George Anderson casually swung the keys to his front door around the index finger of his right hand as he squinted through the particularly strong morning sunlight at Mr. Gibson's open window across the street. Mr. Gibson, as ever, was staring out his window watching George. Caught in the act, he immediately closed the shutters and drew the curtains. George wasn't one bit surprised.

"They can see something different in you, honey, and they're afraid of you… because you're different." Rebecca's voice was so crystal clear that George almost looked around to see if she was beside him. And of course she wasn't… God, he missed her.

Mentally checking that he had everything: his library card, wallet and of course, his front door keys, George stood on his quaint little porch facing the quiet street in front of him. He was more careful these days, one reason being that he was a stickler for organisation and planning, but also because George wasn't getting any younger. It was one of the curses of ageing that was particularly frustrating for him. Satisfied, he stepped off the porch and onto the short and narrow garden path that led to the front gate.

George didn't really know Mr. Gibson on a personal basis. He knew his nosy neighbour's surname however, because it was carved eloquently on a silver plated plaque on Mr. Gibson's post box. Normally, George, just like everyone else, found overly inquisitive people rather irritating; but he had a notion that Mr. Gibson wasn't really your average day to day snoop. He also admitted to himself that if he had been his own neighbour, knowing more about himself than the average Harry he stayed next door to, he'd also be excessively curious about the goings on in his own life. So instead of finding people like Mr. Gibson annoying, George found them threatening. He judged Mr. Gibson as being more perceptive than his other immediate neighbours were. People like Mr. Gibson made him nervous, they were the very reason why he lived his life the way he did. Admittedly though, his lifestyle would definitely raise a few questions in a small, close knit community such as this one.

Rebecca's musical voice almost sang to him, "It's something you have to keep with you. It's something that they'll never understand, George. Hell, I don't even understand it myself. But I do understand, that sometimes you really do need to speak about it."

On Park Street the average house owner was between sixty and eighty years of age. Get-togethers were not uncommon, and as George understood it, Friday nights on Park Street had historically become "Bingo night". Bingo night was held at different houses every week, but George had never been invited to join in. George was not in the least bit insulted about this, because he had no intention of ever going to one. He didn't feel that sociable anymore, and he definitely did not want to be around a large group of elderly people. Ironic that, because he was "elderly" himself at the grand old age of seventy-one. More interesting, however, was the mere fact that ten years ago… George had been very different to what he was like now. He had never been the most popular person on the block, but he had definitely been more people orientated. These days George was indifferent to his neighbour's lives. He would never attend a bingo evening on Park Street because he was different to the rest of them, very different.

As he reached his small little wooden gate, his eyes strayed to his post box. One quick glance confirmed his expectations, no mail except for the exposed end of a hurriedly forced advertising coupon. He couldn't even be bothered; he never read them anyway. George reasoned that he'd pick it up on the way back. Having stepped out his front yard, and with the gate closed and locked behind him, George deeply inhaled the still, pleasant morning air around him. The sky above him was a clear, cloudless blue. The birds were singing in that big old tree across the street the way they always had on mornings like this. It was going to be a lovely day.

"You can't keep hiding away from the world, George. Everyone has their secrets, and everyone has their ghosts. You've just got to keep your secrets in your pocket, and forget you put them there for a little while." George had always found it very hard to forget for a while, but Rebecca had been right.

He loved mornings like this, because it allowed him to think of the positive things in life. He always tried to think of the nice things, because if he didn't keep himself busy and happy, he'd start thinking about the "carpets". George didn't really want to think about the "carpets". He preferred not to dwell on them too much. He would not stay sane for long if he pondered too much about their existence, and why he had been chosen to see them and others not. Yes, he was different, he thought grimly. But it was a "secret" different, as long as he did not go out and make an issue of it. There was no point in scaring people, anyway. There was no point in worrying about something you couldn't do anything about.

"And what would you say to them, George? How would you go about explaining this to anyone? They'd treat you worse if they knew. Half of them would think you've gone completely senile, the other half would think worse. And if you could prove it to them, maybe they'd be better off not knowing." Rebecca had been a very wise person.

The library was down the block, seven suburb blocks away from him. George enjoyed the stroll in the mornings when he had the time to absorb the surroundings and think of little things. Today, however, regardless of the sun smiling down on the deserted street and the pleasant singing of the birds in the trees, he realised that he was going to think a lot about the "shadow carpets".

