In the dark everything looks different. Trees become sinister characters, towering above you ready to strike. The soft wind becomes vicious whispers, merciless threats against your life. The throbbing flicker of a streetlamp is the warning glare of a UFO, coming to claim your shaking body for alien science. Everything can adopt a malevolent nature, in the dark.
There you are, sitting alone at the isolated bus shelter, back hunched against the wind assaulting you from all angles. The amber glow of a solitary streetlamp half illuminates your bleak expression, a menacing shadow shrouds the other section from sight. There's rain kissing the road, reflecting the artificial haze above you, patterns dancing across it making it molten. You roll a cigarette, your frozen hands fumbling to collect the last dregs of dry tobacco from your worn out tin. Post- ignition you inhale deeply, throat burning. You are the only person at the stop. The road stretches before you in both directions. It has no bends, just barren concrete, an industrial invitation for adventure - or demise. Trees swaying gently in the frosty winds surround you, their melancholy rustling creates a lullaby that lures you into the dangerous familiar arms of sleep. You close your eyes, just for a second, just to rest them. But sleep grasps you, it takes you by the hand and leads you into the further - into the subconscious of your own mind, it guides you through your repressed memories and over your empowering secrets and dark sexual fantasies. You float around in the valley of sleep for a while, only to be brought back down by kittens scratching your face. You open your sleep encrusted eyes to tell them to go away, to fend off your furry foes. However you are not met by the small adorable faces of disgruntled cats, but a mossy tree branch. You're on the dank floor of the woodland that lay behind you at the bus stop.
You have no memory of walking there, no idea how you got to be there. You sit up, heart pounding. You think you can hear footsteps fast approaching to the right of you, so you rise to your feet and you run. As you run the footsteps increase, pounding all around you, throbbing closer and closer like an agitated heartbeat. Branches are grabbing at your clothes as you flee, cutting into your skin and grazing your face, making attempts to catch you, to hinder your escape. You don't know where you're running, with no path and no clear idea of what you're running from every direction change is thoughtless. It's almost as if your destination is running to you. You hear an owl screech somewhere behind you, vocalizing the lamented anguish you're too afraid to express. You want to call out but you're unaware and apprehensive as to what may answer your plea. As you speed up, so does your apparent stalker. You slow, the cold air searing your tightened chest. The footsteps subside, and as you stop - they cease. You realize in a moment of shameful recognition that you were evading yourself, your own heinous blood pumping throughout your imbecilic body. You trudge forward, now just hoping you make it back to the stop so you can put this whole incident behind you. But you're so lost. You continue to walk through the cryptic forest. Devoid of the immediate threat of death you now begin to notice how beautiful your surroundings are. The towering moss riddled trees obscure your visionary pathway to the sky above you, you crane your neck and catch a glimpse of the moon. Wide and lethargic it sighs light at you through the murmuring leaves.
You come to a clearing. There's a woman standing before you. You stare at her in awe, unable to believe her solid presence in this desolate place. But is she solid? Her straggly hair falls over her petite bosom, perfectly encircling her undersized mounds. She cocks her head to the side and you hear her neck clicking mechanically.The sound of it is years of discomfort, the release of eons of deformed tension. It sickens you. She reaches towards you. The bluish tint of her water logged skin shines with the moonlight- reflecting its lonesome purity. You notice her veins are black, the blood in them long stagnant. Each iris an abyss, her eyes freeze into you, boring down into your mind and thieving the part of you that you weren't conscious of since you were sat at that bus stop - your clarity. You fall into them as you gaze, seeing in them everything she has seen. The augural nature of all you find beneath her lids imbues into you a beautiful fear of a magnitude you never thought you could experience. You begin to scream. Her solidarity breaks you, bringing you to your knees. The desperate longing on her rotting face lights you up, igniting you from the inside so you burst, warmth spreading to the very tips of your extremities. How tingles race through your body like moon fire, forcing it into convulsion. She beckons you forward. You join her in the sea of lunar light, your peach skin flourishing as it's placed against her decaying tissue - the contrast monstrous. She extends a long purple tongue and places it against your cheek, you feel a stomach churning pain as the two make contact. You can smell your skin decaying, her saliva burning you like acid. You go to pull away but then you remember her stare, the worlds you saw consumed within her pupils. Dark mythical haunts where the people were all like her, infinite beauty exploding from them. You long to be like her. You shut your eyes, screw them closed so tightly you can feel them twitching manically with the strain of it all. You hear the owl again and somewhere in front of you a harsh, unforgiving voice;
'Mate, you getting on or what?'
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