Where the Shadows Go

My hands trembled as I pressed the pen against the paper. Black ink bleeds through the page. With each stroke, I shaped the figure that watched me. I shaded lightly in between the lines and admired my finished drawing. I pulled my blanket further over my body—my shivers alongside it. The image of the shadows’ sharp eyes from my closet imprinted on the inside of my eyelids. From the cold zip of the air that shot down my spin, I could tell his eyes remained peeled to me. I laid there for an eternity; praying for the merciful darkness of sleep.

Eventually, their presence didn’t scare me. I learned to treat them less like a monster under my bed, and more like a discovery. I drew them all without fear. Like a puzzle, I tried to piece them together to create a clear picture. Each shadow that twisted and curled across my bedroom walls, that morphed into shapes, figures, and faces—yet there’s hardly any pattern.

My parents called me crazy. I needed to grow up and let go of all my “bizarre obsessions.” I tried to tell them: every night at exactly 2:16 AM, the shadows move as if they were alive. They never listened. Every time I mentioned it, their gaze never met mine. It was like I wasn't even there. I never mentioned the shadows to anyone else. Never again.

Five years later, here I am, laying in pitch-black silence, notebook and pen in hand, as I wait for the clock to strike 2:16.

I do this every night. My parents think I’m lazy. I’m probably a failure to them; the son they wished they never had. That’s okay. At least Grandma understood me the best. She had an answer to everything; if she were still here, I’m certain we could piece the puzzles together in no time.

I won’t stop trying, though. My blue notebook contains every shadow I’ve ever seen. It’s only a matter of time before a pattern or key reveals itself—anything to give me a sliver of hope.

A cool breeze washes over me and makes me shudder. It's 2:16. A dark streak draws my eyes in, swaying across the walls like the fluorescent push and pull of ocean waves. Around and around it goes, at each revolution pausing at my nightstand.

They’re as obsessed as me. That's the one pattern that sticks out: the shadows' obsession with something on my nightstand. I’ve dimmed it down to two options: the photo of me, my parents, and my grandma, or the stone necklace passed down to me by my grandma. Either way, my grandma's connection drives my hope. I remember when she placed the silver necklace around my neck. It was special.

“The history contained in this necklace is powerful.” she said as the shimmering silver emblem hit my chest.

“What kind of power?” she gave a soft smile.

“You will learn in time.”

That’s all I remember. My memory feels faded, twisted ever since my first shadow encounter. She was right. In time, you learn, but you also forget.

The shadow pulls me back to reality. I grab the necklace, place it around my neck and flip to the next blank page in my notebook. I outline the shadow's movements. As it makes its way back towards me, I drop my pen and hold my hand out against the wall. An ecstatic spark surges through me like lightning. For a moment, the faintest whispers loft through the air, but it fades as the shadow continues its cycle.

It’s chilling. Déjà vu always washes over me. It drives me insane when I can’t remember where the feeling comes from, yet it also helps me. Brain fog clears from my mind, my breath smooths and deepens my lungs, and tension releases its grasp on my muscles. I always feel understood by them. But how can I feel understood by a force I don’t understand? My eyes lock back at the shadow. It never once breaks its rhythm.

This time’s going to be different. As it passes me, I spring from my bed to follow it. I expect it to keep its pattern, but it breaks it. It sifts out of my bedroom door, into the hallway. The hard wood floor creaks as my feet inch forward across it.

I face my parents' bedroom. The closed door intimidates me. I can only imagine their faces full of rage and spite if I wake them up. The thought makes me shudder. All that I have is the shadows as my guide. They’re more than just symbols. They’re alive. I know it.

My eyes dart at the shadow. It glides down the stairs. My feet creep with one step at a time. The stairs whine despite the care I take. At this rate, I would lose the shadow; I can’t lose it. I pause. I focus on my breathing. Breathe, inhaling a gulp of air, my chest puffs up. I release, relaxing the tension throughout my body. My legs finally agree with my mind. One. Two. Three.

I bolt down the steps, my feet pound against the floor, surely awakening them. The shadow is about to turn the corner, and for a moment, it leaves the corner of my eye. My heart stops in the eternal second, but as I reach the bottom of the stairs, it comes back into view. Relief washes over me. Today is the day I will figure out what the shadows are, and where they go.

“What the hell is that!?” my dad’s voice pierces down through the walls, it tears panic back through me. Shit. There’s no turning back now. The shadow gleams back at me. My heart pounds as the footsteps of my parents move and shake the ceiling.

“C’mon, go faster,” I urge. It listens.

