Return of the Shadows

No one had ever been able to live in the house for more than a week. Most said it haunted, but they didn't know the meaning of the word. Yet. They hadn't met me.

It was sunny the day we moved. It was wrong, to have the sun, a symbol of happiness, shining on such a day as this one. It was just my dad and me. My mom had died a mysterious death. My dad still had no idea what happened. I did. But he didn't know that. There was a lot he didn't know. It was easier that way.

We drove up the dirt road in our truck. Dust kicked out the back, hiding us from any spying eyes. And trust me, there were many. It was one of the reasons I had pushed for my dad to get a truck when he'd asked. He didn't know that either.

I didn't have a phone. Well, that’s not true. I had a flip phone but that was only for calling Lou. Screens hurt my stomach and gave me headaches. And besides, I was much more comfortable reading. It calmed my racing mind, gave me something to focus on. It also made it easier to contain the monster that lurked under my skin. That's what I did the entire car trip. Music played in the background, but I didn't focus on it. Cars rides weren't as bad as some other things like art but they also weren't ideal.

The house was set at the top of a hill. It overlooked the town we were moving into. You know the small towns you read about in books where everyone knows each other? This was one of those towns. Also not ideal, to have everyone know me, but it was better than a crowded town. I was more susceptible in those. With all the people it was much easier to lose control, and I couldn’t risk giving myself away. 

My dad was humming as he pulled into the driveway. He was always humming these days. It helped him ignore his grief. If I’d wanted to, I could’ve gotten rid of his grief completely. However, that would’ve made him feel guilty for not being sad about his wife dying. He was that kind of man. And besides, it would have taken too much energy. These days, everything took too much energy. It was the result of not being able to practice. A sacrifice I was willing to make if it meant I would stay out of their arms. 

There was nothing special about the house. It was your typical country house. The only thing that made it different from the rest of the houses in the town was that it was big. Well, that and people thought it was haunted. 

My dad and I hadn’t rented a moving van. We didn’t need one. Our house had burned down not long after my mom had died. We probably would’ve moved anyway just to get away from the house where my mom lingered in every corner. For my dad anyway. I didn’t care, I had no attachment to my mom. I had just sped up the process by burning the house down. It might have attracted more attention but it was the only way I was able to destroy all of my belongings without people asking too many questions. And besides, how many people are going to think a sweet girl like me would burn down my house with all my stuff in it. 

The driveway was made of pebbles. The colorful ones used for decorations. Okay, so they weren’t that colorful, just whites and gray with streaks of red and black, but it still looked cool. I walked with my dad to the front door. I needed to seem like I was still dependent on him like I couldn’t send the world into darkness at any time. But whereas my dad peered into the darkness of the house and said he was going to go get all of our stuff, I walked in and started exploring. At least that was my cover story. Really, I was just going to find a space where I could call Lou without being overheard. 

I ended up in an empty room upstairs. It looked like a bedroom, but there was something off about it. Lou picked up on the first ring. 

“Dusk? Is that you?” he asked immediately. 

“No, I’m some other person whose caller ID says Dusk,” I told him exasperated. Still, I couldn’t stop a smile from lighting up my face. Lou was the only one who knew what I could do and didn’t run away from it. I think he had a death wish, and he was most certainly not right in the head but he was brilliant. 

“Hey, no need to get cranky on me. And I know you’re smiling right now, so you can stop acting like you’re not glad to talk to me.” 

Of course, Lou knew I was smiling. He always seemed to be able to read my moods. Maybe it was part of being a genius. Or maybe being mentally insane gave him extra perception. 

“Whatever,” I said. 

“Any problems? You are at the house, right? What’s it like? Is it haunted? How was the car trip? Did you-” Lou could’ve asked me questions for hours but I cut him off. 

“Yes, I’m at the house. There weren’t any problems. The car trip was fine, and if by haunted you mean ghosts then no it is not haunted,” I informed him, preparing myself for the next onslaught of questions. 

“So there’s definitely something off about it, then right?” he asked. I expected him to keep going but for once he seemed like he was going to shut up and listen. 

“Yeah. I’m going to have to investigate, but right now I’m just getting a really weird feeling and there is an unnatural number of shadows. It’s two o’clock and sun should be streaming through the windows, lighting up the entire house, instead, the floor, walls, and ceiling are covered in shadows. There’s only a small space that isn’t shadowed.”

“So it complements you. Maybe it’ll even rub off on you and you can have that small piece of happiness,” Lou commented. 

“Shut up, Lou.”

“Any signs of them?” 

“Not yet. It won’t be long now though.” 

Just then the door slammed downstairs and my dad’s voice wafted through the house. The shadows seemed to cover that up too. 

“Dad’s calling Lou, gotta go. Bye!”

I hung up before he could reply. I loved Lou, dearly, but I also hated the way he made me feel. I was shadows and darkness and hate, but Lou made me feel like sunshine and flowers. He was the one person I could never kill. And I hated him for that. But I hated myself for it more. Because I could never truly love him even if he wanted to get together. 

