All's not well which doesn't end well

A chill would seep into his bones, every time he unveiled his window-eye to reveal the abandoned wooden shack, just opposite from his house, staring innocently back at him. He didn't know why, but he just knew it was just pretending to be innocent. Just so it could get him by surprise, and one day, without knowing it, he would get swallowed up whole by that gaping black moth-ridden mouth.

No, he wasn't being paranoid. Because, after all, he knew that he was in a story that doesn't end well. He was in danger. And like all people in danger, he panicked.

He would hurry home immediately after work, so that the shack would not have the chance to get at him after it was dark. As an extra precaution, he wore disguises: sometimes a moustache, other times two. And when it did not seem to be working, he highlighted his eyebrows. He reasoned, that since so many people said that his eyebrows were his defining feature, changing his eyebrows would mean that he would not be himself anymore. And the shack would never recognize him.

He would escape, every day, on and on, until the shack decided to abandon its pursuit and leave him to his ordinary, ordinary life. As ordinary as it could ever be, in a story that doesn't end well.

If he were here to narrate his story, it would be adapted into a tragedy film. Or perhaps, it would be more of a horror film. Nobody is sure: both kinds do not end well. It would definitely not be Disney who buys the rights, though. Because Disney is always happy. And Disney is always wrong.

It was on one ordinary, ordinary day, that he was held back by a storm. A typhoon, in fact; one that disallowed him from stepping out of his office, no matter how important it was that he get back to his house before dark. The storm was a ferocious monster, baring its teeth at him ominously every time he dared toe past the exit of the office. Between the monster and the madhouse, he chose to be afraid of the monster first. Because it was nearer, after all, and more real.

Like all characters in horror movies, he was doomed once he made that decision. Because in movies, it is always bad decisions that land one in deep shit. Every time, without fail. And this time, because he chose to ignore the shack, the shack would make sure that it never, ever, ever, forgot him. It wouldn't forgive him.

That was why, after it was dark, after he decided, stupidly, to heck it and run home and risk getting eaten up, he couldn't find it. His house seemed to have ran away, scared off by the threatening, dangerous shack.

And because his house had run away, that meant, of course, that he had to run, too: away, away, as fast as he could from the evil presence that he could feel was getting stronger and stronger every moment. He hardly heard his trouser legs brushing against the tall grass; neither did he feel his sweat as it ran down in long rivulets down his back, soaking his white shirt throughout and making his glistening skin obvious, and palatable, in the dark night. It was the only time he had ever sweated so much in such chilly weather. But that was of no significance: he had to run, if he ever wanted to sweat again, to feel alive again. Because the evil would take all that away from him and make him one of their own.

No, he wanted to remain as a living, breathing, paranoid thing, thank you.

And like all horror movies, the character does not have the correct buttons to push in order to get to his desired ending. Those buttons lie in the hands of the director. The mystery-man behind the scenes. He, on the other hand, is just a fictional character in a stupid movie. Not even an actor; even the actor has more power than him. The actor can choose to stop running. He cannot.

And even as he ran, he saw the shack looming over him, from the direction that he was running towards. It had known, all along, where he would run, and it had ordered the earth, its ever-obedient slave, to warp and distort itself such that it was in front of him, all along. Now he would think 'Damnit I don't want to die yet no no" and his face would show "Damnit I don't want to die yet no no" and then, as the scary music comes on, he would prepare himself for the inevitable.

He would brace himself and prepare to-

You know best what happens next.

He lingers, for a while. But the horror remains, within. Where else can we look?