Today’s
Prompt:
You get to your studio to develop pictures
from the hour you spent in the park. All of the pictures turn out well, except
for a select few. In six photographs, there is a man in the frame. Something seems
slightly off, and rather strange about each picture. Who is he and what is
weird about the photographs?
Courtesy:
writersdigest.com
Uduak
(/hoodoo ark/) and Usen (/hoo send/) took a walk along the beach one morning.
Cause it was a fine morning for a walk.
“I got to tell you a thing or
two about those pictures I took at the park,” said Usen.
“Don’t tell me they were no
good. You made so much fuss about those,” said Uduak.
“They are masterpieces. But they
ain’t what I expected.”
“If they’re masterpieces and
perfect and yet, you do not want them even though you took the shots, all of
them, truth is, you must be nuts.”
“I ain’t nuts, Uduak. Believe me;
something ain’t working the way it ought to.”
“Then, what exactly are you?”
“There’s a man in the pictures.”
The
men halted. The wind was picking up speed but it had nothing to do with it.
“What else is new?” Uduak said, fetching a pebble from the dirt. “Those
pictures are from the park. There ought to be more than one man in the pictures if you asked me. You
make it sound odd that there were actual people
at the park or in your pictures. You did not expect to find anyone.” It was a
statement not a question.
“No, no,” Usen said, waving off
Uduak’s statement. “You really ought to stop flying off half cocked. There is a man in the pictures.” Uduak meant
to interrupt and Usen cut him off. “Wait. The same man appeared in only six of
the photos and he was nearly always in the shadows.”
Uduak
scowled as he stared at his friend. “In broad day light? You took the pictures
in broad day light and managed to capture a man standing in the shadows? I ask
you for the second time, are you nuts?”
Uduak touched his forefinger to the side of his head and twisted back and
forth, back and forth, to stress his point. “Cause if you ain’t, I must be off
the bend.”
Usen’s
face colored. He hesitated.
“It sounds crazy,” Usen said.
“No. It is crazy and you are a
victim of a figment of your imagination.”
The
two men who had resumed their walk stopped again urged by the arresting view of
an imposing mountain far out at sea. Usen pointed out at the outcrop of land
mass, which from the distance and probably, because of the little distortion of
vision induced by fog could have been only a shadow standing vertical.
“Out there in the water, do you
see a mountain or is it just a shadow? And look up in the sky ain’t that a
bitch. I never dreamed I’d be so happy to see the sun.”
“Alright, I get the point. Now,
quit being a smartass,” said Uduak.
“You mean you agree that a man
in the black suit can be in the shadows in a picture taken at high noon?”
“Usen!”
“He marked his place, Uduak. He
was right there behind everybody and
everything else and yet, he was a superimposition. Like one of those photostock productions.”
“You’re really serious about
this?” Uduak said, becoming a little grossed out.
“On my mama’s grave.”
“You never knew your mama.”
“On my wife’s head.”
“Heads up, Usen. You don’t have
a wife.”
“Well, just come on over to my
studio and take a look at the pictures for yourself. See if you don’t change
your mind in a hurry.” Usen said, flashing a smile as wide as summer.
“Stop that,” Uduak said.
And
so it happened that Uduak came over to Usen’s amateur studio to have a look at
the freaky photos. He saw the man,
too. It was like a picture within a picture. Uduak for some reason did not see
the queerness of the situation.
The
next time they got back together, which they did often, and went strolling on
the beach, Usen dug up the issue again.
“Each time I try editing those
pictures or sending ‘em through the printer–I’m talking about the six with the picture of the man in the
black suit –he retreats an inch into the shadows.”
“Because you willed it to happen, Usen. Don’t you get
it? You’re seeing what you want to
see. Give the damn thing a rest. Just let the pictures be and in time, it just
might happen that the guy in the shadows will show himself to be what he really
is,” Uduak said.
“And what exactly do you think
he is Uduak?” Usen said, but he wasn’t angling for a fight.
“Blotches in the film is all.
So, what do you say? Let’s catch some chicks at a bad time.”
“I’m game.”
Uduak
and Usen pulled out their digital cameras and started snapping off photographs
of abominations that stand in holy places. And for the moment, the man in the
picture was laid to rest at the backburner.
After
the beach walk, Uduak and Usen retired to Usen’s studio, which is what they
called his laptop, printer, digital camera and several photo editing hardware.
They plugged their cameras to the USB cables then connected them to the system
via the USB portals. Next, they transferred the pictures to the wider screen.
It improved the view significantly.
They
went through the images in silence, relishing their Kodak moment. Yet, the devil came.
The
men were silent, stunned out of their comfort zones as the realization shook
the very foundations of their belief.
The man in the black suit appeared
in guess… six of the pictures.
When
the renewed heebie-jeebies in the wake of the weird pictures subsided, Usen
sighed and said, “You still think that man is blotches in the frame that’s
bound to fade out with time?”
“Please, do not patronize me.
What are we gonna do about that guy cause apparently, he’s either stalking you
or stalking me.”
“Or stalking both of us,” Usen
said and shrugged when Uduak glared at him.
Uduak
ran six of the pictures of the man in the black suit through the printer. The
printer vibrated then uttered a shrill noise as if it was stuffed with shards
of glass. And finally the pictures came sliding out. The spots where the images
of the man ought to have been were fuzzy as if a mild heat had charred it.