I wasn’t supposed to be capable of love. However I had been made, the power that had filled me hadn’t left room for anything but darkness. And Lou, Lou had somehow infiltrated that darkness. 

I was roused from my thoughts by the heavy stomping of my dad’s feet on the stairs. Quickly, I shoved my phone into my pocket and stood up, dusting myself off. 

“Hey, I was thinking we could go into town and go shopping and then get some dinner,” my dad said. He was so oblivious. He didn’t ask me why I was in here all alone, didn’t ask why I had come upstairs, didn’t ask me anything. It made it easier, but it would’ve been nice. For someone else to care.

“Yeah, Dad, that sounds great!” I tried for his sake to sound excited. 

“Good,” he said. He sounded relieved. 

We drove into town; people staring at us. They had already known we were going to be moving in, but now there would be whispered rumors instead of outright speculation. I didn’t pay much attention to them, I was keeping my eyes peeled for any dark clothing. I didn’t see any. I took that as a sign of safety. I was wrong. 

By the time we finished grocery shopping, the sun was setting. I should’ve taken that for the sign it was. My name was Dusk, it only made sense that they would act at Dusk, but I was stupid and caught up in not having to look over my shoulder. 

They nabbed me while I was crossing in front of an alley. My dad was already so far ahead of me. I had let him get ahead, content to take in the sights and dream about how I could destroy them. He never saw when I disappeared into the alley. 

A hand was clasped over my mouth, and arms were wrapped around my lean frame. I was strong, from martial arts, but I hadn’t been eating as much in the past months, and I had always been thin to begin with. I struggled as hard as I could, going so far as to reach out with a tendril of power, but the second that tendril left me It slammed into an unforgiving wall. It wasn’t real of course, but my power couldn’t get past it and it hurt, gods it hurt, to try to get past it. I think I was screaming, but my body was so filled with excruciating pain that I couldn’t tell. 

I must have passed out because when I awoke I was sitting in a remarkably familiar room. It took me a second to recognize it as the room I had been in at the house earlier. The door was locked and reinforced. 

I hadn’t been out long. The sun was only just below the horizon when I peered out the window. I didn’t like windows either. But that wasn’t the bad part. As the sun sunk lower and lower, the shadows started moving. It seemed almost like a dance, how rhythmically they moved. 

I’m not scared of the dark. Not in the slightest. But this wasn’t the dark. These were shadows and they were moving. I should’ve known they would’ve found a way to kill me with my own element. 

The shadows were moving toward me. They moved slowly, still dancing, but they were definitely moving toward me. I didn’t know what would happen once they reached me, but I knew it couldn’t be good. I banged on the window, begging it to break, but it would seem that had been reinforced as well. 

By the time the first shadow reached me I was crying. I had never cried before. Not when I had killed my mom, and not when I had burned my house down, but I hadn’t had any attachment to those things. I may have been born in darkness, but I had lived in the light, and I didn’t want to go back. Not to that place where there was to Lou. I had never admitted it to myself before, but I liked living, even when it hurt. Because that meant I was still living. 

The shadows didn’t hurt, not physically. Instead, it plunged me deep into my mind. And that hurt much worse. You can’t escape your thoughts. They don’t stop even when you’re sleeping. Sometimes you can push them away but I couldn’t. No, I could not push away the thoughts I was seeing. My thoughts. I hadn’t realized I had thought all the things I had. Hadn’t realized how truly dark I was. Hadn’t realized how much I wished to be light. How much I hated myself. 

I don’t know how long I spent trapped inside the shadows. That’s what I was, trapped. I couldn’t escape. There was no way out. No way out that didn’t end with me acknowledging myself. My true self. I didn’t want to. Had fought against it until my skin had started peeling and my bones had started cracking. It hadn’t been until I was on the brink of death when I stopped fighting. When I let the memories and thoughts sweep in and carry me away. I didn’t like what I saw, but I accepted it. I accepted myself. 

Lou was in the room when I came to. At first, I thought I had to be dreaming because Lou was supposed to be back in Austin, but then he started talking and I realized it couldn’t be a dream because there was no way my dream self would know all the things Lou told me. 

He said he was sorry for lying to me. He said he couldn’t have told me, and that he had needed to wait until I was ready. He told me that’s why he was crazy because he had been forced to spend hours after hours in that room after dark. I barely heard him. It felt as if I was underwater. Because Lou, he was they. He was the one I had been running from. And he had been there the entire time. He had lied. And I had fallen for it. I had loved him. And he had betrayed me. 

I broke then. When I realized that. I broke into a million pieces. No one would ever put me back together. Lou may have lied and broken me, but he had also given me a gift. He had made me see who I was. And now, the world was going to pay. 

I was darkness. Pure darkness. And I was going to destroy the world.