The Man E-Book

Wendigo Studios

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

The Man
Getting home from a night of smoking can be tough, especially when you're a teenager with friends who manage to get you lost almost everytime you head into a new alleyway. It's even worse when you're alone on the dark, empty city streets with only your friends with the possibility of being stalked.
But that's a ridiculous idea to consider, there's no way you're being stalked by anyone, especially when you're a hardened teenager with knowledge of the city and what to do, is it?

Leseprobe

Wendigo Studios

The Man

BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

The Alleyway

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” a voice that didn’t sound like an adult but wasn’t also a child’s voice drifted through the rather uncomfortable atmosphere of the winded down city’s many alleyways, the sound of his sneakers being one of the only sounds that is audible within the darker side of the city. The boy, the source of the disturbance, looked this way and that around the various bins of trash and loose mostly burned out cigarettes left out on the ground to rot.

They weren’t the same kind of cigars he and his little group of friends had smoked a few minutes ago, but that really didn’t matter much, they didn’t matter much, they were simply going to be left behind anyways. “Well of course, I’ve taken this path a couple of times, so I know where to go!” snapped another boy at the first boy, his oddly dull blue irises that looked more like the color of softly rolling fog glaring daggers at his comrade, his natural black hair with purple streaks fluttered over his shoulders as he walked.

The first boy flinched in surprise and backed up a few steps away from the boy who snapped at him, his sneakered clad feet kicking up small pebbles left on the alleyway floor. He looked up to his friend, watching him calm down and his head back in the direction they were heading, head turning this way and that as if he was making sure they really were going the right way. The first boy gave a heavy sigh of relief, bowing his head, allowing his long blond hair to shroud his unfairly pale skin till his head was nothing but bright yellow hair.

“A couple times?!” snapped another boy, stomping over to the black and purple haired male with steps that could wake the entire world, fluffing up his red-orange hair that acted as a large red bush on top of his head, he readjusted his orange jacket to rest on his shoulders, his green eyes that were usually full of cockiness and cunning whenever he came up with ways to cause minor trouble around town were now full of anger and irritation mostly at their leader and their current situation. “Yeah Bram, that’s really reassuring!”

“Whatever Ronald,” Bram replied, rolling his eyes rather coldly, refusing to look back at his friend. He crossed his arms over his chest in a way that made the blond haired boy think of a grumpy child who refused to eat their vegetables. As funny as Bram looked, right now wasn’t exactly the right moment for humor. “Even a couple times can really ingrain an exit into your mind!” came the reply of the black and purple haired boy, he ran his right hand through his hair, moving it out of his face.

“Are you serious?!” Ronald shouted, his voice sounding like he was in complete disbelief, his arms waving upwards in exasperation and anger, not liking the words Bram was saying. “You got lost on the way to homeroom in high school, twice in a row! There is no way you can possibly get us out of here when you get lost on the way to the bloody homeroom!” The redhead angrily turned his back to both his friends, walking toward another part of the alleyway to kick at a set of empty trash cans resting on the ground.

Bram gritted his teeth in frustration and snapped his furious glare toward Ron, the movement caused the golden bling necklace to swing on his neck till it dropped back into its place. He clenched his fists together and stamped his right foot on the ground, making the long haired boy behind him jump a foot backwards, his thin olive-brown jacket blown in the light wind that blew over the alleyway and the three teenagers within it. Some of his long blond bangs fell into his brown, almost black eyes. He pushed them away, letting them rest on the left side of his forehead so he could see everything better.

He blinked once he had his vision and almost jumped out of his skin when he heard the sound of yelling from some part of the alleyway. Admittedly, he was a little more then unnerved in this rather lonely alleyway in the deepest hours of the night, it might’ve been the cigarettes he had smoked from earlier in the night heightening his paranoia or the atmosphere of this place being unnerving more so than usual, it was hard to tell. Either way, the yell almost caused the poor boy to almost jump out of his clothes and skin at the exact same time.

He panted heavily, taking in a few deep breaths to attempt to calm himself down from the sudden adrenaline rush. As reality started setting in, another yell flooded his ears and this time, he was able to recognize the sound as his two fellow smoking buddies. He tilted his head over in the direction of the spot he knew Ronald had gone and to the surprise of absolutely no one, Ronald was still there at the empty trash cans with Bram also there, glaring daggers at the redhead. The two appeared to be arguing about something or another, probably about Bram’s inability to remember directions on a mental map in one’s head; he wasn’t entirely certain but it definitely looked like it.

Bram must’ve said really harsh to Ronald cuz’ in less than a heartbeat, Ronald turned around away from Bram and kicked hard at the set of trash cans he had been previously kicking, sending them flying a few meters down the alley till they hit the wall of a large brick building, mostly likely a house or an apartment or something like that. But regardless of what it was, the sudden action caused the two boys to freeze up in surprise like they weren’t at all expecting the sound to be that loud. For a few seconds, the trio were left in a very tense and awkward silence as Ronald slowly set his hands against his head, the cold realization starting to hit him like a brick wall.