He found his thoughts drifting back to that bizarre afternoon about ten years ago when his life had changed so drastically almost overnight. Nothing profound had happened to him. He hadn't been struck by lightening or fallen on his head; he hadn't recently visited or been around a strange character in a dark back street somewhere. There was absolutely nothing special about that afternoon at all. Rebecca had still been with him. The tantalising aroma of her cooking had carried through the front door into the yard where he stood, casually leaning over his front gate chatting away with Erin Charmers, a long time friend of his. And so it was that George's thoughts went back in time…

He remembered Erin…

Erin Charmers had often walked his dog, Jake, from his own house on the far end of the street to George's place in the late afternoon if the weather allowed it. This particular day had been very windy earlier on, but the wind had died down and the late afternoon had turned out quite tranquil. The air had been a little humid and they'd discussed that briefly. Erin believed that it might rain later in the evening. As they socialised and talked about arbitrary things, both of them watched Jake sniff at a group of purple daisies at the foot of George's short brick wall. Something was definitely interesting him about a particular area around there. He was pulling at his leather leash, whining and whimpering in protestation when Erin wouldn't give him enough freedom to pursue his exploration amongst the shrubbery.

"He's a right curious bugger he is." Erin chuckled as Jake tried to shove his snout as far as possible under the wall. "Old Jake here will find something interesting in just about anything. Sometimes I wish that I could have a dog's simple curiosity of the world, without having to worry about all sorts of responsibilities."

George had laughed at that. Erin had battled a little since his wife Angela had passed away. George's friend had never been much of a cook. He had never bothered with the domestic tasks around the house except for things like general structural maintenance, because Angela had always been so organised. She had also been quite aware of Erin's absent-minded ways and had not allowed him to do much in the kitchen. Angela and Erin had married at a very young age, and so Erin had little time to live the life of a self-sufficient bachelor in his younger days. The result, of course, was that Erin had to feed him self for the first time since he had left home as a boy, and he wasn't really prepared for that. He was an extremely inefficient cook. George remembered having often invited him for dinner jokingly adding that he didn't want George to burn his house down.

"Well, I hope that he's going to find what he's looking for before he steam rolls the rest of my garden." George had observantly replied. "He's a demolition machine when he gets excited."

Erin had pulled gently on Jake's collar. "Here Jake, come on boy, no use getting all worked up about something you can't see." To George he had added, "I've got to get going George, I need an early night tonight, I'm tired and these walks aren't as refreshing as they used to be. I invariably end up out of breath and wheezing, I think I'll turn in early tonight."

"The curse of ageing my friend." George had grinned. "Don't keel over just yet, because you've got an invitation to come join Rebecca and I tomorrow night."

Erin had shifted his weight and pulled more firmly on Jake's leash. "Come Jake, it is time to go now." As he'd turned to leave he spoke over his shoulder. "You're too good to me sometimes George, but I can't refuse an offer like that… see you tomorrow evening."

It was as Erin started to walk away down the street that George had first noticed the shadow. It was the first word that George would find himself using to describe it, "shadow", but it wasn't a very good description. It was unlike any other late afternoon shadow that George had ever seen. It was strangely deeper, almost translucently thicker and more tangible than the other shady areas on the street. In a grim, repelling fashion, it looked rotten… like the black mould that forms on decaying food. Its questionable presence, about fifteen feet away from him, near the drain on the other side of the street, was enough to make George disturbingly uneasy. It took a moment for George to realise why his palms were sweating and why gooseflesh rippled from the small of his back to raise the hairs on his forearms. Then he clicked because… it was moving. It was slithering across the rough tar like a thin, mobile layer of predatory moss. Even worse, it seemed to be aware of its direction. It was following Erin at around about the same pace as he casually strode back towards his house.

George's first reaction was to call out to Erin in consternation, but he quickly checked himself. He'd just been discussing the ageing process and its shortcomings with his friend, and he didn't want to sound as if he was going senile. Besides that description was ludicrous… it was impossible. There was nothing like that known to science. George decided that he also needed to turn in early that evening. It was quite possible that he was just hallucinating or some trick of light, perhaps, was playing with his mind. But he watched it for a while, blinking and wondering how it could look so real. It was almost as if he knew that he could touch it, but wouldn't want to. It could be dangerous to touch it. He turned and went inside, and pretended to forget about it.

Later that evening as George had seated himself down on his laze-boy to watch the eight 'o clock news and Rebecca was clearing up in the kitchen, they were both surprised by a knock on the door. It had turned out to be bad news. Erin had suffered a massive stroke, and he had died instantly. George was staggered, crushed. His closest friend had seemed so full of life when he'd left him to stroll home that evening, but Erin HAD admitted that he wasn't feeling all that well.

