The Shadow People: A paranormal short story

by Pace, Pepper

  The Shadow People

  Pepper Pace

  ©Pepper Pace Publications

  Copyright © 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015. The Shadow People first appeared in publication on Literotica.com. in 2009. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever, except for short excerpts appearing in book reviews. For reprint or excerpt permission inquiries, please contact the author by e-mail at: pepperpace.author@yahoo.com or http://pepperpacefeedback.blogspot.com

  The Shadow People is a work of fiction. Characters – including their names, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are otherwise used fictitiously. Any similarity from this book to events occurring in real life – including locations, or persons living or dead is wholly coincidental. The use of musical titles and the naming of musical artists is not an infringement of copyright per sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work.

  Author’s Note

  The Shadow People first appeared on Literotica.com as a free read in 2009 thru 2015. It was then removed for publishing. The published version has been re-edited and includes a never before seen epilogue.

  Warning

  This story is fictional but the Shadow People is a phenomenon that I believe in. Many people have experienced the visitation, including me. If you are sensitive to the topic or to ‘scary’ stories then please pass on this one. There will be many more Pepper Pace stories that are set solidly in the romance realm.

  If you are still reading this, that means that you intend to go further and this warning is for you and not for the ones that closed the book and turned away. You see the Shadow People come when you believe. Some people are sensitive to the spirit world, which also may invite them.

  With that said, if you decide to go further with this book, my suggestion is just to pretend that this is just another Pepper Pace story and that none of the things that take place within these pages can ever happen to you.

  … But… if by some chance you experience your own night-time visitors, then do as I do and ask them very nicely to go away.

  “…Ninety-five per cent of the material of the universe is invisible, which is why it is called dark matter. There could be shadow galaxies, shadow stars and even shadow people.”

  -Stephen Hawking

  Chapter One

  Dani wrote rapidly, scribbling into the notebook with no spacing between paragraphs or neat indentions—just front and back of each page covered with closely written words. The two men flanking her were pecking away or surfing the web using their laptops. The fact that Dani was only using a ninety-nine cent notebook purchased from a nearby drugstore was not her unspoken testimony against the cliché of sitting in a STARBUCKS cafe typing away on a laptop. It was just testimony to the fact that she was just too broke to afford one.

  She picked up the large white ceramic mug with its green STARBUCKS logo imprinted on it and upended it to her mouth--only to come away with one lukewarm drop of Caramel Macchiato. Shit! It sucked when you forgot that you had already drank the last of a delicious beverage. She stared absently into the bottom at the residue of caramel goo, contemplating sticking her finger into and collecting the last of the deliciousness. Instead she closed the notebook with a sigh, holding her place with her ink pen. Another seven plus dollar drink just was not in her budget so she dragged herself up, collecting her mug to carry back to the counter.

  She resisted yawning, but knew that there was no way to hide the tired circles that had formed beneath her eyes. The guy behind the counter wearing a nametag that read ‘Tyler’ gave her an appreciative grin and the corners of her mouth tugged upward into a responsive smile despite everything else that was going on in her life. But then she quickly hurried away.

  Dani’s mind lingered on the guy as she walked down the street. He never did more than smile, but he remembered that she always drank a Venti Caramel Macchiato with extra caramel and light whip. Sometimes she caught him looking at her while she wrote, her fingers scribbling continuously when she was concentrating extra hard--so hard that she would sometimes forget to take a sip of her drink. She knew that ‘Tyler’ thought she was concentrating too hard to notice him staring. But that wasn’t true.

  She had been a regular visitor to this STARBUCKS for the last four and a half weeks and there was not a day that passed when she wasn’t perched in one of the chairs at a corner table, body stooped tensely over her notebook, her brain trying to make sense of things—or maybe not to make sense, but just to get it out of the dark recesses of her mind and into the light.

  She had passed this STARBUCKS a million times over the years, never once going in, but since THEY had returned she’d been a regular. It seemed … safe. Dani shivered as she continued walking to her nearby apartment, forgetting about the Barista and the warm drink and the smile that she had exchanged with a handsome guy.

  She wasn’t afraid of much; not dark alleys, not the interested looks of strange men. She was no longer that shy girl afraid of being in a group of people she didn’t know. Yet the one thing that kept her roaming her apartment at two am, or pecking away on her old desktop with sleep glazed eyes—the one thing that scared her more than anything in the world was the one thing that she could do absolutely nothing about.

  Sleep.

  Dani entered her apartment and stopped to look at all of the benign shadows in the corners of the small space. This room seemed so innocent in the light of day as the sun was just beginning to set. There was a time when she thought this was the most beautiful part of the day, but not anymore. Sunset would never be beautiful to her again.