Through the living room, to the kitchen, while the stomps of my parents reach the staircase. I rush ahead to the end of the mudroom door and open it. Moonlight pools in. I turn back. The shadow glides towards the door behind it–my father. His eyes dart towards mine.

“You’re dead meat, Jason!” his voice is like a sharp knife stabbing at my chest. His eyes never glance at the shadows. He didn't see it. If only he could see the shadows, maybe things would be different, but no one ever does.

I step outside into the night sky with the shadow. The sound of panicking feet and furious cursing of my parents behind us push me forward. My eyes follow the shadow into the mist ridden road, it’s gone. I run after it.

My dad screams behind me again and again, but I can’t understand him. I glance back. His scream sounds like he should be right on the steps to my house, but he is not there. I reach the road and my house is gone. My dad's screams fade to a whisper, everything swallowed in the moonlit mist–me along with it.

I have to find the shadow. I sprint through the road until my bare feet against the cool pavement ache. My hands rest on my knees as my breath heaves. How am I going to return home? My parents would kill me. I couldn’t. Deep down I knew that, but I put it aside and shut the door. Just another problem to deal with later. There’s a bigger problem: where did the shadow go, and where am I?

The street lights' faint yellow glow hardly illuminates the road. I should be in the neighborhood, but there are no houses. No cars. Only the utility poles, street lights, and trees stretch across the vast depth of the road. In between the trees, cast the shadows, and hidden in them are peering eyes following mine. The cool breeze makes me shudder. I walk the only way I can, forward. For the first time since my first encounter, the shadows shoot fear down my throat that I can’t swallow.

The road bends and curves with the trees. I approach a sign that reads: Dead End. What? How long have I been walking? There’s no sign of the sun rising, no birds, no howls. Nothing. I have little choice but to continue my journey, with no end in sight.

A distant figure appears in the road, and I halt. His face bleeds through the mist and seeps into my mind. I recall the face. I take out my notebook, flipping through the pages until I stop. Etched in the paper is the shadow that looks exactly like the figure standing before me.

“You look familiar,” says the figure, his voice soft and timber, echoes.

“Who are you?” I approach him to get a clearer picture, but his image begins to blur and distort, until he is gone. Dispersed with the darkness. His words still echo in my head.

My feet are limp, my head heavy, as I tread on. A shadow sways from beneath me. It’s the one from my house, moving forward in its same rhythms. Relief floods through me. Finally, a sign. It acts as a guide, moving me through the road to the end of the paved road. The shadow reveals a small opening tucked in at the end of the road. Trees surround me as I walk through the thick forest. This time there’s no trail, no path to follow; the shadow luring me to where it wants.

Through the woods and up the hill. Without the street lights, it’s dark, but the mist lifts the reflection of the moonlight, giving off a dark blue glow. The trees descend in number the further I climb, until the few trees left, with their branches hanging naked, with their dry twisted ends. The surrounding air grows heavy, yet everything is still. A metal door to a graveyard meets me. Tomb stones lie sprawled across the flat grassy yard. I tug at the lock as the doors welcomingly spring open. I gulp down the fear stuck in my throat and step through.

Each grave I walk by, a presence that seems alive, or even above consciousness itself, is there to greet me. There’s a sense of loss with each one, but only one draws me forward above the rest. I walk towards it.

The grave stone contains fresh flowers, and a framed image below it. The name Natasha Sharrol etched within the stone. My grandmother, 1963-2004. That’s not right. My grandmother couldn’t have died before I was born. I have memories. They were real. Real, real. I mutter the word again and again until it aches. She gave me that necklace, with her own flesh and blood. I remember! It’s a lie. The shadows lie.

The flowers now lie shriveled below me, their color dulled to a lifeless flaky brown; the picture frame, now cracks and dust splattered throughout the glass, inside the paper yellowed with age. I pick up the frame and wipe the dust off it. The picture is of my grandmother, my father and mother—no. It’s the same picture from my nightstand, but I’m not in it.

The frame slips from my trembling hand. How can this be? My entire life, a lie? Whispers pierce through the air. One shifts me right, towards another gravestone. I step up to it. Jason Theron; my name, etched within the stone. My stomach curls inside me, something itching upward to my throat like I’m about to throw up. My hand reaches out to touch the chiseled stone of my grave, but I can’t feel its cold embrace. I look at my arms, my hands, my body, but I'm no longer flesh and blood. I’m stuck. Stuck to the plain of a third-dimensional world. I read the date: 2004-2019.

“Finally, you find your way home.” A soft, whispering voice echoes behind me. I twist, seeing the shape of a woman face me.

“Grandma?” I say as my crackling voice fades to a whisper with the others.