Shadows

 This story came about one night. It was really late, I was tired but not tired enough to sleep. I had been starring at a shadow on the ceiling of my bedroom and thinking about it moving. I'm not real sure why. Anyway this story is called "Shadows". Enjoy.

The following letter was found at the home of Roger Dean by SGT. Frank Malone. SGT. Malone was investigating the house after Mr. Dean had been reported absent from work and unreachable for over a week. SGT. Malone found this letter and a voice recorder. There was a recording. Most of the recording was the same as the letter. The rest is transcribed below.

#

Do you sleep with a nightlight on? Do you tell yourself that it’s just so you can see if you have to get up in the middle of the night for a trip to the bathroom? Are you afraid of the dark but don’t want to admit it? Do you leave the bathroom light on with the door cracked in a motel room? If not, maybe you should.

#

When I was a boy, I had a night light. It was a typical child’s night light made to look like whatever the popular superhero was then. Everyone has seen them. Now my night light is a more standard functional light, the type that serves the function of guiding me out of the bedroom without tripping.

I’m willing to bet you have one also. Now, have you ever looked at the shadows thrown onto the walls and ceiling by this light? Of course, you have, we all have, they’ve even been used in cartoons and children’s movies to show why they shouldn’t be afraid of the dark. The shadow on the wall that looks like the boogeyman reaching out for you turns out to be nothing more than a tree branch, a pile of toys, clothes laying in a clump on the floor.

It’s been thirty years since I first learned how dangerous this lesson truly is. I was a young man then, long past the normal fear of the dark. I laughed at danger, thought ghost stories were only necessary to scare a date, and frequently weaved my way home from the bar down the street in total darkness.

Back then, my light was a simple affair. Small plastic base plugged into the wall with a tiny bulb throwing off soft orange light. Sometimes I laughed at the images on the walls and ceilings. Sometimes they caused a stirring of fear and I would be forced to move the object casting the frightening shadow.

Perhaps the fear of the dark is a leftover from the evolutionary processes, a reminder of times when we were not the top of the food chain. Those times have past long ago. Man has explored the furthest reaches of the earth and found that with few exceptions there is nothing to be afraid of in the dark. I now laugh at this belief. The truth is we don’t really believe this. If we did, there wouldn’t be a market for night-lights past the childhood models. Hotel bathrooms would be dark during the night.

Anyway, I was telling you what happened thirty years ago. That was when I first saw one of the shadows on the wall move. It wasn’t extreme that first time, just a small twitch that my brain could easily rationalize away and ignore. Hell, that may not have been the first time I had seen a shadow twitch, just the first time I remember it.

On this occasion, my light was tucked behind a lamp that sat beside my bed. My girlfriend had set this silly stuffed frog on top of the lamp. It had been there for weeks and I really didn’t think anything of it. I rarely used the lamp and she preferred sleeping on that side anyway so it wasn’t something I thought about.

I had been having a particularly busy few weeks and hadn’t looked at the shadows in quite a long time. Then one night I noticed them. My girl was sleeping beside me, we had both strove hard to wear each other out, and I succeeded at least. As I was lying beside her, I was staring at the ceiling, my mind running through tasks that needed to be completed the next day, week, month… for the rest of my life really. I was in a contemplative mood, and the night seemed perfect for some soul searching.

As my mind wandered, I was staring at the ceiling and that’s when I saw it. The shadow looked oddly like a knobby, oval, fat little head. The kind I used to associate with ugly but kind fairy creatures. I could make out the ears, two little holes where the eyes would’ve been, even a darker shadow that could’ve been out a twisted little mouth.

As I’m staring at this shadow head on my ceiling I started to feel as though maybe it was looking back at me. I mean, do we really know what resides within the shadows. Hell, maybe it was just a particularly smart spider up there watching me and my girl, waiting for me to sleep so it could drop into one of our mouths. That might sound stupid but statistically the average person swallows one hundred and four insects every year in their sleep. Who can say that at least some of those insects weren’t suicidal and planned to be swallowed?

I digress. As I was saying, I was laying there looking at this knobby head and feeling like it was staring back at me. Then suddenly, one of the eye-lights went dark, and then lit back up. Like it knew what I was feeling and winked at me. Letting me know that yes, there was something in that shadow, and it wasn’t a spider.

Of course, my mind rationalized that immediately. Maybe a draft had moved the lampshade; maybe my girl had moved a little and bumped it. Hell, maybe a mouse ran over the lamp base and caused it to jiggle. The point is, my mind wanted me to know that there was no way a shadow had just winked at me, that a winking shadow made as much sense as a suicidal spider waiting to be swallowed.

