A Candle in a Dark Room

They’re always there, stalking, yet they’re never suspected of anything. I should know, I was one. I don’t know how I came to be. That’s not entirely true, but I suppose being evasive sounds far better than admitting that you were a mistake. I should clarify that I am nothing more than an observer; my bias is as phantasmal as my existence. This is not my story to tell, yet it is mine, all the same.

I remember who he was, before he became a mere husk; a feared scientist who killed anyone in his path, but I can assure you there was nothing scientific about what was taking place. A monster to most, but then again, what is life to someone who can give it just as easily as he can take it. I always found it curious how he saw beauty in his own creations, even after all they went through. Repulsive atrocities to most, but to him they were perfect; celestial bodies that glimmered with the radiance of his hard work. It's not as if people's words had any bearing on his decisions anyways, especially when most of their words were boiled down to deafening screams.

He feared nothing, no one. But me? I shook him to his very core. I was almost identical to him in every way; for I knew of his thoughts, I knew of his past, and I would soon come to create his future. I was nothing more than an obstruction of light, but I represented what he was more than he did.

He was certain about everything he did. He never questioned right from wrong, never had a second thought, not a single doubt. He did what felt right; he did what was right. My mere existence went against everything he believed. There was nothing certain about me. I was not materialized enough to be seen in full, but exerting enough energy to be perceived. Direct eye contact makes you feel uneasy, but avoidance will only grant you the image of me, stalking around in the corner of your eye. You may try and reason with me, talk to me, encourage me to move to the light, but a ghost in its most real form, I am tethered to this world, a specter imprinted into the fabric of time and space.

He avoided me at all costs.

He bathed himself in light, flame at every turn, surrounded by so many candles that even a priest would look upon his own altar in shame and envy. He paced looking straight ahead, refusing to turn his head or pay any mind to the images that would manifest in his peripheral. As a child asks their mother to look under their bed to vanquish the monsters, he knew looking would only accentuate their egos, acknowledging their existence, building upon their fear; he would pay them no mind. He knew he was always right. Such darkness could not exist, especially not one that radiates from him. He banished me into a corner, drowned out by a light almost as bright as his sense of self-righteousness. The old man didn’t even sleep for weeks, for closing his eyes would be to invite the darkness to invade his mind. He started seeing things.

He was in his study one night, writing in his journal; as the darkness crept in in defiance of the sunset, the flames started to flicker. The lights were dancing along the walls, their motion only as limited as the flame was to the wick. A symphony of lights so beautiful I had no choice but to join in. I slipped out of my corner and waltzed along the walls, feeling the warmth of the flames all throughout my body, my being, occasionally pierced with rays of light, only to be reformed as the brightness danced away. He didn’t like that. He stumbled away from his desk knocking down all the candles in front of him and went into a frenzy. He threw anything within reach: books, quills, chairs, bottles. I only grew larger as he receded back into the light, filling him with fear and dismay. He saw all the darkness within him, all the evil he tried to hide away engulf the room, just as his guilt would engulf him. I was nothing more than a conscious veil of darkness, vulnerable to the light; but as forcibly as a candle can defy the darkness that exists, it can also define the darkness that remains.

He couldn’t take it anymore. He could not remove me. I was part of him, but perhaps he could remove all the evil that lied within. He laughed and cackled like a madman as he jolted for the letter opener until he held it up to himself; a man, who in that moment, looked upon himself as if he was God, and only he could vanquish the devil from this unholy world. He pointed the letter opener straight at me and screamed at the top of his lungs, for he would finally defy me.

He drove it straight into his throat.

Blood splattered all over the walls and coated me. As he fell to the floor, he gazed upon the last thing he would ever see. His shadow on the wall, tinted red, as if in defiance to all he had done, outlining that he was utterly, wrong. He laid flat on the floor, motionless, yet still I remained, dancing by the candle light, but for once, I had finally been stopped. Plastered on the wall, captured by death, projected, by a candle in a dark room.