The Shadow

The shadow followed quietly as he walked through the alley in the car-park. It was dark. Almost devilish. But a light at the far corner made the shadow apparent. And he could not stop feeling scared as the shadow did not seem to make any effort to stay hidden. Someone was clearly behind him and that someone did not mean to stop.

He walked faster, almost breaking into a jog. The shadow did the same. His car was just behind the next pillar. He rushed towards the car. And as his keys jingled he could hear a more dangerous metallic sound just behind him too. He did not want to look behind. He was too scared to do so and hope with all his heart that the shadow would just disappear.

–

It had been a busy day for our man. And not so good a day… A lot to hear from the boss and then the bad traffic made things drearier. The noise of the road was a complete opposite to what the silence of the car parking was. Not that he had helped the noise. The traffic, the rash bikers, the slack taxi drivers… he could not do without honking. And after some time honking almost had become an involuntary action as he maneuvered through the car clogged roads. Probably helped him relieve some stress as well… just the way the yellow stress ball in his office cubicle does.

–

The stress was rising with every second at the car-park. And all his mind could wish for was

the horn. Probably that could take it away. Blowing it hard… take both the stress and the shadow away, along with whatever metallic the shadow held. But to his horror the door of his car was unlocked and someone had ripped off his horn button. He saw a red chit stuck on his steering wheel.

–

Probably he should have just driven away, not wasting one more second. Not wasting one more second after locking his car door safely. But that red chit…

—

The police discovered the dead body in the car much later in the evening. It was when one of the security guards decided to go for a loo break that he noticed the smashed wind-shield. The head was smashed and right hand thumb chopped.

As the police brought out the body and traced the vehicle for any clue the red chit stuck to the head… with blood partially littering adding a different hue to the red.

The inspector in charge unfolded it to see if it held any important information. Probably it was. Probably it was not. Not much of a clue at least. It was too generic a term and could have meant for almost the entire population of the city…

STOP THAT HONKING HABIT. ELSE YOU SEE MORE OF ME.

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