Short One Shots

I'm Not Alone.

Fear.

Fear is all I feel. The darkness surrounds me and I am slightly blinded by the pitch black world around me. Everything terrifies me but I try my best to not show my fear. The small rustle of a tree branch makes me jump. How did I get in this situation, you ask? You know what? I'll tell you.

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With the school day over I decide to walk to the park before I go home. I slowly make my way there, breathing in the cold wind traveling across my skin. It's getting dark, but I decide to still go the rest of the way to the park anyway. That was my first mistake.

When I reach the playground that I first found when I was ten, eight years ago, the swing was already creaking as it moved forwards and backwards. I silently sat on the one next to it, admiring the view of the clear night sky. I turn my head as I hear footsteps but as soon as I do, they halt.

I scan the area around me hoping to find whoever made the noise. My heart is racing as I try not to think about it and I'm once again sat in the quiet. It turns peaceful, hushed and for a minute I convince myself I imagined it. Until I hear it again.

I jump slightly this time and frantically try to see whoever is near me, but yet again, they stop walking. I search my surroundings needing to know who was there but I couldn't find anyone. There had to be someone, I told myself. There can't be footsteps without someone making them.

I stood up from the swing and decided it was probably time I went home. Slowly walking across the grass to the pathway, I started to calm down from what happened. The park was only a ten minute trip from my house so it won't be long until I get there. But ten minutes in my mind sounded a lot longer when I hear footsteps for the third time. Except this time, they were louder and were heading towards me.

I started rushing, knowing subconsciously that no-one I know goes to this park. Whoever it was who was following me, though, was much quicker. The footsteps got louder and louder, closer and closer. I looked behind me and they paused once again, but I knew better than to assume they stopped for good.

As soon as I turned my head to start walking again, my wrist was grabbed and I was pulled backwards. I looked around but they disappeared, again, no sign they were even there to begin with. It didn't matter anyway seeing as I was nearly back, in the safety of my own home. But as I looked forwards, trying to find the path I always took, not even considering for a moment there was any way I could get lost... there was darkness.

No, there was no way I could've gotten lost, I've walked the same path almost every week to the park and back for eight years. There was absolutely no way I could've been that stupid. But the path is nowhere to be found, there is no longer the creaking sound of the moving swing. I was now in the middle of the forest but I could see the light of the town not too far ahead. It finally clicked in my mind what happened when I heard footsteps, in the forest, behind me.

So I ran. I ran and I didn't look back, desperate to reach the brightness of the town, desperate to get help. I was so close, right behind the pathway, I almost made it too. But as soon as I stepped foot outside the forest, I fell.

I fell. And when I got back up again I was once again in the forest. This time farther away from the comfort of the town. And I ran. I ran and I ran and I ran, and I fell and I fell and I fell. I was hit with the sudden realisation, the horror of the situation closing in on me... I'm stuck.

Then I felt a different kind of scared. The kind when you wake up from a nightmare not knowing what you dreamed of but knowing it was awful. I didn't feel scared I was lost, or because I was stuck in a never ending cycle. I didn't feel scared I probably would never see home again, or anyone I know. I was scared of the footsteps.

They weren't just any footsteps, I figured that out a while ago. But I couldn't see anyone that was making them. I couldn't find anyone around me, or anyone who could've possibly pulled my wrist.

But as I looked forward from sitting against a tree, I saw a suit. More specifically, someone was wearing the suit. Someone silent, I couldn't even hear them breathing but the one thing I could hear... was their footsteps.

I am terrified as I realise, it's not a person, it's a shadow. And I'm even further unsettled when I realise... I'm not alone.

~