Watched

Please note, although this short story is complete it is by no means finished and still has minor inconsistancies, and spelling/grammatical errors no doubt. Any comments, or constructive criticism would be much appreciated, but keep the above in mind...be gentle!

Watched

“That lesson wasn’t too bad” Sara grimaced, and Kirsty pulled her coat tighter as they went through the rotating door.
“No” she said. She put her umbrella up and stepped out from the protection of the university’s terrace.
“If you like root canal surgery”
Her friend grinned but didn’t try to object,
“So you coming in for Jenkins’ class tomorrow?”
“Yeah, I think I better, I missed it last week. Wasn’t feeling up to it”
Sara’s grin widened,
“You mean you had a hangover! Jenny said she saw you at Destiny’s and Elite the night before”
Kirsty glared ahead,
“Well Jenny needs to mind her own fucking business”
Her friend wisely shut up at this point, instead asking whether she would be ‘Trick or Treating’ this evening, Kirsty just ignored her and within a few seconds they had reached the end of the path they were on, Kirsty turned one way, her friend the other.
“See you tomorrow then!”
Kirsty looked over her shoulder
“See you”
As she walked away she pulled her coat tight again, not so much through coldness perhaps as habit. It was beginning to get dark again, and walking home at night had always made her nervous. Well, not that she would ever admit it, but walking alone made her nervous. Kirsty was a social creature, but all her friends lived at different halls sites to her, or had got a private house last summer break.
She concentrated on avoiding the puddles and walked on.

Kirsty had walked this route countless times now. She very rarely took the bus and it wasn’t practical to bring her car to university, there just wasn’t anywhere to park it, plus she didn’t qualify for a permit to park on campus. Sometimes it annoyed her walking home, but only half as much as she moaned to her friends, really she hadn’t minded up until recently, and secretly thought she needed the exercise anyway. She had only ever told her best friend Joey this, and had been hurt when she had only laughed at her and told her to stop being so paranoid. Paranoia was a touchy subject for Kirsty; something she had been succumbing to a little too often recently, and it was because of these long walks home. The pride in her self for doing it, despite the lack of company, was in danger of being overshadowed by the suspicion she was being followed.
It had all started a couple of weeks ago; Kirsty had a fight with Joey over a lad they liked. He had danced with them both the night before in a nightclub, really danced, groin-to-groin kind of dancing. In their drunken state they had ignored the implications of this, ignored the fact that he had danced with just about every other woman in the club also, both thought that he was after them exclusively. Sobering up the next morning Joey had been smart enough to know better, but by then the rift had been created. After accepting his phone number they had gone home in separate cabs, and the next afternoon was the first time they spoke again following a lecture they shared.
A massive row ensued, in no small part inflamed by a lack of definite memory of events on either side, both made up for it by attempting to appear more indignant than the other and Joey had wandered off angry as usual. She had been through counselling a year or so before beginning at university and had almost had to hold back a year when her psychiatrist had warned she may not be ready for the pressures of student life. She had seemingly made a big improvement over the summer and though she struggled with the occasional illogical rage, it was the general consensus that she was doing fine these days.
Storming home that evening Kirsty had felt vaguely watched, but probably could just put it down to her ex-best friend maybe following her, hoping to catch up and apologise. She had kept her eyes forward, and her pace brisk.
Since then they had hardly spoken, and Kirsty had begun to hang around with Sara, irritating as she was, at least it was someone to walk into lectures with.
But the watching hadn’t stopped there. Regularly on her walks she felt it, long after Joey had made it clear she wasn’t interested in making up. Sometimes it could be a feeling, sometimes she seemed to actually catch sight of someone just past her field of vision, but whenever she turned to look, no one was there.
Tonight as she walked she began to feel it again, she stole a look around her, seemingly casually. Fellow students were intermittently scattered, also newly free from their lectures. Kirsty saw a couple of people she could recognise from the room she had just left, although none of them seemed overly interested in her. An old man shuffled along the pavement painfully slowly a few metres behind her, holding a lead connected to a small grey dog, which was shuffling equally as painfully, his days of running away long over. The dog looked like he would rather have been at home, curled up on the sofa. The man looked like he wasn’t aware where he was, never mind who was around him. A few curtains twitched as she turned into a residential road, but that had always happened, and a few minutes later when she turned off, the feeling still seemed to be with her.
Kirsty looked thoroughly perplexed, there wasn’t any obvious reasoning behind these feelings. Perhaps it was stress, perhaps loneliness now Joey had shunned her, perhaps someone was following her.
To the side of her she registered movement and spun around, she seemed to see a flash of black disappear behind the trees. Kirsty watched the area intently for a second, but nothing moved. She took a step towards it, then smiled at herself. It was all in her mind no doubt, the more she thought about it, the more overactive her imagination would become. She turned back to the path and walked on.

