Afraid of shadows (Short Story)

 A myth is far truer than a history, for a history only gives a story of the shadows, whereas a myth gives a story of the substances that cast the shadows.

Annie Besant

Who's afraid of their own shadow? It follows you, moves around you, encompassing the space beneath you. A simple darkened spot created by light. When he told me, I didn’t believe him. But I do now. Now, I am afraid of my shadow. Although I no longer have one. I am afraid of the day that it finds me and that day will come. I know it, just as mother knows her own child.

A shadow, something so simple yet so terrifying. I know you don’t believe me and that is okay. I wouldn’t believe me either. But what I am telling you is true. The shadows are not what they seem. Perhaps yours is good, I don’t believe that all are evil but mine. Mine is something all together. I hide in the light. Afraid to move, afraid to cast… a shadow. It hasn’t come in sometime, but it will. I cannot fight it, I don’t know how. And when it comes, it will take me to the shadow land. What happens there, I do not know. I do not what to find out. The shadow land, I sound crazy, even to myself.

His name was Ziegler, that was all he told me, no first name. He was shorter than me, with stubbly greying red hair and a belly that hung over his belt. His belching obtrusive behavior turned me off to him right away. I wanted nothing to do with him. A drunk; he stunk of nights filled with alcohol and sin. His stink peeled off of him in a way that happens after months without soap. Scabs covered his arms and face. His teeth yellow, black, rotted brown. I wanted to be rid of him from the first second he spoke.

His garbled words flowed between swigs of beer. He made no sense, speaking only of this shadow land and things he had seen. Ziegler spoke of a world opposite of our own. Blacks and greys dominated the landscapes, the colors we take for granted never known. No blue skies or green grass, no pink-hued sunsets or white fluffy clouds tinted purple as the sun rose. The shadow land was grey, black, obsidian. It was a murky, inklike world where the shadow king ruled. Who would believe such mad ravings? I didn’t and look where I am now. I tell you only to warn you. You must hide from them.

Ziegler didn’t care if I believed him or not. He did not truly warn me; it was perhaps only his drunken confession. Rambling drivel to ignore. And I did. I ignored him. I wanted nothing to do with the stinking drunk. Ziegler and his filthy clothes, his fingernails long and caked with old dirt. How could I have believed a word that fell from his lips? If only I had. Then I would not be lost. Or is it they had found me?

It is only a shadow; I had always thought. Nothing more than a dark stain on the ground, one that follows you. Perhaps in front or behind or to the left or to the right. It is only because of the light. I believed this. I knew this. This is the truth, but this is a lie. A simple little lie. A lie that will now kill me, nonetheless. Why had I not believed the crazy ranting old man?

Ziegler claimed the shadow king feeds off of our world. Sucking the life from those who catch their shadows. Most are children, he claims them and sucks their very life out of them. As if he feeds on their souls until only a shell remains. These children become his. The nightmares we have as children scared of the dark, dismissed by parents the world over. They say they are only shadows, we should not to be scared. But I say, the children are right to be afraid. The shadows are more. Much more than we believe. They live to feed like vampires. Sucking and savouring the tasteful soul of small children’s nightly terrors. Ziegler knew this, and now so do I. I refused to believe him at first, dismissing his lunatic ravings.

“How does someone catch their own shadow?” I asked mockingly.

He stared at me with his drab brown eyes. They sunk back into his face, mere pock marks.

“I didn’t believe it, either.” he said, ignoring my question. “I laughed at the man who told me, just as you laugh at me.”

“No bother, I know the truth and the truth will kill me soon. I have seen the shadow king and lived, and that is more than most.”

He brought his beer to his lips again and drained it in one long pull. Letting out a foul smelling belch.

“The shadow king cares not if you believe in him or not. He prefers that you don’t. Perhaps the soul tastes better if the person does not believe. I don’t care to know.”

Ziegler opened another beer. It bubbled over, the foam dripping to the floor. He payed no attention to it.

“Even if you don’t believe me,” he said, holding the beer before his lips. “Take my advice, don’t cast any shadows this day.”

It was just after midnight. The bar was lit and shadows were all around us. Dim grey shapeless shadows that held the forms of their owners.

“Don’t cast a shadow?” I asked. “How, there are shadows and lights everywhere. You’re fucking crazy, man.”

His eyes changed, the drab brown was now pulsing black. A smile crept onto his face. His rotting teeth shown in a wide PR grin. Ziegler’s laugh began in his belly and echoed in his throat. It was an unnerving laugh, a hideous benign laugh that taunted.

“Do you want to know how to catch your shadow?” he asked in a taunting tone.

“Sure, old man, how?”

“You must catch it in a mirror. I caught mine by accident. I stood in a bathroom, one mirror in front of me, one behind and one on each side. My image repeated many times. My eyes closed, and I remembered the terror I felt as a child. It surrounded me.”

“Uh, huh?” I said humoring him.

“Listen to me, boy.” he shouted. “My terror seized my mind. I could see the shadow king, his arms around me. I opened my eyes, and it was there behind me. My shadow, it’s hands over my eyes. I could see the world through a thick foggy grey soup. The shadow smiled, a bleak black mark etched on its face. I tried to blink, to force myself away, but it was no use. That black mark met my lips in the mirror, and it fed. It sucked and sucked and savoured. Licking at its inky lips as if it was feasting. I could hear the sound in my ears and I could feel the very life being sucked from me. I closed my eyes, willing the being to be gone. When I opened them again, I was alone. I have never seen my shadow again.”

His hand shook as he brought his beer to his lips. He drained the nearly full can in one long gulp. I felt a pain of sorrow for him. I wanted to help him, but how do you help someone so delusional?

