Footsteps

I hear it again. Every night around eleven ‘o clock, I can.

It started as a dream, an illusion, and eventually grew into a nightmare. Something I couldn’t fathom then, and still can’t now. Those… noises. Sometimes I think that they were all in my head the whole time. Sometimes I feel they were the creation of an isolated mind.

You see, I am a recluse. I purposely removed myself from society ten years ago this day. My only contact: A ten-year-old boy by the name of Seymour Duncan. Great kid. He is the product of an overbearing, sympathetic mother and, perhaps, a community as well. To this day I’m not sure exactly why such a bright, outgoing lad such as Duncan would want to have anything to do with this scholar, this bibliophile, this hermit. But I saw something in him that most others didn’t. And I believe his interest in me was merely forbidden curiosity. To him I felt like a living museum, an exhibit in the flesh that could tell him wild stories of fantastic and frightening things for a fraction of the price of an admission into any other facility hosting the like. What I saw in him, I don’t know. Maybe I saw a hope in the outside world I had abandoned long ago. Maybe he was my compromise, my leniency if you will, of the atrocities that happened out there on a daily basis. He was my way of seeing one last wonderful gem without having to shuffle through a mountain of trash to find it.

At least twice a week I would see Duncan: Once on Tuesday to tutor him on his schoolwork and once on Friday, when he would deliver parcels, medication, and other unfortunate necessities to my home. How did a recluse ever get to know one on the outside world if he himself is not a part of it, one might ask? Well, as mysterious and curious as his interest in me was, it was equally as strange and wonderful in the circumstances of our meeting; a miracle, a blessing, fate, whatever. People called it many things the day I saved, at that time, four-year-old Duncan from an almost certain mortal fate at the hands of hooves and carriage.

It was the day before I had decided to lock myself away from the outside world. The day the air was no doubt at its most refreshing. The park across my home was brimming with the admirers of a lavishing summer’s day. I sat on the park bench, thinking, observing and dreaming. At that moment I had heard a woman shout, I turned to see what the matter was and saw him. Duncan had gotten away from his mother and had entered the street; one busy with flighty carriages, speeding towards their destinations. I still feel that they were traveling too fast for the leisure of the day and the pedestrians about. But, as a park full of horrified spectators discovered, I was one to change the otherwise inevitable and, with one swift lunge, I grabbed the boy and pulled him out of the way of one of those demons a second before it could devour him. That day I was touted by the town as a hero. The next day it seemed as though I was forgotten. But so were they. Two people remembered my heroism that day, however. One I would see seldom since, and another I couldn’t keep away. I guess that’s why young Seymour was allowed the pleasure of my company, or mine the pleasure of his. At first I denied it, eventually I tolerated it, and then embraced it. He became like the son I never had. However, time takes away all things and eventually he stopped showing up at my door. I began to wonder if fate had come by to rectify my interference. Perhaps fate had sent another demon his way. Perhaps his mother decided it better for him to find other companions. Or perhaps he just lost interest, as growing boys tend to do. Still, as soon as he left, the dreams came…