I dismissed it from my mind almost at once, though I did roll over to face my girl rather than that shadow-head. I thought no more about it until a year later. My girlfriend had become my fiancée and no longer spent the night. She was living with me. I was working nights usually she was awake in the morning making breakfast when I got home. We’d eat, talk, sometimes even made love before she had work.

Then one morning I came home and she was gone. Her purse was sitting on the kitchen table where she always left it, keys by the door. The only thing out of place was her. Naturally, I called the police to report her missing. I got the runaround about waiting twenty-four hours before she could be considered officially missing.

I waited the twenty-four hours and reported her missing again. I could tell they thought she had left me, run off with another boyfriend or something like that. I knew that wasn’t what had happened, though I had no other explanation… yet.

#

    A year passed with no sign of her. She officially became a cold case to the police. I still spent every moment I could looking for her. I hired private detectives, canvassed the streets. Nothing worked. I was reaching my wits end and getting desperate. I decided to go see a psychic; sounds crazy doesn’t it? I decided to see the psychic because I had tried everything else see? Nothing had worked and besides it was cheaper than another detective.

Madam Souvle was her name. She worked out of a small dingy shop on the street corner. I almost ran out the moment I walked in. The light was dim provided by a few candles, the air was heavy with the pungent odor of some kind of musky incense. A circular table dominated the center of the room, there was pentacle inlaid in the table with gold. Spread out on the table were more candles, the standard crystal ball on a black stand with golden dragons circling it, cards… everything people needed to believe this woman was an authentic psychic.

I guess sometimes having our expectations met actually warns away. The shop was exactly what I expected to find and it didn’t disappoint me. Only showed me that this really was a scam and my money was about to be wasted. Madam Souvle herself fit the role of psychic perfectly. Fly away gray hair sat upon her small head. Her skin was wrinkled past the point of defining an age and paper-thin. She could have been fifty, or maybe a hundred and fifty. One milky white eye stared at me blindly, the other a depthless brown that appeared black in the dim light. She was wearing a black top or maybe a dress, I couldn’t tell with her sitting down.

“Mr. Dean, sit down my troubled one.” Her voice came out in a dry raspy croak. The heavily scented air was making me light headed. I wanted to turn and run by my feet carried me to a chair across from her. My body fell into it heavily.

“Very troubled, yes. You have lost someone very dear to you correct?”

“Yes.” My voice sounded like it was coming from the depths of a cave.

“Yes. I see a child Mr. Dean. A young boy, with long hair. You do not know this child. He does not know you. The girl is with him.” Her wrinkled hands trembled on the table. The soft clicking of her fingernails pierced into my floating head.

“Why is she with him?” I couldn’t believe I was asking her this. As far as I knew, Michelle didn’t know any young children. It wouldn’t make sense for her to be with one.

“This she doesn’t know. She is in the dark. She sees the boy. She sees the dark.”

“So she was kidnapped?”

“Yes and no. She was stolen yes, but she is not being held. It is the dark.”

“What?”

“The darkness keeps her Roger.”

“How can I find her?”

“Find the boy, you will find her. Find her, you find the darkness. Find the darkness, you will regret it.” Her voice got firm at the end.

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“The darkness is evil, it needs to feed, and it fed on her.”

“So she’s dead?” My throat felt thick, tears were starting in my eyes.

“When you get home, turn on your lights, keep the darkness out. You have seen it before, it knows you saw it.” A tremble crept into her voice.

“But if this darkness takes me, won’t I get back to her?”

“No. Do not be foolish, do not tempt it. That is all I can tell you.”

“Where is she, where is the boy?”

“I don’t know. I cannot see that.”

“TELL ME you old bat! WHERE IS SHE?” My head was no longer floating. A piercing pain centered itself above my right eye, my blood pounded through my temples, and anger coursed through me.

“I can help no more Mr. Dean.” She sat unconcerned with my anger. Her face turned away from me. I had been dismissed. I stormed out of her store slamming the door behind me.

I calmed down on the walk home. Obviously, the woman was a fraud. Most of the city knew me by now from the reports on television after Michelle disappeared. She had seen me on the news and remembered my name when I called. She probably wasn’t even that old, stage make-up could’ve accounted for her appearance, especially in the dim light.