The meek blond teenager swallowed harshly, sweat forming on his forehead as his expression morphed into an expression of fear as his eyes stared at the building wearily as if expecting something to happen. He couldn’t see the faces of his two friends but it didn’t really matter, he didn’t need to see their faces to know what they were thinking, their body language was more than enough. Finally, the two boys turned away from the trash cans and sort of sped walked back back to the meeker boy with faces pale and eyes knotted in worry. “Let’s go, Andrew,” Bram said sternly, pointing a finger in a direction that seemed to be a way to find a way out of the alleyway.

Andrew wasn’t too certain if where the streaked hair was pointing at was the way out but he wasn’t about to question his leader just yet, especially when he had that amount of fear in his voice despite his attempts to mask it like the many times he usually did when something popped up. The three teenagers sped walked down the alleyway streets, they weren’t running unless they had to, if the building the trash cans had crashed into was occupied with people who would not take nicely to them ‘running wild’ as many would put it, in the middle of the night.

The thought hadn’t really occurred to Andrew when the trio first went down the alley to smoke. In fact, none of them had even given two thoughts about the people who dwelled in the buildings or apartments close to the alleyways where troublemaking teenagers would go to smoke or do all the other drugs: Andrew, Bram and Ron being three teenagers who did the former.

This was mostly because he and his friends were focused on leaving the alleyway then getting into a stupid argument about Bram not being able to remember what a mental map and how to use a mental map regardless of where he was and how many times he had been there. Now that both Bram and Ronald had caused a disturbance, the idea of leaving was now all on the teenagers’ minds just in case whoever happened to be in the possible apartment or house, decided to call the cops, an almost unlikely possibility, no one wanted to take risks.

“Okay dude, where exactly is the exit?” Ronald whispered to Bram after what felt like an hour of no one talking to one another, something that the trio would sometimes do. Bram rubbed his chin like he had grown a beard in only five seconds flat in thought, eyes staring straight ahead at the road of the alleyway before they flickered downwards as one of his feet hit an empty soda can, sending it rolling a few feet down the alleyway till it stopped near a wall. “Bram?” Ronald asked, pausing in his trek at the same time both Andrew and Bram had stopped.

Andrew looked long and hard at Bram’s face, taking note of the hard, thoughtful or rather deep thinking expression on his friend’s face. It was rather unusual to see Bram using his head as he was usually the type of person to act on instinct or dumb decisions rather then think about the consequences of said dumb decisions. But truthfully, Andrew was grateful for this as he didn’t really want to be here any longer. Ronald, on the other hand, looked confused to all hell as to why Bram was taking so long to answer as he was expecting the boy to act rash and answer without thinking everything through.

“From what I recall,” Bram finally said after a few more seconds of not speaking, pulling his gaze away from the road and toward his two friends, who were staring at him expectantly for the answer. The two donned similar yet different facial expressions, Andrew looking more nervous while Ronald was puzzled. “We have to continue going straight then take a right turn then head straight then left then right.” It was a simple kind of explanation, nothing too complex and it was easy to follow. Much easier then either Andrew or Ronald had expected, though truthfully they didn’t know what they were expecting but in the worst case scenario, they were expecting Bram to not remember the directions, but thank the God above it hadn’t escalated to that.

“Okay, that’s easy to follow,” Ronald responded, trying his hardest to hide his relief but wasn’t too successful. Andrew raised his brow and tilted his gaze at his redhead friend, unsure as to why his friend was doing that. There was no problem with feeling relieved, after all he himself was relieved that they weren’t going to be stuck in this unknown or rather barely known alleyway to them for the whole night. “So, let’s get the hell out of here before someone such as the police or something, catches us out here and assumes we’re up to trouble or something like that.”

Despite the unlikely possibility of the police showing up since three teenagers hanging around in the alleyway to smoke wasn’t a giant issue, the three teenage boys went back to walking through the alleyway, passing by deserted trash cans and pieces of discharged trash like background props on a movie set, a very silent movie set as by now, the entire environment had gone completely quiet, maybe a little too quiet for Andrew’s comfort. Although he didn't turn his head, his eyes nervously darted around the alleyway as if he heard something from somewhere in the alley.

In the dark, dank alleyways of the city, it wasn’t uncommon to hear the sound of teenagers lumbering around the alleyways, knocking or kicking empty trash cans or soda cans on the paved road or hitting the walls of apartments or other buildings or doing whatever the hell else teenagers did in the city at night. Even if he and his two friends were a good distance away, the sounds always found a way to his ears. Even in the late hours of the night, Andrew should’ve heard something from somewhere, but there was nothing.

On one hand, this was to be expected as Andrew hadn’t once seen anyone else up late past these hours beside the usually stoned or drugged out teenager or the late night worker either walking by them or driving on the road. However, on the other hand, the atmosphere was too unnerving for Andrew to call peaceful and at the same time, the sound of a can being kicked around or sneakered feet hitting the paved road would be both terrifying and relieving to the meek boy.