Out Here on the Perimeter

Drifting. In and out. Room lit by the spectral glow of modern electronics. The shape of my wife a comforting weight beside me. I don't understand how she sleeps so peacefully, unafraid, but there she is. Breath even and measured, still in the dark.

I roll over onto my side, seeking that perfect spot that will allow me to finally fade out for the night. We have been out of town, up north, and I find only misery in the hated humidity I have had to return to. My eyelids slide down again and that's when I hear it. A furtive sliding sound from the direction of my closet. In the time I've been away I have once again grown accustomed to sleeping without a light on. My father's house, where we had been visiting, held no threat, safety even in the dark. Now... that sound.

In the split second that I hear it, my eyes snap back open. I am in no mood to deal with this tonight. Hot. Tired. I have felt nauseous most of the day, on the verge of vomiting and instead of lying in terror, as I would normally, I simply fling myself out of the bed. I feel him there, in the dark, but I don't care. Not tonight. I'm too tired, too sick, too depressed even over missing my family and the city I have, over the years, grown to love.

My wife is safe from harm. I don't know how I know that, but I do. It is only me he torments in this house, only my darkness he haunts, stepping through the spaces between my thoughts. I nearly trip on the fan cord, cursing, moving as quickly as I can to avoid not only hands which may grasp suddenly from the lightless corners of the room, but also waking The Wife.

Downstairs a light is on as it always is. The door behind me vibrates slightly in its frame, a faint scratching sound emanates roomside. Light or heavy, there would be no evidence of it in the morning. There never is. I grab a Dr. Pepper from the fridge, seeking solace in caffeine. The back door next to me thuds as if hit hard, the blinds bouncing, the glass rattling. This elicits a sharp scream which I cover quickly. I begin to suspect it is my terror he desires, and he has it now, but also my anger.

I turn, face the door, slam the fridge hard enough to dislodge items from the door inside. Breathing heavy, throat pinched closed with copper madness and I rage.

"FUCK YOU"

SLAM

"FUCK YOU"

SLAM

"FUCK"

SLAM

"YOU"

SLAM

"MOTHERFUCKER"

The door slams in its frame again as I drop the can of Dr. Pepper and reach, one hand for the knob, one for the deadbolt. I twist, I turn, I pull. The door flies open, as though pushed from the other side, barely missing my foot which surely would have been broken.

Framed in the doorway is only darkness. My back patio. The gate in the small fence closed. The cicadas drone on in the wooded dark. No stars shine, no moon can be seen, but nothing moves. The only sound the normal insectile buzz I have lived with so long I hardly hear it anymore.

"Fuck you," I say into the darkness and slam closed the door. The Wife, miraculously, has not awakened. The rest of the night passes without incident.

It is only in the morning when I check the weather that I realize the sky had been cloudless, clear, and should have been full of glittering stars.