Shadow's Edge
The rain beat down steadily, and combined with a northwesterly wind, made seeing much more than a few feet beyond his car windshield impossible. Larry had pulled over twenty minutes ago, confident the storm would pass, but no such luck yet; it seemed to be getting worse.
At first, he'd tried to get some rest. After the week he'd had, sleep was high on his list of priorities to keep his mind and body functioning, but even the steady drone of rain on the car's roof couldn't soothe his cares away. Part of the problem was that Janice and his parents kept creeping back into his head; how were they taking his disappearance? Hard, he was sure, since his cell phone hadn't stopped ringing for two days, but this was something he needed to do. He was a danger to them, and that was that, even if they didn't know it.
He had been edging up on a nap when the rain intensified, shaking the car with the force of its downpour. Such a deluge was rare, and the fact that as the minutes went by it got worse gave him no small measure of concern. Eyes wide open again, he stared down the country road in front of him, hoping to spot the thing before it saw him.
A creaking in the seat behind him told him he'd been looking the wrong way.
“Larry...” the figure now occupying his back seat whispered, and he did his best not to shiver. Their first meeting had led to Larry out stone-cold for the better part of an hour, and when he'd woken up the shadowy apparition was gone. He'd seen it several more times over the course of the following month, and each time he tried to learn a little bit more about it. In the end, he came away with the fact that the thing had his face, could speak softly, and didn't seem to have any sort of purpose; when it arrived, it simply sat nearby, invisible to everyone but him.
He'd been sure he was crazy. Work had been breathing down his neck to finish a number of projects, and his boss – an ass – had been replaced by an ever bigger ass who seemed hell-bent on making Larry's life miserable. Janice wanted to know when they were getting married, since he'd been smart enough to propose last winter, hoping that would silence her questions about his love for her. He did love her, very much, but didn't see why so much of love had to be about doing things he had no interest in, like getting married or planning social events. Larry wanted to spend time with Janice, not her parents or his own, and there was nothing more uncomfortable for him than talking about his feelings in public.
The shadow-version of him was merely an inconvenience, though search of the Internet revealed no answers as to just what might be wrong with his brain. Without answers, Larry had gone back to normal life as well as he could, and ignored the shadow whenever it popped up. The longest it had ever stayed was overnight once when he and Janice were fighting. It had sat in the chair at their bedside, darkened eyes staring at him for hours. He hadn't slept well but had made up with Janice in the morning, and the thing had disappeared.
It was another fight he and Janice were having that finally sparked his need to leave. He'd been thinking about it in the back of his mind for some time; work was getting worse, and as much as he loved his fiancee, things seemed to be going from bad to terrible. Their argument had been about the size of centerpieces, of all things, but rapidly spiraled beyond that to cover ground about his shortcomings. He'd responded in kind, and soon enough their apartment was filled with shouting, finger-wagging and the occasional slamming door.
After one such slam, Larry had come back to the living room to find his shadow, hovering just over Janice's right shoulder. She'd lit some candles, something she often did when she wanted them both to calm down. It typically signaled that she was willing to end the fight, and Larry would usually go along with it. That night, he'd ignored the obvious and laid into her again, chastising her for a number of past slights. The tempo of the argument was just picking up when the shadow-man had stepped forward and pulled down hard on Janice's right arm. With a stumble, she'd fallen down onto the candles, suffering burns on her left arm, neck and the side of her face.
Larry had been horrified.
The shadow came more frequently after that, and each time it appeared Larry felt his stomach drop. His anger seemed to catalyze it, and his anger seemed to be growing every day that passed. He had no control over the shadow; his hand passed right through on a touch, and ordering it to stop appearing did nothing. Two days before he'd left, it started talking to him, sibilant whispers of his own name and Janice's.
“What?” He screamed, twisting around to face the apparition in the car. “What the hell do you want?”
“Unhappy...” was the reply.
“You're goddamn right I'm unhappy, shadow! You've ruined my life, I've got nowhere to go, and the people I love think I've gone crazy. Is that not clear enough unhappiness for you?”
His shadow-form shook its head, then pointed at itself. “Unhappy,” it said more firmly.
“What?” Larry was incredulous. “You're unhappy? What do I care?”
“Unhappy!” The shape was yelling now, and reached forward to grab Larry by the shoulder. The next thing he knew he was on the wet ground outside the car, his shoulder aching and the car door wide open.
“Come.” Above him, the shadow crossed his arms, and Larry struggled to rise. The rain was finally slacking off, and he could see farther into the forest in front of him, though he wished he hadn't looked. As far as he could see into trees, shadow-men and women shambled, moving slowly along the forest floor.
“Come,” his shadow said again, and he followed. He had little choice.
- D
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