When the Oil Runs Dry

My mother never liked to talk about her childhood village. Said the air there was heavy. Not with heat—something else. Like memories that didn’t belong to you, but watched you anyway.

But one evening, when the storm knocked our power out and the wind was howling through the cracks in the wooden window frames, she finally said it.

“You ever hear about the Sarker house?” she asked, eyes fixed on the empty hallway behind me.

I hadn’t. And I wish I never had.

The Sarker house was the oldest in the village. Sat right at the edge, where the land dipped into a pond so still it never reflected right. People said if you looked into it long enough, you'd see things blink back.

The house had no men left. Just Ma Sarker and her two daughters. Ma Sarker was the kind of woman who never blinked. Her skin always looked damp, like she'd just come from a place that wasn’t dry. And she never lit her lamp with matches like everyone else. She used oil—but not the kind you bought. She made hers.

They said she crushed certain roots. Mixed them with old herbs and… something else. Folks whispered it was animal blood. Others said it wasn’t animal. But no one dared ask.

And every night, she’d light that clay lamp and place it on the windowsill. A low, golden flame that didn’t sway with the wind. It just stared.

One monsoon season, the oil ran dry.

No one knows why. Maybe the roots stopped growing. Maybe the land got tired of her. That night, the lamp didn’t light.

And that was the night the knocking started.

Always after midnight. Always three knocks.

Tok. Tok. Tok.

Not like someone trying to come in. More like someone checking if they could. Like a question wrapped in silence.

First, it came to the Sarker house itself. Ma Sarker didn’t flinch. She just stood at the window, staring out, as if she'd been waiting.

The next morning, the younger daughter was gone.

No footprints. No signs of a struggle. Her shoes were neatly placed by the door, still dry despite the storm. Like she’d stepped out willingly… and never came back.

The night after, three knocks at the neighbor’s door.

He didn't open it. But they say his hair turned white that week, and he never spoke again—not even when the village priest begged him to say a single word during prayer.

The third night, no one heard knocking.

Instead, everyone in the village woke up at once, gasping. Like they’d all been pulled up from drowning. Some said they saw her—the younger Sarker girl—standing in the pond, face just above the water, eyes open, unmoving. But when they rushed there at dawn, only lilies floated.

My mother saw her. She swore it. Said she never slept right again. Not because of what she saw. But because of what she heard.

A whisper. Just behind her ear.

“Your oil will run out too.”

She was thirteen then.

And every year since, during monsoon, she kept a little clay lamp burning in the window. She never said why. Never let it go out, even if the room filled with smoke. Sometimes I’d wake up and find her asleep on the floor, lamp still lit beside her like a guard.

I used to think she was just being superstitious.

Until last week.

The storm knocked the power out again. Same howling wind. Same creaking wood. I searched every drawer for matches, every shelf for oil.

Nothing.

And at 12:07 a.m., I heard it.

Tok.

Tok.

Tok.

I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Just stared at the dark.

No one came in. No one left.

But in the morning, I found muddy footprints in the hallway. Small ones. Like a barefoot girl. And the edge of my pillow? Damp.

I don’t sleep anymore.

I just light my lamp.

And wait.