iGCSE The Shadow.

It was an unusually hushed evening outside Stockwell station as the clouds enveloped the city. The typically busy fruit and flower stand, which was always open, lay empty and was being pummeled by the elements. This time the fierce rain was teeming down on the stand and the street was completely abandoned. I looked around desperate for somebody to share a word…or even a feeling with. Whoever thought a Londoner would say that! The sky looked as if a ragged grey blanket had been smothered across it as I surveyed the station around me.

I glanced at the departure boards for any form of covered transport home but they stared morosely back at me, all saying the same thing. No way home here. Dressed in only my shirt and shorts, I was frozen to the bone and shaking from the chilling weather – my knees felt non-existent at this point. They were so numb due to the brutal weather, it felt like I was slithering my way along an ice skating rink. This was clear to see, unlike the sky above with the pitch black clouds smearing it like paint. The dark tones above were making what few people were left out on the street run for cover and I knew I’d soon be on my own…

I was dreading the thought of the trek back home, about a 15 minute walk, when suddenly the idea crossed my mind to take a much quicker and more direct route. As I walked past the usually jam-packed local pub, The Rose And Crown, it was for some odd reason near to deserted, uninhabited; it was quite strange but I thought nothing of it. Maybe it was the numbing raw coldness – too intense to be outside for some people. Once I’d made my way past the pub, I found myself in a dilemma. There were three roads, one of which was a much quicker way than my usual route, maybe taking around 5 minutes to get home. It’s important to mention that I’d only been down this crooked path maybe once or twice before. It was a very narrow and winding road, with the tough rooted trees overcrowding it, like the tentacles of a city-living octopus. Even the dull grey paving stones were ruptured, making it almost impossible to walk along – they were notorious for being dangerously slippery when the rain was as bad as this.

Then there was another road, taking maybe 10 minutes, but I knew this road was by far the quickest one. However, this one was even more neglected than the first road, even the branches of the trees had cracked off from the violent wind. There was always tons of old rubbish which is never taken away. It looked like a dystopian world in contrast to the one we are living on now. Most, if not all, of the homes seemed isolated from the “real world” – they didn’t even look homed, in fact they seemed almost disowned. Then there was my usual route, which happened to also be the only one lit up by lampposts.

The other routes were close to pitch black, but by this point I just wanted to get home.

I had just made my way past the first couple of ruined, brownstone houses, which looked like they’d had old coffee spilt on them and never been restored. It was at this moment when I decided to look at the time on my phone. I glanced down to see in shock that the time read 11:11PM. I was astounded, to say the least, to see it was this late. I began to wonder if my phone was broken, because it simply did not feel like I had been walking for over 4 hours. I rang my mother – just as I went to call her, my phone cut out.

I was all alone, on this pitch black, unwelcoming street, with no source of light. I was absolutely frantic with fearfulness on this bitterly frigid night. I decided I was going to walk a bit faster at this point;  well, that was an understatement. I heard the slow drops of the rain, tapping from roof to roof, like pencils on a table.

Suddenly, I thought I saw a shadow, the shadow of an animal I think, around the back of one of the houses. As soon as I looked again through the rain it was gone. My pace quickened along with my heart. Did I just see that or was it in my head? The rain continued to pound down as I hurried down the alleyway towards home.

Out of the corner of my eye, a shadow of something, something big, eased out behind me…