The evening carried on without much incident. It was fairly quiet, so Anne and Meena got to stay connected throughout the evening and leading up to the end of their shift Meena let Anne know that she would be leaving right after her shift she wanted to get some sleep.


"Ok, how about you wait the hour till I'm off and I can take you home," Anne asks.


"Nah its fine, thanks though, I'm just two blocks away, I'll be ok," Meena replies.


Meena wipes down the last table she was working with, puts her things away and goes to say bye to Anne.


"Anne, thanks so much," she grabs Anne and gives her a hug. "You're so good to me, I'll make sure I message you when I get home ok?"


"Are you sure? Ok Em, make sure you message me ok? I'll be waiting for it. Take care of yourself and don't talk to strangers," she says sarcastically.


"Hahah jerk, I'll remember that when I'm being murdered by an old lady with fake teeth," she makes zombie sounds and fakes eating her friend.


They both laugh, Meena grabs her jacket, gives Anne one more quick hug and leaves out the door.


Outside the pub the streets were empty. There was a straight line walk to her apartment building from where she was standing. The silence in the city made Meena uncomfortable as she took the first few steps towards her home. Waiting at the intersection she waits for the sign to walk, taking in her familiar surroundings she feels uneasy. The signal changes, she looks left, pauses, looks right and feels like she sees something in the distance. She stops squints and tries to see if something is there. Convinces herself its nothing and crosses. As she crosses there's a nagging feeling like someone is behind her, her head whips back, and sees nothing, so she puts her head down and hurriedly crosses the street.


Rounding the corner she was within steps from the front door to her building when she hears, "I NEEDED YOUR HELP, YOU DID NOTHING!"


The screaming caused Meena to jump and look in all directions trying to locate where the sound is coming from. She shakes her head like she's going crazy and looks around again. Slowly she takes steps back facing the street just in case. Her hands reach into the bag over her shoulder to find a key fob when she hears a deep whisper that makes all of the hair stand on her neck. "Its your turn... this is the last time." The sound jolts her body in the opposite direction, she lets herself in and races to the stairs where she escapes to her room. Sitting on the floor she's utterly confused as to what what was just experienced. Her thoughts are scrambled as she tries to make sense of the last five days. Trying to rationalize the blackouts and what may have happened to her that she can't put together. A feeling of dread begins to overtake her as if a moment of time is going to erupt from her memories. She slowly gets up off the ground and goes towards the mirror in the bathroom. Staring into her red dehydrated eyes, the under eye bags are noticeable, going over her skin with frustrating detail she starts to realize how exhausted she looks and looks away almost disgustedly. Her hands move towards the faucet and water begins to flow into the sink, her eyes go back up to her reflection and it's as if she is seeing herself inside someone else. A shadow begins to form around her and starts to feel like a cold chill engrossing her body. In a panic she reaches for the faucet to turn it off but she can't extend her hands. She stares at the mirror in shock as if it is holding her back from moving, she struggles and tries to fight but the hold gets tighter and tighter, eyes wide staring at herself in the mirror she begins to see the life leaving her eyes as she struggles to catch the remaining breath in her lungs. Just as she is about to black out she lets out a death curdling scream, she's freed and falls to the ground in a lifeless heap.


Slowly the air begins to refill her lungs and her fingers and feet begin to twitch, her senses start to come back together and she realizes she's on the floor. The weight of her head feels enormous as she tries to move it off of the ground. Dragging it on the floor like a wrecking ball, she has to get momentum just to lift her chin off of the ground. Getting her arms into push up position she tries to lift her body up, but it feels like there's an elephant on her back. Forcing all of her muscles to work together she manages to get onto her knees, placing one foot down in front of her and forcing herself back to her feet. Very unsteadily regaining her balance she stumbles slamming into the closed door behind her. Working through the confusion Meena turns, opens the door and leaves the bathroom heading right to her phone.


The time says 4:43 a.m.


Her mouth drops open in shock "4:43??" She whispers. "I've been out for 4 hours?? What the fuck?" Pacing back and forth across the room, she feels like she has nowhere to turn. She walks to the bed, falls flat on her back and stares up at the ceiling hoping to go to sleep till the sun comes up.


The only reason she decided to leave the bed was the sun shining on her face from the only window in her room. Pulling herself by the face she manages to sit up and move to the edge of the bed so her feet touch the ground. She sits, and thinks. Looks over to the bathroom, and thinks. Looks at the floor where she was sitting and thinks. Too scared to go back into the bathroom she puts some clothes on, throws a piece of gum in her mouth and leaves her room. The sun hits her in the face forcing her to cover her eyes with her hand as she digs in her bag for her sunglasses. Her mind unable to acclimate to her surroundings begins to play tricks on her and she begins to panic like everyone is looking at her. She walks slowly but every time somebody walks past her she feels like they're looking into her soul but she can't seem to see anyone's face. She's staring at them, they're staring at her but she can't make out anyone's face, the panic start to become overwhelming, forcing her to duck off into a side street.


Trying to catch her breath, and away from the constant stream of people she begins to get her bearings and collect herself. Looking back at the street she contemplates whether or not she's ready to rejoin when someone pauses at the end of the street and faces her. Meena stops and stares for a moment, looks behind her to see if maybe this person is looking at someone else but there's no one there. She turns back and the figure is still there, standing, staring. Meena defiantly stares back, the person starts moving closer and Meena begins to make out the face, slowly she gets closer. The weight of her memories begin to take over her as she begins to piece together why this face was familiar. Then it hits her, that night, she was drunk leaving her workplace, stumbling out onto the street, when she accidentally bumped into that old lady knocking her to her knees. The woman looking up at her angry and injured, yelled at her in frustration.


Meena in her drunken stupor yelled back, "Fuck yourself you shouldn't have gotten in the way." Instead of helping the old woman up she walked over her and stumbled away.


The woman on the ground started yelling, "you can't treat people like this!" A bystander came over and began to help her up when the old woman continued, "you will get this same pain back!!! I curse yoooouuuu!!"


That last word sent shivers through Meena's body, it made her turn back and see the woman being helped up. For a moment there was a hint of guilt but the alcohol numbed any thoughts of apologizing and she continued on.


The memory pulled her out of her current reality to remind her of how awful she had been to this person, and as she snaps back she begins to realize that the person coming towards her is the same woman she had knocked to the ground with callous disregard. The weight of the moment was overwhelming and Meena began to realize that she was going to have to pay for her behavior, closer and closer the woman was approaching and just before the woman reached out to grab her, the blaring sound of a car horn shook the moment and made Meena realize that she was standing in the middle of the street with vehicles surrounding her blaring their horns. Shocked to her core she puts her hand up as an apology and scurries away.