Though his aspect was visible, his face took the worst hit. It was hard to
identify. Uduak tried to do a reprint.
“Maybe, at a later time, buddy.”
Usen held his hand. “It’s best we don’t stress the printer,” he said.
The
freelance photographers waited in the silence allowing both the static and tension
in the studio to fill up the void in their brains.
“What are we really going to do
about that guy?” Usen spoke like a man climbing out of a dream.
Uduak
sat hunched over and he had pulled the collar of his flannel shirt over his
head. “Well, we got digital cameras for a start.”
“What’s that got to do with
anything?”
“We get back to the park and we
can start by checking the pictures soon after we snap ‘em,” Uduak said.
“Great idea,” Usen said, but his
words lacked the conviction. “What do we do when we find the trifling son of a
whore?”
Without
looking up, Uduak said in a growl, “We will
cross that bridge when we come to it. Okay?”
“Whatever.”
One
beautiful morning, these freelance dudes set off on an investigative paparazzi
stint and were still undecided on what to do with the man in the black suit if
and when they had him in their clutches.
“We couldn’t even tell if he had
on a leather jacket or an overcoat.” Usen way out of his elements did nothing
to hide his sense of defeat from dripping through his words.
Uduak
blew hot air on his hands and rubbed one against the other. The chill wasn’t in
the air but in the gig. It had him all tensed up. “Mind if we ask around if
anybody ever saw this guy in the park?”
“And strike terror into the
hearts and minds of these lovely people? Would you like being called a freak?”
“How long before we start taking
the snapshots?”
“How about right away?”
And
they were off snapping and checking the pictures.
Snap.
Check. Nothing. Snap. Check. Nothing. Snap. Check. Check. Nothing. Nothing.
Nothing.
Outwitted
and outfoxed, the freelancers mobbed a park bench and crashed their tired butts
into it.
“Did you see those pictures?
He’s not in any one of them,” Usen said.
“You telling me? I wish I could
just forget it ever happened. This creep show’s not good for my nerves.”
“I’ve had my share of the creeps
the very first time I set eyes on the dude in six of my pictures. If freaking
out was hard currency I’d be swimming in dough, right now.” Usen flung up his
arms and jerked his head backwards so that it perched against the top edge of
the backrest, his face staring up into the sky. A dark figure leaned over him
and looked straight into his eyes holding him in his gaze. He couldn’t break
his paralysis. The eyes of the man in the black suit pinned him into position
and penetrated his subconscious and in that instant, Usen knew.
It
didn’t take five seconds but he knew why his camera had picked up the man’s
image. Then he was gone.
Usen bowled out of his seat and
totally flipped out.
Uduak
jerked forward but stayed seated on the bench. “You trying to give me a heart
attack? What’s gotten into you?”
Usen’s
eyes roamed the park, searching for the man in the black suit. He was nowhere
in sight. “Shit. He was standing over me just now, looking dead into my eyes. I
saw his eyes, no irises, just two orange balls of flame. And he had no face, I could
see right through him. He was wearing a hat, a magician’s hat but it seemed to
hang on empty space, a void. And he smelled like…”
“Like sulfur,” Uduak completed
his sentence for him.
“How did you know?”
“You saw the devil? I read something
like this before in a Stephen King story, The
Man in the Black Suit it was called. Well, I never.”
“He stood right here.” Usen went
around the bench and stood in the spot he supposed the man in the black suit
stood a few minutes ago.
“You really saw him? In black
and white?” Uduak’s words oozed with sarcasm, an unconscious act triggered by dread.
“Of course, I saw him. He was
here, right here.” Usen stomped up and down on the grass.
“If he ain’t anywhere around
here now, where the hell did he go?”
“You can’t be asking me that,
can you? You’ve been here all along and you happened not to notice a man this
tall, wearing a black suit creep up on me and give me the jump of my life?”
Uduak shrugged. Usen burst out
laughing and Uduak followed. It dissolved the tension.
“That fools turning us against
each other. We can’t let that happen. We need to put him behind us.”
“I’ve been thinking the same
thing.” Uduak patted his friend on the shoulder. “Maybe, that’s just what we’ll
do. Get the devil behind us. Somewhere where the sun never shines and the water
is fire.”
The
freelancers looked into each others’ eyes and laughed again.
“Maybe, the bastard wished to be
left alone.”
“All he had to do was ask. It’s
simple courtesy,” Usen said.
“Maybe, we wouldn’t have
understood his language. Come on, we’re done here.”
“Maybe, he should have stayed
the hell out of our pictures, is what I think.”
Uduak
and Usen left the park and went home. At Usen’s studio, when they moved their
pictures into the system for editing and printing, the man in the black suit
was back in six of them. In each of the pictures, he had his back towards them
and each succeeding picture showed a smaller image of him. He was walking away.
Sometimes,
the man in the black suit was back in the pictures but Uduak and Usen put him
in his place–at the back of their mind. They knew better. He never bothered any
one of the men again. And when people picked up one of their photos and asked about
the mystery man in the background the photographers said, “Oh, that’s the park
caretaker.”
When
they replied, “Why do we never see him around?”
They
answered, “It’s best if he is left alone.”
Eneh
Akpan
June
5, 2013