The days that followed had been very miserable for George, and Rebecca had also been upset about it. The two of them had attended the funeral, and answered phone calls and spent a lot of time consoling others. It wasn't pleasant. George couldn't get Erin out of his mind. He'd been his close friend for years now. In the following years George had missed his friend very much.

Yanked back to the present by the honking of a horn as some young, road hog screamed passed him on one of those fancy motorbikes they all owned these days. "Damn children", he grumbled under his breath. "They don't take life seriously enough." But he remembered that when he had been younger he had been much the same. Youngsters didn't think about death that much. They were all fit and full of life and they all felt immortal. It had even been surprising ten years ago (and even then, George had been no spring chicken) when Erin had passed away. He had been George's best friend. And some how George had assumed that he'd live forever.

"Nothing you could have done about it honey," Rebecca answered his question for him before he even asked it. Again her voice was so close, so crystal clear, that he almost looked around him to see if she was there.

The passing away of a close friend was never very pleasant, George thought to himself, as he continued on. He'd reached the blue post box on the corner of Park Street and Courier Street, he'd always thought it had been very appropriate to put a post box here. Every time he saw it he'd think back to the stories he'd read as a kid… about fairy tale places where everything had a simple reason for its name. Real life was a lot more complicated than that, he thought grimly. Life wasn't a fairy tale, life was a mystery, and there were things about life that you'd rather not put a name to for fear of getting to know it too well. There were some things about life that you weren't meant to know about at all. Grimly, because his mood had changed now, he drifted back into memories. His world had gone for a nose dive not too long after that...

It was only a few days later that he had finally realised that something was happening to him. He'd been window-shopping to take his mind off Erin's recent death when he saw it again… the "shadow carpet". It was creeping down 4th avenue at a slow, methodical pace. George had stood and watched it, stunned. To a passer-by in the street he'd said, "Do you see that?" She'd looked at him, a plump lady possibly in her late forties, and then in the direction he was pointing in. "Yes, incredible isn't it? They really need to do something about all the littering here, it's pathetic, and there are enough bins around. It makes me sick." Then she'd casually walked away because… she hadn't seen it...

The avenue had been full of life. There were people walking briskly from shop to shop, there had been people in passing cars, and there'd been people lounging around on corners, or waiting for the traffic lights to change. None of them paid any attention to this alien phenomenon gliding its way slowly up 4th avenue in broad daylight. It was literally oozing its way directly under the nose of that guy outside the bakery shop, and he didn't even glance down at it. George had stood perplexed, until he realised that the shadow seemed to be following someone again. It was following a young girl down the street. She seemed to be in a hurry, and she couldn't have been more than eighteen years old.

George had been utterly amazed that no one had paid any attention to it. No doubt about it though, George was seeing it, and he had to say something about it because he was frightened of it. It gave him the creeps… Damn! It was downright scary. The shadow-thing was about four by four feet in size, and darker then any of the other shadows on the street, and it was freaking weird.

This time he wouldn't keep his mouth shut because the shadow was accelerating all of a sudden. It was moving with sudden purpose. It had been stalking her and now it was "pouncing" her! George suddenly realised that he had to get to her before the shadow did. He called out from where he was, "Lady, watch out! Watch out behind you!" As soon as he'd voiced it he realised just how ludicrous he sounded. She'd turned, standing in the road stopped on her way across it, distracted by him. She'd been facing him, her eyes questioning, when the thing had reached her. It had pooled around her, reached around her shoes, climbed her ankles. And then it was climbing her shins, covering her slowly in black shadowy, fungus. If she'd been able to see… if she'd been able to comprehend it, she would have fainted, or worse. But she couldn't see what it was doing to her! She just stared back at George, wondering why a stranger had shouted in her direction. The world had gone into slow motion for George as he realised his mistake… but in a profound way he wasn't all that surprised when the car hit her, because he remembered Erin.

George's jaw dropped unconsciously as the car impacted with her, crashing into her from behind. Straight away the bonnet caved in and the fender bent as if something a lot larger and heavier had slammed into it. She bounced off of it and then the impact threw her into the air like a rubber doll. Limp, and already lifeless she had hung in the air slowly somersaulting backwards in an ungraceful, uncontrolled manner, before she had dropped head first into the tarmac behind the breaking car with a sickeningly bony thump audible even in the midst of screaming breaks. A following car had managed to break too hard, broad siding and spinning straight into the first. But only after it had gone right over the girl, tearing her apart under it's locked tires.