  She felt hot tears blur her eyes as sighed and stared at the ceiling wishing for this all to finally come to an end. When was it going to end? Good or bad, it didn’t matter anymore. The waiting was torture, not knowing how it was going to happen…

  Patricia …

  She didn’t have to even actively be thinking about her best friend Patricia before the tears would sprout to her eyes. She didn’t need to revive memories of their friendship to miss her so deeply that her entire body ached. This loneliness had settled around Dani until she felt saturated in it. There was nothing else but this loneliness and this fear.

  She powered up the desktop computer, knowing that it would take a long time before it warmed up. It was a dinosaur of a computer, the same one that her Mother had bought for her on her sixteenth birthday … seven long years ago. Unintentionally thinking about her mother and Patricia and turning sixteen made her hands tremble and the panic slithered up her spine.

  Her intent had been to turn on the teapot so that she could make instant coffee but instead she settled into her ratty yet comfortable reclining chair. It was covered in an afghan that Mama had made years ago, which caused her to feel very secure every time she sat in it.

  Dani opened her notebook, disregarding the half finished sentence that hung there on the page. The sentence and thought was disregarded, no longer needed, it’s purpose already served. Dani began scribbling again, about a different subject, about that day when this entire shit had started. They had been sixteen and Patricia had told her a secret that she should have never spoken of … and then that secret had then become hers to bear.

  Sweet sixteen parties never meant anything to Danielle when she was not the most popular girl in high school, nor desired to be. She didn’t want a car since she didn’t drive, didn’t want lots of high fashion clothes since the only thing she ever wore were chucks, jeans and t-shirts. She wanted a computer and to maybe have a sleep-over with a few of her friends. For her, that would be a sweet sixteen.

  When Mama surprised her with a computer
, Dani had been in a state of sheer joy. She didn’t think her mother would do it; could afford it but she had managed it. Dani understood the sacrifice. Her mother was single and there was no father around to help out. Mama worked two jobs to give them a comfortable life; and in return Dani did little to stress her out.

  Her three best friends came over and they played on the internet, using a free AOL disc to surf the unknown territories of cyberspace. It was so fun, but Mama made them get off of it after three hours so they popped popcorn and watched movies and told horror stories. Dani was the best at telling stories. She wanted to be a writer and had already written a poem that had been published in the local community section of their newspaper. The new computer would help her write a real novel and that was her biggest wish--to be a published novelist.

  Crystal began by telling them about an urban legend that ended with a veterinarian telling a family to step away from their newly found puppy because ‘that’s not a dog—it’s a giant poisonous African rat!’ Everyone laughed and shivered, but mostly laughed.

  Neecy told a story about a maniac that had kept girls trapped in his basement as sex slaves, which then caused them to begin talking in hushed voices about sex. Sex was still a mystery that none of them had broached and contemplating a day when they would no longer be virgins seemed a distant dream. And then Dani had given them each a solemn look.

  “Okay, what I’m about to tell you isn’t a fake story. This is real.” Dani noticed that the smile had fallen from Patricia’s mouth and her eyes had taken on a strange look. Dani almost didn’t tell her story because of that stricken look on Patricia’s face. With a slight frown, Dani put the look aside for later analysis and she plunged forward. “Does … anyone else see things before they happen?”

  Charron nodded. “That’s called Dejavu.”

  “Everybody gets that.” Crystal added.

  Dani paused and then with a slight swallow she continued. “I saw my grandmother’s funeral before it happened.”

  Neecy raised a brow. “Girl, I don’t believe in that kind of stuff. Maybe you just think you saw it.” She then reached for the bowl of popcorn. “When you think you have Dejavu, you can’t remember what’s going to happen anyways. You only remember it after it’s over.”

  Dani shrugged. “I remember it, and not just that … I’ve seen other stuff too.” She was too ashamed to tell them that she’d had a dream about having sex and that it hadn’t just been a dream—it had been more than a dream. She decided to keep that story to herself.

  Dani didn’t know the guy in the dream. But she remembered the both of them lying on a couch, making out--a very sensual dream considering that she had never even kissed a boy before. And then she’d touched his penis. It had been hard and ruddy colored. He was white, her brown fingers had closed around it and he had begun to move and he gently removed her hand and glided his erect penis into her body. She could not feel the boy, and she couldn’t see herself because she was looking through her own eyes, but in her sleep her body reacted. It was what had awakened her. It was the first time she’d ever had such a vivid sex dream and her body throbbed. Dani had quickly written down every detail so that she would not forget. There were days when she would run the images of that dream through her mind—days when she wondered if any guy would ever notice her, days when she looked into the mirror and saw that the reflection returned the image of a person that was totally unremarkable. Then she would remember that one day a boy would love her and she would love him.

  It bothered her that there was not much that she could see of him. Long dark hair had obscured his face, though she could see that he was very attractive, early twenties, and the most amazing thing about him was that his arms were covered in colorful tattoos.

  After that dream, she always looked for a boy with dark hair and arms covered in tattoos; because that would be the boy that she would love.