By the time she was halfway home she had forgotten about her paranoia again, put her uneasiness to the back of her mind, and was thinking about mundane things such as all the reading she still had to do for her lecture first thing the next morning.
Someone shouted her name faintly behind her, and half smiling she turned around to acknowledge them.
No one was there.
She scanned the park, puzzled, using her hand to shade her eyes from the glare of the park lamps on the rain soaked ground. She looked back down the path she had turned down; it stretched clearly back to the road. There was no one in sight. She looked to either side; the grassland was flat and open until it met the sparse few trees backing the houses that began on the right-hand side of the park boundaries. Nothing. She stood a moment longer, staring fixedly at the trees, the only possible camouflage within shouting distance. She pulled her coat tight. Went to turn away and instead turned back for another look. She made herself look away and took a deep breath, she knew she was only scaring herself, no one was there.
Perhaps the voice had been a figment of her overactive imagination, perhaps one of the residents of the nearby houses calling to one of their own. Looking self-aware again she walked on, trying to laugh at herself once more, but she couldn’t quite manage it. She kept her eyes purposefully on the end of the path she was on; looking like a child whistling past the graveyard. The wind was fiercely nipping her, the rain doubled its efforts, creeping under her umbrella and making her shiver. When she reached the end of the path she let out a sigh of relief and took a last glance back.
Someone was there.
A figure dressed morbidly in black stared back at her from the previously empty space beside a tree. The light was too dusky to work out their features, but Kirsty could clearly see the relaxed stance, legs slightly apart, and arms by their side. One hand hung open, one was casually holding something, it shimmered as it caught the lamplight.
Kirsty hurried towards the person, perhaps hoping to get close enough to identify them before they bolted, but she froze as they began to move. Instead of turning away, the figure had taken a step towards her. Now they were out of the shadows she could just make out a ghastly smile on their face, and the hand holding the shiny object was raised mockingly. It was a knife.
Kirsty turned and ran as fast as she could, she seemed to be cursing all the refectory meals and packets of crisps she had consumed, vaguely wishing she had joined a gym as she had being meaning too. Her lungs must have ached, the cold air scraping her throat as she pulled in harsh breathes. The umbrella acted as a windbreak, slowing her down, she couldn’t work the spring catch so just dropped it. The route she took home wasn’t guaranteed to pass another person until she neared her halls, another five minutes at least. She couldn’t keep running much longer, and quite dare steal a look behind her to see if she was being pursued.
She turned to her right and took another right off of this street, practically turning back on herself and heading back towards the main road she had left when she entered the park. It was a fairly busy road, and at the very least she could stop a car to help her.
As she passed the houses she vaguely registered the lack of lights on, the only illumination seemingly the streetlamps. She splashed through a puddle that was deeper than it appeared, and whimpered as her ankle twisted slightly. Half running, half limping she rounded the corner to the main road and ran straight into a black figure. With a scream she hit out wildly, overbalancing herself on her weak ankle, she fell to the damp ground. Beginning to sob now she turned around to face her assailant and realised that it was she that was the attacker. Staring down at her fearfully, guarding his younger friends behind his caped arms, was a kid of no more than twelve or thirteen in Halloween costume. He had fake blood drawn on his chin, dripping from his plastic fangs and his pale face paint was smearing in the rain.
Suddenly it all began to click together for her, and she realised how stupid she had been. Tonight was the 31st of October, Halloween. She glanced behind her and didn’t seem particularly surprised to see that no one was following her. Apologising awkwardly she stood up and brushed herself off, the vampire kid seemed to relax visibly as she walked back the way she had come.

Back on route again, and quite soaked, she could finally laugh at herself. She had herself so convinced that someone was following her, she even saw a stalker in a kid dressed up for trick or treating!
Ten minutes later she was safely within sight of her halls, waving cheerfully to people she recognised, people she knew from ‘around’. She had always been happier around other people.
Kirsty dug out her keys as she approached her lodge, I didn’t have much time left- tonight was the night when I would make my move. She fiddled with the key in the lock; she always struggled to get it first time. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a figure step out of the shadows.