Shocked and completely horrified, George had looked on, his eyes wide and his mouth open. No matter how many times you saw it in the movies, there was no way it would ever compare to the shock of experiencing something like that in the real, cruel world.

Back to the present… as George contemplated a crossing… he shuddered with the memory. Yeah! He thought as he looked left, right and left again before crossing one of Park Street's tar tributaries. Life was a mystery, and it was also damn unfair. It had taken him a while to get over that. It had taken him a little longer to realise that he was not to blame for what had happened because quite frankly it would have happened anyway. He knew that somehow, because the shadow was there to make it happen. Strangely enough it hadn't taken a lot of explaining before Rebecca had believed him. And when she finally had, things had never been the same between them either. George had seen many, many more shadow-blankets in the ten years between then and now. He'd not told Rebecca about all of them, and he'd told no one else anything about their existence. However, people start noticing when you're different, and they begin to avoid you. George didn't mind, he didn't want to see their carpets, didn't want to see their fates creeping behind them. He often looked behind him these days, wondering if he'd see his own demise coming for him. That was a coldly interesting thought. He tried not to think about it though, and he hoped that when it finally came for him, it would choose the night so that he would not be able to see it. Many times he'd wondered if he'd be able to run away from it. If he could see it, couldn't he run from it? Avoid it? When he stopped to think about it, no, he'd have to sleep, he'd have to stop sometime. And then it would take him.

Only about six months before Rebecca died she'd calmly forbidden him to tell her anything about it if he saw it coming for her… She had been very reasonable and understanding about George's unwelcome gift, and he knew that if it was possible, he owed her the unspoken secret. When the time had finally arrived, George had seen it, and he'd had the time to say good bye. He could have screamed at it, savaged at it or cursed it. It would not have made any difference.

So what was the point…

He'd just calmly taken Rebecca in his arms, and kissed her. In his own secret way, he was telling her goodbye… When the time was right, he had left the room, because he didn't want to see it. He did not want to see it envelop her in its hideous cloak. At least he had been with her and at least he had time to say good bye. George had sat down in his lonely kitchen and cried for a long time before picking up the phone.

A concept was forming in George's head as his slowly measured pace timed itself to the pavement slabs (a game he'd played since he was a kid), the birth of a profound theory. He suddenly realised that he was not the only person on Park Street that didn't attend bingo evenings. Mr. Gibson across the road was also a retiring person. He didn't go out that much. Mrs. Smith lived across the park in number fifty-six and he hardly saw her at all these days. Why did people retire from the world when they reached a certain age? Why, indeed… Was it at all possible, that perhaps he WASN'T the only one that saw the shadows? Age brings the fear of death to your doorstep. Age makes you think of your own mortality. Age conspires against you, knocking on the door of your consciousness with more and more incessant eagerness the older you get. Age wants to show you something. It wants to show you where it's all leading up to. In return for wisdom Age rewards you with the growing uneasiness that your life is nearing its end.

Rebecca's answering voice was almost pleading him. "We can't read too much into these things George, love. We only know what we have experienced in our short lives. There's so much out there that we don't know: that we'll never know. We must accept the fact that we will never know everything."

Mr. Gibson… why did he stare out at George's house every morning? Did he know? Did he know and share George's shocking knowledge? Had he known for the last few years about the silent suffering and fear that George had to deal with every day of his secluded life? Maybe the owner of the silver plaque post box knew everything George knew… maybe he realised that he could never confront George in case his perceptions were wrong, and maybe he too realised that he would never, could never share his fears of the "shadow carpets" with anyone. If so, then he, just like George, was alone.

Only half a house away from the open driveway leading up to the library, George promised him self that on the way back to the house he'd try and think of pleasant things. He'd read the covers on his library books, perhaps. Ahead of him he could see Alistair Randal carrying some books and limping the other way aided by his walking stick. Armed with his new ideals, George studied Alistair's face… searching for a hint of something that would give his theory more weight. He was too far away from the older man to make out the man's details. His stance and walk didn't give away any haunted thoughts; he didn't cast any knowing glances at George confirming that he shared George's experiences. Alistair was about five years older than George was, and George knew that Alistair had seen him before he'd turned off the narrow path in the other direction. But he hadn't given George a second glance as he continued on his way. That's because Alistair Randal didn't know what George knew. The man could not reach into his mind and draw out George's darkest secrets. And it was better that way because some secrets were best kept from others. Some secrets could NEVER be shared because…

It's not possible to know the "why" or "how" of everything. Some problems remain our own because there is no point in worrying other people about something no one can do anything about.

George knew the road ahead of him was going to be dark and lonely.