Now I wish I had listened to her. I should’ve stopped my search and moved on with my life. They say that it is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. I doubt the bastards that say this have ever actually loved at all. That’s why I couldn’t give up you see? I loved Michelle; I needed to find her.

That night I saw, the shadows move again. I lay in bed, the words of the old woman haunting my thoughts. Flashes of anger would course through me. I knew she was a fraud and still I went to her. Then I noticed the shadow on the ceiling again. Michelle’s frog hadn’t been moved and the same knobby-headed creature was still there staring at me.

I looked away from it to the frog on the lamp. It was funny how such a weird shadow could be made from such a mundane object. I didn’t realize anything was wrong until I looked back. The knobby head was still there, only now there was a hand beside it. It was a gnarled looking hand, long knotted fingers, and the shadow hand looked as though it had sharp pointed nails on the end of those fingers.

I looked back at the frog and could see no way for the shadow hand to be created from the stuffed animal. I looked back at the ceiling and the hand had gotten larger and, somehow, closer. I know that doesn’t make sense. It looked as though the shadow was no longer ON the ceiling but coming OUT of the ceiling.

Well, I had seen enough. Sure that it was just my frazzled nerves and the words of that old fraud I turned on the light feeling foolish as I did. I think sometimes that things would’ve been easier if I hadn’t turned on the light. I don’t know exactly what would’ve happened, but I know it would’ve been different.

The light flashed on and the shadow disappeared. At the time, I thought maybe I was dreaming a little because I heard a short howl of pain when the shadow disappeared. A deep-throated howl rumbled like boulders down a mountain. But a shadow can’t howl, certainly not in pain. I dismissed that sound as a large truck with a bad muffler speeding down our street.

#

I don’t want to bore you with all of the details. In the morning, I decided to move the frog. I placed it on the bed where Michelle used to sleep. I told myself this wasn’t because of the shadow or my fear of the knobby-headed shadow creature I wasn’t seeing on the ceiling, I just wanted something of hers in the bed with me. Isn’t it amazing the lengths we will go to in an effort to avoid admitting that the things bumping in the night actually are snarling in our face?

Eventually I realized the old lady was right and wrong. The darkness wasn’t evil, it didn’t know I was watching it, the shadows did. Shadows aren’t actually dark you see. Shadows need light to exist, without light there are no shadows. The dark needs light to be gone. That’s obvious of course.

At first, I thought maybe I was going a crazy. I had dismissed that clawed hand as a dream. It had to be a dream; shadows don’t come out of the surface they are on, that’s impossible. So if I saw a shadow coming out of the ceiling then I had to be dreaming it.

Telling myself that helped for a while, until I started seeing more hands coming out of the shadows. Usually I caught these out of the corner of my eye. The part that shows us the things we don’t really want to see, the part that’s not answerable to our rational mind.

I thought the hand was attached to that knobby head. When I accepted that I really was seeing it, I realized it could come out of any shadow at all. Do realize how many shadows are around us each and every day? You can’t get away from them. I suppose you could live in a room with no objects, just four walls and a light. Except of course, you have a shadow. It’s always connected to you.

I stopped leaving the house at any time other than noon. That way my shadow would be smallest, and most objects had easily avoidable shadows. I didn’t know what would happen if I stepped into one, I didn’t want to know.

At home, it was a little harder. I kept all my lights on of course, got rid of the nightlights and anything the cast long shadows that would be hard to avoid. I learned to sleep in total darkness. There are no shadows in the dark. Gradually my search for Michelle ended.

It was never a conscious decision. I didn’t wake up one morning and give up hope. I think I knew what had happened the moment I saw that clawed hand coming out of my ceiling. So I gradually gave up the search, I put her frog back on the lamp not worried about the knobby head because it was always dark in my room now.

#

Over the years, I became obsessed with shadow creatures. I found out about so-called “Shadow People” in the course of my research. A quick search on the internet will reveal some pretty impressive photos and even videos. I’m sure a few of them might even be real. The one thing I knew is that I wasn’t the only that knew about the creatures in the shadows.

Nobody I talked to about these “Shadow People” knew what they were or where they came from. I knew though that I wasn’t dealing with “Shadow People”, I was dealing with creatures in the shadows. Shadow people seemed to usually be non-violent, and none of the pictures or videos I saw ever looked like the knobby-headed creature on my ceiling.

I tried once to capture an image of that creature. I thought maybe if I caught a picture of it, or got it on video then I could prove to myself that I wasn’t crazy. That’s all I was worried about then you see. I didn’t know what else I would do with the video but at least it would show me I wasn’t crazy.

