Rohit had just moved into his new flat. This one was quite satisfactory to him. He wanted a quiet place to live after the exhausting working hours at the office and this accommodation had everything a bachelor like him could wish for.
Moreover, there wasn’t any landlord living to trouble him, the landlord had already moved to the United States about 2 years ago and the flat has been deserted since then. There was just one caretaker of the house who also had moved back to his native place about 2 months ago, immediately after making a deal with Rohit for the rent and accommodations.
“Rohit, you’ve already moved into your new flat and you haven’t yet thrown the party? This is not done.” Sahil complained on the phone to Rohit.
“Anytime Sahil, although the flat is fully furnished, we can plan a wonderful party after a couple of days. Besides, it’s your birthday as well next week, so we can kill two birds with one stone,” replied Rohit.
The doorbell woke up Rohit in the middle of the night. He rubbed his eyes got off the bed and looked into his mobile which showed 1:45 am in the dead of night.
“Who might have come at this hour?” wondered Rohit.
Due to the darkness in the room, he hit himself on the edge of the computer table on his way to the door. He peeped through the spy hole of the door to see who was standing out there, only to find the back of the head of the visitor. Rohit could only see the curly hairs of the visitor outside due to the light of the lamp post out in the street which was also fluctuating.
“Who is there?” Rohit asked before opening the door. But the visitor did not reply.
Rohit asked again but only to hear the silence.
With mixed feelings of curiosity and irritation, Rohit unlocked the door and slammed it open.
But to his utmost disbelief, he found no one outside. A wave of fear ran through his veins and he started sweating, on the cold nights of January month.
Terrified with the presence of nobody, he looked here and there just when he found a shadow stretching from across the street, under the tree. Following the shadow, Rohit tried to look at the source of the shadow, but he could see nothing clearly.
“Who is there?” Rohit asked with a trembling voice.
In response to Rohit’s call, the figure vanished behind the trunk of the tree, leaving his shadow still intact right there where it was formed initially as if the shadow was a separate entity.
Although Rohit was terrified and his legs were shivering with fear, that shadow seemed to have calling him towards itself, Rohit could not resist himself either and moved across the street to find out who was behind the tree.
The shadow was still under the tree without any source, Rohit was moving slowly towards it, and the street light had stopped fluctuating by then.
He turned around due to fear, only to be more terrified to find that he had no shadow of himself, even though he was moving towards the light.
He looked back towards the tree, he felt like someone was hiding behind the tree. He mustered all his courage and moved quickly towards the tree, but there was no one there only he and now his shadow.
The shadow which was already there intact has now found its source, Rohit. He could not believe his senses what he had just experienced.
Filled with fear, he turned around to move back into his flat, but to his utmost shock, he saw someone already standing beside his door. He looked closely and realised that it was himself standing there but before he could make sense of it, the person moved inside his house. Instinctively, he looked at himself and could see nothing but a shadow. He shouted with all his strength, but apparently, shadows do not make noise.
With the breaking of the dawn, Rohit who was nothing more than a shadow now, also disappeared gradually.
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