Fear

One day Stefan an ordinary clerk at Mercury Newspapers received a job offer letter with a salary greater than his current from some business owner, asking for his presence at the addressed mansion. Stefan excited about the tempting offer presented in the letter started packing his stuff to go and meet the owner. He never once thought about the critical questions that should have risen from the letter received as to Why him? Why now? Who exactly is hiring him? How did they find him? Was the job placement advertised before? Or as to why directly hiring him without any interviews? While he prepares for the journey to the mansion he practices the lines he will be using to strengthen his first impression on the owner. Stefan completely indulged in a world of his own thoughts started to imagine  himself as a special guest, attended to by the servants, being assigned at a post senior to that of his current, having his own staff at work, his own secretaries addressing to him on various matters and maybe at some point in the future, a huge property owner himself. The next morning feeling excited, anxious, thrilled brings out his car and his cat Susie and heads towards the mansion as addressed in the offer letter.

During his journey he realized the thick blanket of fog covering him, increasing his anxiety and making it more difficult to locate the mansion he was heading to. Suddenly his car sounded to have hit something. Getting out of his car he does not see anything on the road. While inspecting any changes to the body of his car, the cat starts to hiss. Stefan jolted by the sound of his cat; turns around to look for the cause of it. There he saw a huge wolf with blue eyes and blood dripping from his mouth as if it had just hunted something. Stefan making a move back towards his car makes the wolf not only growl at him but also to follow his steps. Stefan stops immediately realizing the wolf’s moves. The sudden whisper of a woman from the woods sends chills down his spine. Stefan calming his nerves finds a lady in red; eyes as blue as a clear sky, looking exactly like those of the wolf fixated on him while walking towards the wolf.  Stefan’s cat sensing the unnatural presence jumps back into the car. Stefan unable to comprehend the situation remains static, looking at the lady continuing her steps towards the wolf. Stefan regaining his voice yells at the lady “Hey, What do you think you're doing? Don’t! Stop! Stop walking towards that beast!” The lady ignoring Stefan continues her pace towards the wolf. Upon reaching close enough to the wolf she whispers something into its ear, making it walk with her into the nearby woods. The fog also lifts just like it is shown to lift at the end of any horror movie.

Stefan takes a few more minutes gathering his senses, goes back into his car and accelerates it far from that place. After driving a mile further he stops at a check post where a senior police officer inquires Stefan about his identity, vehicle, destination and the reason for the visit. Stefan notices a sense of surprise in the officer’s behavior when asked about the directions to the mansion. The officer instead of guiding him towards the mansion shouting “The road ends a mile and a half further” tries to warn him indirectly about the dangers he was about to put himself into. Disregarding the sincere warnings given by the police officer, Stefan turns up the volume of the radio channel tuned into and continue with his journey. It was the only station was still being broadcasted this far out of the city. Not being such a fan of poetry, Stefan surprisingly found himself to be enjoying John Keat’s poem “Ode to Melancholy”, where he quotes:

“Though you should build a bark of dead men's bones,

    And rear a phantom gibbet for a mast,

Stitch creeds together for a sail, with groans

    To fill it out, bloodstained and aghast;”

Moving a few more meters, Stefan starts to lose the range of that last radio station broadcast. While driving, he bends towards the dashboard grabbing a casket of his favorite songs; that all of a sudden he shivers in fear of unknown. Sitting up straight he finds himself accompanied in the backseat of the car, by that same wolf he had seen walking into woods with the lady earlier; and just as Stefan turns around to confirm what he had seen, the wolf launches itself onto him.

Stefan jolts up from his sleep. All sweaty and jolly, Stefan quickly peeks around his room just to find his cat laying next to him. Stefan cuddling  his cat in the bed, absorbing the morning sunlight entering the room from a small gap between the curtains welcome the new day. Stefan realized that he had fallen asleep while reading the end of a horror story book. To quickly finish the book he turns over to the last page of the book, reading aloud the only sentence written in the middle of it “Fear is only in our minds”. Stefan had also left the television on which while reading the book, which now was broadcasting a live baseball match “I see the ball going out the stadium and it’s a home run”; “The White Bears once again walk away with the title of League Championship”. Stefan turns off the television; picks up his cat and walks to the kitchen. After finishing the breakfast he then drives to the library and returns the book.