So one night I placed a camcorder in my room and pointed it towards my bed. I plugged in my old nightlight turned out the lights and lay on my bed. The knobby head was back as ugly as he ever was. The coppery taste of fear coated my throat, adrenaline surged through my system. It was a fight with myself to lay still.

It seemed like I was there forever. I saw the head wink at me once. Its dark smile opened to reveal ragged, sharp looking shadow teeth. It never reached out for me though. I tried speaking to it but received no responses. I think it knew about the camcorder. Once I started to feel like I might sleep, I turned all the lights back on.

That’s it really. That’s my story. I never found Michelle or the boy she was attached to. I think I eventually realized that she WAS the boy’s shadow. I don’t think of them as shadow creatures anymore. I think the creatures ARE the shadows, not something that moves from shadow to shadow but the shadow itself.

All I know now is that I am tired. I think it’s time for me to meet these shadows, and see what comes next. That’s why I’m writing to you whoever finds this. I expect you’re a cop; someone will report me missing, you’ll check here, get entry to the house and find I’m not here. You’ll see a voice recorder sitting on the kitchen counter, I attached a note saying play me, then this letter underneath the recorder. I don’t know if you’ll read the letter or listen to the recorder first. It doesn’t really matter though, I told my story to the recorder much as I wrote it here.

I hope that it’s daytime when you get there, so you can read without too much worry about the shadows. Sure, you’ll dismiss this as the tale of a delusional nut-job. If you could find my body, you’d call it a suicide letter and account it to the unsolved case of my fiancée.

You won’t find my body though, just as they never found Michelle’s. Once I finish here I’m going to turn off most of the lights, allow the shadows to come and I intend to go with them. I’ll leave the recorder running though. Maybe you’ll get to hear my last words. After you listen to the recording, I think you’ll believe me. I’m going to try to get the shadows to talk. Hopefully if they do it’ll be recorded.

Thank you for reading my story even if you think I’m crazy. Maybe I’ll see you around as a shadow, though you won’t know me. I was Roger Dean. Now I guess it’s time for me to fade into the shadows.

#

Footsteps followed by a soft clicking noise, presumably the light switch.

“Alright you bastards come here.” Deep male voice.

The sound of footsteps return, sounds like pacing in front of the recorder.

“I see the claws moving towards me now. I wonder if Michelle saw them coming or if they just grabbed her. If I ever see her again I think I’ll ask. My friend Knobby head is in the doorway. He’s short and squat, quite a lot like a fairy creature. It’s hard to tell but I think his arms are quite long. He’s smiling at me. I’m going to try talking to him.”

Silence.

“Who are you?” Mr. Dean.

Silence

“What do you want?” Mr. Dean.

Silence

“Did you take Michelle?” Mr. Dean

A brief scream follows. The rest of the recording is silent.

#

     It was 5:30pm when SGT. Malone arrived at the Dean household. He reported it empty. It took twenty minutes for a crime scene unit to report on scene. When the investigators arrived, the only sign of Malone was his cruiser parked out front. The investigation into the disappearances of Michelle Blanchart, Roger Dean, and SGT. Frank Malone is ongoing. There are no leads.

#

     Shadows surround us all the time. Michelle, Roger, and Frank became intimately familiar with that fact. Over 2300 people are reported missing in the United States every day. Some of these are found alive or dead. Some are alive and actively avoiding discovery. What about the others, the ones that are neither alive nor dead, that don’t want to stay hidden?

     We see them all the time even if we don’t notice them. They are the people on the other side. They are attached to our feet when we walk. Their bike tires connect to ours. To them we are the shadows. Sometimes, if you pay close attention you can see them moving when you don’t. Sometimes they want you to see this. Everyone needs a shadow, and there are only so many to go around.

     So when you go to bed tonight, and snuggle down underneath the covers trying to find that sweet spot that ensure a quick journey to sleep think about that nightlight. Think about all of the movies and stories you have read that say that light can protect you.

     Think about all the times you sat looking at the shadows on your walls and ceilings. All the times a scary shadow disappeared, into a pile of dirty laundry. Look at the shadows, what do they look like? Who do they look like? Did that one just move?

     Maybe you should turn the lights on. Did you hear that noise? Maybe it was just the traffic outside. At least those shadows are gone though, right? No shadows in this room… except, did that dresser always cast such a long shadow? What’s causing that long shadow, it looks like it’s coming from behind you. Do you dare look?