In the shadowsIn the shadowsNarrative Essay

One year, six months, twelve days, four hours. Every day, every hour, every minute brings within excruciating pain. Here I find myself on the

very last hour of my life, lying helpless on the ground demanding reason, desperately trying to reach the truth inside my scarred soul.

Who am I? Why me! As my eyes begin to close, dread is swiftly breaching my mind, my soul, but suddenly I can see myself, I see my wife again, my daughter, everything around me is pitch black. Now I realize that my torment isn’t over, it had just begun.

All I can hear now is a sublime noise, like a linear sound; suddenly it shifts into a beating, very vague at first then it starts to rise, it is my heart… pounding. Terror conquers and paralyses me. Since I was little, every night I had nightmares, vivid dreams portraying me doing terrible things to my loved ones. I open my eyes and all I can see is my bedroom. I can’t move, I sense my wife’s hand wrapped around me. Is she alive, how could this be possible? I get up. Panic is all I can feel now. A cold feeling just passed through my spine, this has happened before. Is it deja-vu? I remember this night… I can see now what’s unveiling in front of me.My name is John. I have worked into the force for many years now. I am a crime investigator, I am married to the women I love, have a beautiful daughter, only 5 years old, but all I can feel right now is… guilt. Why? What have I done?I feel confused, the past is now, time has dilated to a point that I can’t understand. I see myself again, alone in the office, papers everywhere, pictures of young girls pinned on my board, and darkness surrounds all but one piece of paper. The dawn is breaking, a light shines only one name, the name of the serial killer I had to catch. I feel tired, my head feels ravaged, but still, I can sense a trace of emotion inside my soul. I can’t define it. Would it be joy or relief? I haven’t slept for 3 days now, but I can’t stop, not now, not when I am so close.All the things that surround me are beginning to distort in such manner that everything feels confuse, all is spinning, on and on and on, but it suddenly stops. Now I am in my car, I am speeding with 150 kilometers/hour down the highway, the smoke of my cigarette is arranging itself as a shadowy cloak on the car’s windscreen. It’s raining heavily and my heart feels as cold as the weather outside. I finally reach home. I see the door wide open… I am too late. He got here before I did.

How could I let this happen? I run inside the house, I see a tall man, I can’t see his face clearly, just one smile, cold, merciless smile. I try to chase him but as I blink he vanishes into thin air. HOW?! WHY?!I enter the house. Guilt is following every step I take. My heavy breathing is all I can recall at this time, and The Scene, that it could never be forgotten… My wife and kid are lying on the ground floor in a bath of blood. All turns into blank, I open my eyes feeling pain. With every breath I take, I begin to realize what happened. I didn’t die… but someone in me had died that time. One year, six months, twelve days, four hours, this is how much time I spent trying to find the truth. The tall dark man that I saw that night murdering my wife and daughter was me… I see myself surrounded by cold concrete walls, strapped in an electric chair facing someone with a dark hood on his face, holding a lever… I laugh, I laugh and cry in the same time, because I am finally able to see the real me, my very unstable sanity… I close my eyes and I wait to die with my mind at peace knowing that I deserve my punishment.

Tibi Panait