THE SHADOW

Forsaken, I have come for you tonight.

Awaken, look in my eyes

And take my hand.

Give yourself up to me.

—Dream Theater

A man drives down the freeway. He speeds up, faster and faster, as if the darkness will overtake him at any moment. He is crying. Wailing. Screams of agony pierce the night air, their intensity matched only by the roar of the car engine. A woman sits beside him. He reaches over and squeezes her hand, rubbing his thumb over the ring he gave her years before in a park by the river.

She is dead. Her clothes hang off of her in tattered scraps, unable to conceal the lacerations running across the entire length of her body. There is so much blood. More than he thought was possible. She is covered in it, painted red and glistening. The man looks at her, and she is beautiful to him yet. He tells her he is sorry and kisses her cold, lifeless hand.

The headlights turn off. The car swerves across the grassy median into oncoming traffic, and he releases the wheel. A horn blasts as the semi-truck barrels down on them. The man turns to his wife, and just as the car is about to smash into the truck head-on, obliterating it and anything inside, he sees her turn toward him. She is smiling.

“No!”

My entire body jerked under the cover as I ripped myself out of the dream. The last hint of an echo from my voice reverberated through the great room outside of the doorway. I sat up and ran a hand through my hair. It was soaked. When I put my hands behind me to steady myself, I felt that the sheets were also damp. I lied back down and thought about the dream. It was my parents in that car, there was no mistaking it. I couldn’t even remember what they looked like, but I was certain nonetheless. It had been years since I’d even thought about the accident. The police told us that Dad had fallen asleep behind the wheel one night when they were on their way back from visiting her sister in Shreveport. The official report said that the collision killed both of them instantly. It was an accident, nothing more. Still, the image of my mother, sliced open from head to toe, remained burned into my mind. What the hell was wrong with me?

There was something else. Still shaking off the cobwebs of a deep sleep, I realized that I could hear a sound in the background. It was quiet, almost indistinguishable from the din of the pedestal fan by my bed, but it was unmistakable. The earth was singing again. And it was getting louder.

I pulled the covers off and got up from the bed, dressed in nothing but my boxer-briefs. It was dark outside. I looked at the alarm clock and realized I’d slept the entire evening away. The smell of flowers still hung heavy in the air, now laced with the decay of those that had already begun to wilt. It seemed I could never escape that lingering scent of death. I reached over and clicked on the lamp next to my bed, and at the same time heard the distinct sound of the rear patio door slamming shut. My heart sped up and I stood perfectly still.

“Sam?” I yelled out. “Is that you?” No one answered. I looked around the room for something to help defend myself and spotted an old pocketknife on top of the dresser. I grabbed it and swung the blade open on its rusty hinge until it clicked into place. It wasn’t much, but it was at least better than my bare fists. Slowly, I walked out into the great room, knife raised. The song intensified, the melodious voices clashing with an impenetrable clamor. I called out again with no reply and turned the overhead light on. When I could see there was no immediate danger, I went from room to room. Sam’s bedroom was first, and it was empty. Each bedroom, bathroom, and closet after it told the same story. Satisfied that the house was empty, I walked to the patio door. The music swelled with each step. Outside, the moon was even brighter than the night before, a nearly perfect glowing orb hanging in the sky. The white sheets of cotton swaying in the field gave off a blue tint in the evening light, every detail illuminated in blinding clarity.

There, at the edge of the yard where the grass met the field, stood Sam.

She was facing away from me in her green pajamas, looking out over the field and standing perfectly still. I slid the glass door open. “Sam, what are you doing?” She didn’t react at all, like she couldn’t even hear me. I passed through the doorway and took two steps, then froze. Far off in the fields, a black shadow crept toward us. I looked up to see that the sky was clear, a dazzling display of stars adding their own radiance to the light of the moon. Even if it had been overcast, the shadow was too dark to have come from a simple cloud. It was impossibly dark, siphoning away the light as it advanced. The song crescendoed to a fever pitch, as if every voice in the world sang out at once. A single voice surged above all the others, a deep and ancient command that resonated to the depths of my soul.

“COME!”

