The streetlights bled weak halos onto the wet asphalt, each one a little island in the vast, inky sea of night. It was late, far later than I usually walked home. A quiet hum of distant traffic was the only soundtrack to the rapid drum of my own heart. I pulled my jacket tighter, wishing for the warmth of my apartment, the familiarity of my own bed.
That’s when I felt it. Not saw, not heard, but felt. The prickle on the back of my neck, the subtle shift in the air behind me. A sense of presence. Just nerves, I told myself, trying to sound convincing even in the silence of my own head. You’re tired. Overthinking everything, as usual.
But the feeling persisted. A subtle rhythmic sound, just behind the ambient city drone, a beat that didn’t quite sync with my own hurried steps. Footsteps. There were definitely footsteps. I sped up, trying to make it seem natural, like I just remembered something urgent. My breath hitched.
A closet | Source: Unsplash
I risked a quick glance over my shoulder. Nothing. Just the long, empty stretch of road, swallowed by shadows. See? Nothing. Go home. You’re being ridiculous. But then, as I rounded the corner, dipping into an even darker side street, I heard it again. Closer this time. A distinct, heavy tread. My stomach dropped.
THIS WASN’T MY IMAGINATION. Someone was there. Someone was following me. My heart started to race, a frantic bird trapped in my ribcage, flapping against the bones. Every shadow became a lurking figure, every rustle of leaves a whispered threat.
Panic clawed at my throat. I broke into a run, a clumsy, desperate scramble, my heels slipping on the damp pavement. My lungs burned, air rasping in and out. I didn’t dare look back again. I just ran. I ran like my life depended on it, because in that moment, it felt like it did.
A broken phone | Source: Unsplash
The adrenaline coursed through me, a bitter, metallic taste in my mouth. My mind was a blur of frantic questions. Who is it? Why me? What do they want? My mind screamed through a thousand possibilities, each one more terrifying than the last. Each one pointing to the single, gaping secret that had been eating me alive for months.
I knew, with a terrible certainty, why someone would be following me. The guilt was a physical weight, pressing down on my chest, making it harder to breathe. It had been a shadow lurking in every corner of my life, every quiet moment, every glance across a crowded room. And now, it felt like that shadow had taken human form.
I finally reached the relative safety of my building, fumbling with the keys, my hands shaking so violently I almost dropped them. The lock clicked, and I shoved the heavy door open, slamming it shut behind me. I leaned against it, gasping, eyes squeezed shut, listening for any sound from outside. Silence. Just the pounding of my own blood in my ears.
A man holding a phone | Source: Unsplash
I stumbled up the stairs, taking them two at a time, not stopping until I was inside my apartment, the deadbolt thrown, every window curtain drawn. I sank to the floor, my back against the door, tears streaming down my face. I was safe. For now. But the fear remained, a cold knot in my gut.
Who was it? I kept picturing their face, trying to piece together a memory that wasn’t there. Was it her? His wife? Had she found out? Had she been watching us, patiently waiting for the perfect moment to confront me, to expose everything? Or was it him? My partner? Had he somehow discovered my betrayal? The thought alone made me curl into a tighter ball.
This is it, I thought, a strange sense of morbid calm settling over me amidst the terror. This is how it ends. The reckoning. I almost wished it was over. The constant fear of discovery, the lies, the furtive glances, the hollow ache of guilt. It had been a suffocating blanket, and perhaps exposure, humiliation, pain, was better than this slow, agonizing suffocation.
A shocked woman holding a phone | Source: Midjourney
I lay awake all night, every creak of the building, every distant siren, sending fresh waves of panic through me. I imagined the confrontation. The accusations. The shattering of lives. Mine. His. Hers. My partner’s. I deserved it, I knew. I had broken sacred trusts. I had invited this storm.
Morning eventually came, not with the gentle dawn I craved, but with a harsh, unforgiving light that seemed to mock my sleepless state. My eyes were burning, my head throbbed. I felt hollowed out, waiting for the inevitable hammer blow.
Then my phone rang.
The sound was like a gunshot in the silent apartment. I flinched, staring at the screen. It was an unknown number. My heart leaped into my throat. This is it. I took a shaky breath and answered.
“Hello?” My voice was barely a whisper.
A frantic, unfamiliar voice on the other end. “Is this… is this you? Oh god, I’ve been trying to reach you! I saw you last night, I tried to catch up, but you just ran! I was shouting, but you just kept running! I needed to tell you—”
An emotionally overwhelmed man | Source: Midjourney
My blood ran cold. She saw me. “Who is this?” I interrupted, my voice cracking. “What do you want?”
“It’s about… about him,” the voice choked out, riddled with grief. “Your partner. There was an accident. A hit and run. It happened late last night. He’s… he’s at the hospital. Critical condition. I was with him, I tried to get to you, I even saw you walking… I just needed to tell you to get there. NOW.”
The phone slipped from my numb fingers, clattering against the floor. ACCIDENT. HIT AND RUN. CRITICAL CONDITION. My partner. The person I had been betraying, the man I was supposed to love and cherish. It wasn’t about my secret. It wasn’t his wife, or my partner discovering my affair. It was his friend, desperately trying to find me, to deliver news that would shatter my world.
I wasn’t being followed because of my terrible secret.
A man lost in thought | Source: Midjourney
I was being desperately pursued by someone trying to save me from an even more terrible truth.
And I had run. I had run out of guilt, out of paranoia, convinced that the world was finally caving in on me because of my sins. I had seen someone trying to reach me, seen their urgency, and interpreted it through the lens of my own colossal failure. I had fled from the very person who was trying to tell me that the man I was sworn to was fighting for his life.
The world went silent. All this time, I was so afraid of being exposed for my infidelity, I completely missed the fact that my entire life was about to be irrevocably changed by something far more devastating. The irony was a cruel, sickening punch to the gut. The guilt I felt for my affair was nothing compared to the crushing weight of knowing I had run from the very call for help I should have embraced. The night I thought I was being followed was actually the night I ran from the truth, leaving the person I loved, unknowingly, to face his fate alone, while I was consumed by my own selfish fears. I hate myself. I really, truly hate myself.
