She gets off the train, follows her usual path
Not the quickest, but the most clearly lighted
The comfortability of familiarity – here
Under the illuminating street lights
Guiding the path to the bus stop
Providing at least a vague sense of protection
From the alien, the dark, the unknown
Here she makes her way, slowly
Step by step, yet with increasing frequency
Following that of her beating heart
As not even the lights are enough
With such fear and uncertainty
By which she is completely engulfed
She must never be confronted
Yet suddenly, from behind her
A ‘Hey, wait!’ is yelled by a man
Struck by panic, fear and anxiety
Her feet suddenly quicker than her mind
She sprints along the road
The yells accelerating her every second
She hears not his words, merely noise
Both outside and inside her head
A quick glance behind and she is terrified
He is catching up, she cannot escape
The inevitable confrontation with her fear
His face the colour of the surrounding night
She falls to the ground, warding herself with her arms
Begging for mercy, for him to leave her
Every millisecond feels like an eternity
…………………………………………
‘Don't worry, I am not going to hurt you!
Here, let me help you up.' He stretches out his hand.
She hesitates a bit, then takes his hand, and is pulled up.
‘Here, you dropped this on the ground.’
He hands to her her bus ticket.
Curious how the backwards phrase continued...
ReplyDeleteNice glimpse of a phobic mind, and the intrusion of the ordinary, rather than the psycho-killer. The technique is called introducing bathos into the text, and can often leave the reader deflated. Here it works, though, because the girl in the text must feel deflated too.
Forgot to comment on the title - do you intend it to mean "fear of strangers in the night"?
ReplyDeleteYes it is a combination of xenophobia and nyctophobia, so a fear of both the alien and the dark.
ReplyDelete