me.
However, one week later, it was said by police that the taxi driver was caught by them and he was the killer of the girl whose corpse was in the room of my neighbor. The complete story was that one night the taxi-driver had an accident on a street where there was no other people. His car was clashed with a girl. He took the girl in his car and tried to go to the hospital but unfortunately the girl died on the way and he began to fear that it was his fault. He drove his car to his home and put the corpse in the room near the bamboo wall where I was always sleeping. Then he ran and hid somewhere in the city.
Three days later, the corpse became destroyed and a bad smell was coming from it. I had no idea why the song of a girl was coming from the room. Who was singing behind the wall?. This question would be in my head forever.