The Shadow House

FEAR?

There are many things to fear. heights, water, spiders, snakes, fire, ghosts, and maybe even harmless mice. Fear is a confusing, and kind of a peculiar thing to me however. I approach what most people would 'fear' like a fluffy hungry kitten comes to warm milk on a cold day. I'm not cocky or arrogant. I just honestly have never feared anything in my life. I don't know if my mind is fucked up or what. I guess I wasn't born with the fear part of my mind in tact. I try nearly every day recently to try to feel it, to see if i indeed fear. Nothing seems to do the trick. all i've managed to do is cause harm to myself doing really dumb shit. I'm 19 years old, ex star running back on my high school football team, and graduated with a 3.6 GPA, thanks to my dad I managed to pull that out of my ass last semester of school. I guess the inability to feel fright has its advantages. But I still don't live a perfect life by any means. Managing to end my high school career with a total of 23 broken bones, and metal rods damn near everywhere inside me. And no ladies, I never broke my penis. Talk about expenses, and the pain. I wish I couldn't feel pain either sometimes, but that's something I got to live with. Hell without it I may be dead.

I would like to add, because I don't get scared, does not mean I don't care for wellbeing. There would be no surprise if nobody cared as much as I around here. I'm on a volunteer rescue team in the community, and will soon be on the police force. I care for life, I care for safety. I care for my wellbeing just as much as the next guy. But I don't believe in putting too much effort in it for my own. I'm smart enough to know how to take care of myself, and the correct way of doing it without winding up dead.

I recently moved into my first place with my girlfriend, Heather. The only downfall of the new apartment is that it's close to this dead, dark looking house. Heather says it gives her the chills. Shes pretty opposite of me. She panics, she worries, she gets paranoid often, very stressed, and she even gets scared, a lot. But god damn I love her. Without her I literally would not be alive. She's saved my ass from lethal stupidity so many times all through high school, and even today. I'm grateful, thankful, and I'm going to marry that girl. Ironically her favorite thing is scary movies. She says she loves the thrill of being frightened. 'I guess its okay if it's not real? whatever.' She says "I loves the intensity right before something pops out and makes me jump!" I wish I knew what the hell she was talking about. She's tried countless times to use scary movies to scare me. No luck. It tends to backfire, and it seems like she only ends up scaring herself. I usually get a good laugh out of it. I'm glad that I do have a sense of humor. Without that I would basically just be a robot. I need my humor to get by. Along with my affection. It's pretty much the only thing I have that's really me, my only personality traits.

My younger brother David and I like to joke around with each other. He likes to push me to the limit by daring me do things that nobody in there right mind would do. I have to have Heather there to 'protect' me now apparently. But like I said before. I know how much I can take before I take serious damage. Although in order to keep her happy, she thinks she has to be with me all the time. She sees herself as my 'fear emotion', so she tells me. I guess I don't really mind her company. She's the best thing for me. If she's happy, im happy.

On our way to David's' place, Heather and I are walking on this cracked, old sidewalk. Lined with a few dead trees. However all the grass in the yards are vibrant, plush green. We walk together, high noon, but alone. No one to be seen. All these houses but no one in sight. It's a beautiful day out. You would think to expect to see children playing in the road, or playing catch with their fathers. but no such thing is going on today. It's awkward. Silent. Nothing is going on, or is there? Maybe something I don't know about going on? I turn to ask Heather if she knew where everybody was. There was no one next to me, her sweet smell was lingering. I knew she was there, i can't just imagine her presence. She was nowhere to be seen. Heather is gone as well. How the hell can someone vanish like that? This is all fucked up. I continue to travel down this lonely path, confused, not knowing what just happened. However I know there has to be a logical explanation to where everyone has gone. Including my girlfriend. The next thought that comes to my mind is, why am I the only one here? Why have I not vanished? Why leave me of all people completely alone?

To make sure that I am truly alone, I go to the closest house. Mrs. Kluther. Shes a widow, has been for 18 years now. She never leaves the house because she's paralyzed from the waist down. Living with her 30 year old son, she relies on him for everything. Never leaves the house for anything. I walk across the street, not even bothering to look both ways for cars. It's not just because of the situation I'm in, by habit I don't look. I never look. Even when there was traffic up the ass. I come to the curb, and walk through her plush green grass. Up to her deck stairs. I hear her t.v on. I think nothing of it because it's always on. Watching T.V is the only thing she's really capable of doing now, never leaves her bed. I knock on the door, and look through the window, trying to look past her ugly puke green curtains. I see nothing. I knock again and waited a few seconds. Still nothing. I turn the knob, and the door opened. I step in and peek around before completely walking in. Her cat walks at my feet, rubbing her side against my leg. i can feel her purrs vibrate up the shin.

I call for Mrs. Kluther and all is quiet as i focus on any noises at all. Theres nothing. i can't hear anything but the overly loud purrs coming from that attention deprived cat. I walk around the house some more to be sure. Sure enough, there is no one to be found in this house. I walked out of the house, and continued toward David's house. I pull my phone out of my pocket and text heather. I asked "where are you." hoping she would text right away, I stared at my phone for a couple moments, but nothing happened. I put it back in my jean pocket and kept strolling.

I come up to the dark house. I can't help but stare at it as I walk by. It's like driving past a horrible accident. You don't want to look, but you can't help but to. The grass on this property is nothing like others. Mostly dirt, with a couple patches of brown grass here and there. The house itself looks like black mold, with the siding peeling off like 80 year old snake skin. The windows look yellow like dehydrated skunk piss. As i scan the side of the house i see a silhouette standing in the window. Intrigued I open the rusted fence gate, and I feel some force begging me to investigate. I walked up the walkway to the dark splintered door, and grabbed the cold rusty knob.