Walking Home

 

                                                                   

See the cat. The cat is playing with a mouse. Rolling it from left to right, then throwing it up in the air. See the mouse. It’s paralysed by fear. Death wraps itself around its body tightly, leaving only its faint heart fluttering.

The evening air brings a chill. The kind that comes with the beginning of winter. Days grow shorter and nights longer. And things that flourish in the dark begin to unfurl under a pitch-black sky. The space between the sky and the earth, between houses and alleys, between people, are slowly inhabited by things that perhaps rise along with the dark.

Walking home at night, up the dark unlit road, through narrow bent alleys, isn’t easy, but home beckons, and the only way to claim that warm bed with a hot water bottle, is by stepping out into the dark. Bidding goodnight you leave your friend’s house. The streets are empty. Closed shutters stare blankly at you, and not a single soul is up and about. The echoes of a thousand footfalls from daytime still resound in the air, and now and then you prick your ears to the sound of feet clattering somewhere down the street. But in truth, only an empty street yawns behind you and ahead of you. The only real sound is the sound of your own footsteps, and the yelping of a few stray dogs lying curled up in the corners.

You clutch the plastic bag in one hand tightly, the one containing the veal you bought during the day. The fingers of your other hand curled around the flashlight, you take the winding road that ascends towards your house. The streetlight has long since died and no one has bothered to replace it. The higher you walk, the darker it gets, the number of houses dwindling every bend. You begin to hum a tune to keep that otherworldly chill away. That chill that begins at the nape, slowly spreading itself upwards making your hair rise on ends. Your back arches. You feel a presence right behind you. You dare not look behind. You hurry ahead, your pace quickening.

See a pair of yellow eyes gleaming like two tiny headlights. Jumping out of the bush stopping abruptly in front of you meeting the eyes of your flashlight. A cat. The nocturnal animal slinking away with a dead mouse in its mouth relieved to see that it is only an unsuspecting human crossing path with it.

The presence behind you doesn’t leave you. You reach a large bend, and gathering pluck, you turn your head just a fraction, your eyes darting towards the corners naturally, to see if there is someone there and if there is, whether it is someone walking home like you.

The footsteps behind you are as sure as yours are, crunching on the gravel under the weight of the body. It surely must be someone walking home too. With the thought that you’re better off letting them pass by, you stop at the bend and sit on the parapet, your fingers wound tightly around the plastic bag, your heart shuddering as the footsteps approach you and walk past you.

See the back. It’s the back of a man walking past you. The way the shoulders swing as he walks tells he’s young. His steady steps carry him ahead of you. Only the white shirt, discernible against the dark, swinging eerily as it disappears in the bend.  It’s just a young man walking home. Relieved with the thought of having company, your fears ease and you resume walking whistling as you go along. As the houses thin out, the spaces are inhabited by bushes and trees. You shine your light on it and you think you catch a shadow sneaking quickly behind the bush. You peer carefully into the bush. It’s only a bush. You shake your head smiling. When you’re alone in the dark, even your own imagination turns on you.

See a silhouette. Further up in another bend. The white shirt visible, sitting on the parapet. Meaning to exchange a greeting, you dart towards him. When you’re about five meters from the man you halt suddenly. There’s something odd about the man sitting on the parapet. He is facing the opposite direction, towards the town below, and yet when you crane your neck to take a sneak peek at his face, it seems he’s facing you. Only he’s not. You can only see the back of his head no matter which way you look.

You could’ve have turned around and dashed down the road. You could’ve gone back to your friend’s place and asked to stay the night. You don’t. You feel you’ve come all this way up, and all it’ll take, is for you to walk past as quietly, and as normally as possible as though nothing is amiss.

You hold your breath. Your feet move forward, your fingertips are numb. You walk, slowly, deliberately, your flashlight trained on the spot in front of your feet. Your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth and your ears ring loudly.

See ahead. Don’t look to your right. He, it, is sitting there in perfect stillness watching you with the back of his head. The steps you take as you pass the man are the slowest steps you’ve taken, and no matter how much you’d like to hurry; your feet just won’t move any faster. With your chest threatening to burst, you finally cross him. Pretending not to have seen him at all, you walk at a normal pace, and on reaching another bend, you launch into a sprint. You run. You run like you’ve never run before. Your flashlight swinging haphazardly. You propel your body with unfailing grit as the climb becomes precipitous. This steep climb you’ve always complained about now seems trivial as you race upwards.

You run until you can run no more. Your legs give in before the rest of your body does. The sudden arresting of your legs send you sprawling on the ground. The palms of your hands acting as brakes preventing your face from crashing against the tarmac. You’re aware of a sharp burning sensation on the edges of your palms and on your knees. Your flashlight has rolled away and died.

Hear the footsteps. Right behind you. You freeze as you hear the soft crunching of gravel close now. Your head turns around of its own accord even when you don’t want to look.

See the man. He’s standing over you now. White shirt gleaming, arms dangling on the sides. Thin beanpole straight legs. He’s looking at you with the back of his head. Even in the dark, you can see a shock of thick black hair where his face should’ve been.

Fear, an emotion effected by perceived threat makes a human achieve feats that otherwise isn’t possible. You don’t know how, but you’ve pulled yourself up with one swift movement. You jump up in half a second and sprint with legs that could carry you no further. It is as though your body is carrying your legs because you’re aware of your body heaving forward and your legs following after.

You grope, trip, stumble, stand up again, but you don’t stop.

See the dim warm light pouring out of the window up ahead. You’re finally at a five-minute distance from home. You can see the light glimmering through the trees and bushes. Someone’s still up. Soon you’ll be wrapped around by the comfort of reaching home. You’ll walk in, you’ll sit down, ask for a glass of cold water. Too tired to take a bath you’ll wipe away the cold sweat before you slip in between the sheets warmed up by the hot water bottle, and you’ll close your eyes. You are home, safely tucked in bed.

Your body jerks with a start. You’re still on the road that leads home. You realise you have stopped. Silence sits heavy around you. No more sound of footsteps behind you. No strange feeling of being followed. You breathe a sigh. A relief sinks into you as you realise how confounding the figment of a fear-driven mind can be. You drag your feet, your body drained, the blood in your veins still humming with the remnants of that pulsating fear. You finally reach the landing. You open the gate leading to the garden. Your legs are killing you. You can barely move. But you want to turn around one last time. It is true when they say that one can resist anything but temptation.

You turn around. Just about five steps from you, there he is. Standing with his shoulders slouched a little, as though he’s tired from the walk as well. His head slightly bent; he’s still peering at you. The faceless mass only an arm’s length away from you. One of his arms is stretched towards you and from his hand dangles the plastic bag of veal that you’d left behind when you bolted earlier. Slime and blood trickling from its corner. You’re paralysed. Your heart stops. You open your mouth only to let out a voiceless scream. You’re swallowed by darkness.

See the sunlight peeping in through the crack of your curtain. You’re awake. The house is still asleep. Images from the night before, flash across your eyes. Was it all just a dream? A feverish dream from which waking was next to impossible?

You walk into the kitchen and put the kettle on. Something urges you to look outside. Thin mist swirls in the garden and in the morning sun, one can catch dewdrops settled on the row of marigold heads. Just beside the row of marigolds, where the boulder sits, you see a small heap. You peer closer, cracking the curtain wider. You recognise the pink of the plastic bag, its mouth creased, its contents still secure within, left atop the boulder.