“You don’t believe me, do you?” he asked.

“No, I don’t.”

Ziegler hung his head in despair. He looked defeated, the power that he once possessed gone. His eyes fell back to their dull, drab brown. Dirt covered hands reached for me.

“Promise me something.” he said.

“Sure, what?”

“Do not pursue the shadow king. Do not try to disprove me. I did not listen to the man, who warned me. And now, now it is too late. The shadows will come this night and take me back to the shadow king, to be his feast. If I was man enough, I would end it all and face whatever blackness lies behind death. But I am scared. I am so scared. What if they are there also? The shadows sucking on my soul for eternity.”

I pulled my arm out of his grip. I didn’t want to hear anymore. Standing, I pushed myself away from the man. His stench clung to me. I could still feel his fingers digging into my the muscle of my forearm. I looked back once at him, a black mark that could almost be mistaken for a smile stretched across his lips. His eyes were ink once more. I noticed the light behind him, there was no shadow on the floor.

I have many regrets in life. And this is mine. I refused to listen to this warning. If I had, I would not be here telling you my story.

Sleep evaded me. The story Ziegler told echoed in my ears, like a broken record player.

“What had he said, shadow land or world?” I asked myself aloud. “Bullshit.”

I stood and stormed to the bathroom. If sleep refused to come, then I must face this head on. The room was white with gleaming white porcelain tiles on the floor, two sinks, a tub and a toilet. The mirrors there were three of them opened to make a triangle, the same as that old fucker had said.

I folded the mirrors out, staring at my many reflections like I had done so many times before. Nothing happened. Just as the many times before.

I laughed at myself, knowing that the old man had just gotten into my head. I turned to go back to bed. Wait, what had he said? I asked myself.

He had closed his eyes. I turned back to mirror facing hundreds of my reflections and closed my eyes. Terror seized my chest. The same terror I felt as a child. Every night before bed. The shadows in my room waiting for me. Knowing that in the daytime one was a jacket, one was a door, one was the tree outside the window. But at night none of that knowledge mattered. That terror had gripped me every night, just as this has a hold on me now. Goosebumps pimpled my skin. Mere seconds had pasted, but it felt a lifetime. I opened my eyes. Behind me was my shadow, smiling. That black mark ink stained smile that smirked just behind me in the mirror. The images merged to one. It crawled towards me from inside the mirror. My eyes shuddered. Blackness engulfed me, I remember nothing more.

I awoke on the floor of the bathroom. My head sore, I suppose I hit it on my way down. The image of that smirking shadow lingered in front of me, I wanted nothing to do with the mirror. I stepped out without facing it.

I slept. Slept like the dead, I didn’t wake until noon the next day. I felt drained after nine hours of sleep, and I felt none of it. The light that cut through the curtains hurt my eyes, the bump on my head throbbed. That black shadow smile ever present in my mind. Every time my eyelids closed, I could see it coming towards me, crawling through the mirror and feeding. I didn’t know if that part was true or not. I don’t remember. But it feels true. Truer than the nose on my face. I had to find him this Ziegler.

That afternoon I returned to the bar where we had met. The goddamned bartender remembers shit. He said there was no one there that looked like that, and he had never heard the name Ziegler before. I argued with him. I was adamant that I had met Ziegler here at this bar. The annoyed bartender shrugged his shoulders and walked away. I sat on the barstool, the very one I had sat on the night before. Where could he be, I wondered and why hadn’t the idiot bar man remembered him? I closed my eyes and that ink black smirk smiled at me, licking its lips as if it was hungry for more.

My stomach lurched, and I ran out the side door. Dry heaves racked my body. I stumbled through the alley, heaving, retching, unable to bring anything out. I tripped over something and fell to my knees. My feet had tangled in an old well wore letterman jacket, the same Ziegler had worn the night before. Its navy blue fabric, long faded and caked in dirt and shit. The faux leather sleeves peeled, ripped and patched over many times. I kicked it away and retched once more, forcing a black mass out of my throat. It tasted horrid; it was mud, shit, blood all at once. The mass was cold and stunk of death and decay. I wiped my mouth on my left forearm, leaving a trail of that strange black mass.

“Ziegler!” I yelled. “Ziegler!”

I ran through the alley looking behind every dumpster, every trash can, banging on every door. There was no Ziegler. It was then that I saw it or actually didn’t see it. I had no shadow. I cast no shadow. No matter where I stood, there was no dark mass that followed me, there was no shadow on the wall. Terror griped my heart.

Now I sit in the dark and record this for whoever finds it. I don’t know if there ever was a Ziegler or a shadow king or shadow land. I know that my shadow is gone for now. But it will come again, when it is hungry. It will feed or feast on whatever the soul is. I remember now that moment in the bathroom. I lay on the floor and the creature that smiled at me was there. Not just in the mirror, but there in the room with me. It placed its stiff, rough lips on mine and sucked. It feasted on my soul; I know that now. I can feel it. Part of it has departed, and the rest is sick. It has poisoned me. I feel myself dying. That black mass was a dead part of my soul. Soon it will be done and I will be a pawn for the shadow king. Just as Ziegler was.

If someone had asked me before, if I was afraid of my shadow. I would have laughed. But I’m not laughing now. I am afraid, no; I am terrified. I will not let the shadow take my soul. It has taken too much already. I refuse to be a pawn for the shadow king, luring unsuspecting souls to the shadow land. If you have found this recording, it means that I am dead. I hope I have the courage to end it all myself, if not I fear what I may become. Listen to the children, their terror is real. The shadows feed.