In The Shadow Of The Trash Can

It's too late to go home. Probably.

I hide beside a trash can, trying my best to not panic. I knew they were behind me, but I thought I was two steps before them. I mean I usually am. Except I am not this time.

The threats started after I took on the – – drug case. As usual, I applied for a transfer and started working on another case. It was all superficial though. The case was still under my supervision. I took great care to remove all traces of my presence too.

For some reason, it didn't work. My junior, who was on paternity leave with his wife and newborn son, ended up with a bullet in his head while he was bathing the little boy. The child was floating upside down in the shallow tub.

We received an emergency call a month later. It was his wife, hanging from the ceiling.

I wanted to give up. I swear. But the higher-ups pestered on, telling me how messed up the whole situation was. How it would affect specific groups of people. I wanted to give up. But I couldn't.

So they gave me the responsibility of the case. I wasn't married, and I knew the case like the back of my hand, so of course, I was the perfect candidate for handling the case. For six months I wore myself to the bones, finding evidence, turning the case upside down, tying loose ends. 

Until one day I was shopping for groceries. One of the employees was showing me the different cup noodles and the next moment, I was covered in blood and brain. I looked down and there she was on the floor, a hole in her head. 

We were fools of course.

I must have dropped everything in a hurry. I looked at my watch. It was showing nine pm, but I could hear everyone closing up shop, which meant it was much later. I looked again and I noticed that the hands were not working. 

I peeked outside the shadows. It was suspiciously quiet. I crept back, making myself as small as possible. 

I waited for a long time. I was completely out of touch with time. It could have been mere minutes or hours, I couldn't tell. But nothing happened.

Very cautiously, I peered again. Then I stepped out and started walking in the darkest possible direction. 

I was in the shittiest possible neighborhood. What could have been human beings were bags of shrunken meat and bones, lying in the filth, needles, and powders scattered about. I saw a woman bare her breasts to a bundle nestled in her lap, trying to feed it. A man was lying half-awake in the middle of the street, his arm cut in half, tire marks in the blood and mushed flesh. I couldn't tell if he was dead or alive.

I shook myself, padding on in the darkness quietly. 

My eyes were on the ground. I took a peek upwards now and then, but I made myself as small as I could, trying to be quieter and quieter.

And then I saw something. 

A syringe. About the width of my finger. Filled with greenish liquid. I stooped down to pick it up and my fingers went right through it.

I tried to pick it up again. Again. Again.

I stood up, looking at the darkness with clear eyes. All around me were ghouls. Their eyes sunk so much I could see the shape of their sockets. Splotchy skin, the smell of death. I was solid and well-formed, a beautiful human form, compared to them. 

And they were alive and I was not.

I saw, but I couldn't see anymore. I started drifting in and out of my consciousness, wishing I could cry. 

What was it for? They had won, didn't they?

For a moment I wanted to run somewhere I could see the actual date and time. I walked frantically in the alleyways, trying to find signs of life. Nothing. Grimy walls and squeaky rats.

Then suddenly, I came face to face with a small church. The panic died down immediately. 

It was small and compact, with a small gate leading to a well-maintained paved path. I could see some attempts at keeping a garden. I looked at it for a while, noting that I was at the edge of the hellhole. Then I turned my back and walked back to the shadows.

It's too late to go home. Probably.

I wish I had a cigarette.