I covered my ears and cried out. My eyes watered. It felt as if my head would explode. I forced my eyes to remain open, and as the shadow raced in our direction, Sam stepped into the field, immersing herself up to her waist in a sea of white. For a brief moment, an image flashed in front of me of my sister as a little girl wading out into an algae filled pond in flowing white robes. An older grey-haired man, also wearing a robe, embraced her. You are buried with Christ in baptism, he said, and raised to walk in a new way of life. He pushed her down into the water and held her there. I struggled against Grandaddy’s hands holding me back, sure that the man would drown her if I didn’t stop him.

“Sam!” My attention snapped back to the present, to the shadow that would soon overtake my sister if I didn’t do something. I wasn’t sure how I knew it, but there was no doubt in my mind that this shadow, whatever it was, would mean death for anyone who stood in its way. This time, there was no one to hold me back. I ran to her, struggling to block out the chorus that hammered against me. When I reached her, the shadow was almost upon us. I grabbed her shoulders and tried to pull her back. The forgotten knife was still in my hand, blade extended. She resisted me, and I accidentally swiped it across her arm. She didn’t seem to notice as blood trickled out of the wound, soaking into her shirt, and continued trying to push her way out into the field.

The noise was so intense I thought I would pass out. With a final effort, I dropped the knife and wrapped my arms around her waist, then jerked her backward. She finally relented and fell back with me, and we both rolled out of the field into the grassy yard. I looked up to see the shadow looming over us. It sounds strange to talk about a shadow as if it has mass and substance, and believe me when I say that seeing it in person was a horrific thing to behold. It rose into the sky like a monolith emerging from the depths of the earth. The formless shape swallowed up everything around it, leaving only an empty darkness in its place. Though it didn’t cross the threshold where crop turned to grass, the shadow surged out toward us. A black tendril like a wisp of smoke brushed up against Sam’s face, leaving a deep gash across her cheek. I grabbed her under her arms and pulled her back once more toward the house, then collapsed from exhaustion.

The dark form shimmered a final time before dissipating into the air. The music that had pummeled my senses only a second earlier ended abruptly, leaving utter silence in its place. My chest heaved, and I struggled to catch my breath. Finally, I got to my knees and crawled over to Sam. She lied on the ground with her eyes open and turned up to the stars, breathing calmly. Blood still seeped from the wounds on her face and arm.

“Sam,” I whispered, “wake up. Come on, we need to go.” She didn’t move. I shook her gently and then tapped my fingers against her cheek. No response. “Sam!”

She awoke as I said her name this last time and jumped with a start. Her eyes moved around quickly and then fixed onto mine. “Adem? What...”

“It’s okay, you’ll be fine, but we need to get back inside,” I said. She blinked and reached a hand up to her face, touching the wound on her cheek. She winced, then looked at her blood-caked arm. Her eyes teared up and she began gasping for breath.

“What is this? What are we doing out here?” she asked, panic creeping into her voice. Her head turned in every direction, and then her eyes settled on a single point on the ground just behind me. I looked back and saw the knife, its blade extended and bloody, laying in the grass. Sam felt the cut on her arm and looked back up at me. She screamed.

“Wait, you don’t understand. There was a shadow, you were standing out here and it was coming for you, and…I helped you!”

“Get away from me!” she shrieked. Sobbing now, she got to her feet and ran back to the house. I jumped up and followed behind her, but stopped when the patio door slammed shut.

“God Dammit,” I said, then turned around and repeated, “God Dammit! What the fuck are you?” The only answer I received was the sound of crickets finally chirping back to life and the wind resuming its path through the fields. I locked my hands together behind my head. “Shit!”

Defeated, I turned around and again walked back to the house. I slid the patio door open and approached Sam’s bedroom. I knocked and held my ear up to the door. She was weeping, but wouldn’t answer me. A quick jiggle on the doorknob told me that it was locked. I pressed my forehead to the wall.

“Sam, I’m sorry. I know you’re scared, and you should be. I don’t know how to explain to you what just happened. Even if I could, you wouldn’t believe me. Just don’t give up on me, okay? I’ll figure out a way to fix this.” I waited. Nothing. I returned to my room and sat down on the bed. Only now did I realize that I was still dressed only in my briefs. The dresser mirror reflected a filthy individual, bone thin, with sunken eyes and pale skin. I made my way into the bathroom, undressed, and stepped into the shower.

Something had to be done. I couldn’t go on like this, especially now that Sam was involved. The water flowed, washing the earth away, and I closed my eyes. The darkness did not await me there. Instead the haunting image of my sister’s frightened face stared back.