  At sixteen that dream had yet to come to life but instinctively Dani knew that it would. She took in the doubtful looks on her friends’ faces; all except Patricia, who hadn’t made one comment. She just looked at Dani as if she would say something but couldn’t. Dani quickly changed the subject and they began talking about music videos and cute singers.

  Later, as they were drifting off to sleep, she saw Patricia staring at the ceiling completely wide-eyed. The next day, when everyone else had left Dani asked Patricia to stay and help her get everything straightened up. Patricia was relatively new to their group of friends. She had only moved into town the year before. But she instantly fit in with them.

  It was strange that the two girls had taken so well to each other since Patricia was her very opposite. Patricia was petite and dainty. She went to the hairdresser to have her long hair styled, she went to a salon to have her nails painted, she even wore designer clothes. Her honey brown skin and light colored eyes assured that she would be popular with the boys. And even though she could have easily hung out with the jocks and the cheerleader types that invariably made Dani cringe—Patricia preferred their geeky little group and didn’t even date, her shyness making her even more appealing to the jocks than even the school sluts.

  “Are you okay?” Dani asked her. “You got really quiet when I was telling that story.”

  “Oh … ” Patricia gave her a look that seemed almost desperate. “You didn’t make that up, did you?”

  “No.” Patricia said adamantly. “I can see things before they happen! I promise you I’m not lying!”

  “What else have you seen?” Patricia asked. “You stopped before saying what else…” Patricia’s brow was furrowed in an uncharacteristic frown.

  Dani took a deep breath and told her about the boy with the tattooed arms.

  After listening intently, Patricia raised her brow. “I didn’t know you liked white boys.”

  Dani chuckled. “I didn’t either.” She thought about boys a lot; not about their color necessarily. Unfortunately, boys didn’t seem to think about her. She was tall and gangly and wore glasses. She felt like she would never get rid of the pimples that had sprouted across her cheeks and forehead and at the age of sixteen she was still an A-cup. Boys went for girls like Patricia. And that was that.

  Patricia was watching her closely. “Do you ever … see things … when you’re not sleeping?”

  Dani had an idea. “Do you?”

  It took Patricia a long time to respond but then she nodded and took a deep breath. “Sometimes at night … these things come to me.” Patricia watched her carefully and then expelled a relieved breath. “They come out only at night-”

  “They? Spirits, ghosts?”

  “Demons.” Patricia said.

  “Uh, what?” Dani almost choked. “Did you just say that you see demons?”

  Patricia was frowning. “I don’t know what they are, actually. But there are a lot of them and they surround my bed at night.”

  Dani was a person secure with the idea of her visions, had been told strange stories of ghostly sightings by her Southern Grandmother for most of her life, considered herself open minded about the unknown. But what Patricia was talking about was a whole other story; demons coming to her in the night? Dani stared at her friend, speechless. Was she kidding, or a liar? Patricia had never struck her as a liar. So why would she tell a story like this?

  “Well what do you do when they come?”

  “Nothing. I can’t do anything. I’m always paralyzed in my bed.”

  “Do they … do stuff to you?”

  Patricia shook her head quickly. “They just … chant or … I don’t know what they’re saying but they crowd my room.”

  The look of shock would not leave Dani’s face. She digested this information trying to sort out her feelings about what was said; attempting to accept her friend’s words and find a reasonable explanation for it.

  “Well maybe you’re just asleep, maybe just having a nightmare?”

  Patricia sighed. “I’m wide awake. I try to get up but it’s like they are pressing
me down.”

  “Are you scared? I mean, if you see these things, how is it that you can just deal with it?” Certainly if demons came to her at night she’d be a stark raving lunatic.

  “Well what am I supposed to do?” Patricia explained that they had been coming to her for many years, every night sometimes. Then it would stop for a long time and she’d almost forget about them—make herself forget about them.

  “Why do you think they’re demons?” Dani interjected. “Maybe they’re spirits or…”

  Patricia rubbed her elbows as her arms crossed in front of her. “I don’t know what they are. They wear dark hooded cloaks. And they leave when I start praying.”

  Dani stared at her. Maybe Patricia was mentally ill…

  “Danielle! Please tell me that you don’t think I’m lying? I swear I’m not making this up!”

  Dani sighed dismissing those thoughts. “Then there has to be a reasonable explanation. What do you think they want?”

  “I think,” Patricia’s face became thoughtful, “they want me.”

  After a moment Dani moved to the kitchen and Patricia followed. She got them both sodas as she gathered her thoughts. They sat down at the small kitchen table and Danielle twisted her lip in deep thought.

  “Patricia,” she finally said. “I believe you’re not making this up. Why don’t you just ask them what they want?”

  “No way! I’m too scared.”

  Dani licked her lips. “I’ll ask them.”

  Patricia’s eyes seemed to pin her. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m going to ask them to come to me. If they come to you and you don’t want them, then I’ll ask them to come to me. And I’ll ask them what they want. They don’t hurt you, right?”

  Patricia was staring at her. “No, but … ”