The Shadow Behind Me

It breathed.

I didn't know where it came from, but it was colder than the night I was in and heavier than the backpack hanging on my back.

I focused my eyes on the road. I had to go home fast. My son was waiting on his bed with a children's book already open on his lap. His mother's eyes were surely glued to the TV, just ignoring him whenever he approaches her.

I still couldn't move my feet any inch. I looked down at them. But instead of trying to find a way to move them, my attention transferred to the shadow on my right side.

Someone's behind me.

I was curious but I couldn't look back. The sound of his breathing was enough of a warning of what was coming next, of what I hadn't foreseen.

I could feel the breathing on the back of my neck. It was getting faster and heavier, and then it stopped. I couldn't hear anything except my own breathing, and then after a second, my breathing also stopped and I became completely deaf.

A harsh force hit my back and I flew five meters away. My head banged on a rough concrete. I could feel the blood draining out my forehead. My left elbow's white bone slightly came out. But the strange thing was, I couldn't feel anything except cold. Then my mind became uncontrollable, it flashes stream of memories I hadn't seen a long time, all about my wife with our three-year-old son and our half-finished house, our birthdays celebrated in different restaurants around the city, the new places we'd visited together, mostly without enough budget.

I heard a honk from a near car, and then a woman screamed: "Oh, my God!". And then all became black and empty.

I opened my eyes without any much thought of what had happened. My son was reading a book on one side of the bed, and on the other side, my wife was talking to my non-listening son.

When my son saw me watching him, he crawled above my lying body and hugged me hard. He asked me what I was feeling. I said I was fine. Then my wife asked me to stop talking and just wait for the nurse to come.

My son asked me if I already saw my left foot. My wife answered him with a glare and asked him if he could just read the book silently. My son repeated his question to me.

The feeling I felt the other night entered my body in an instant. I was scared of pulling up the blanket covering my legs, of seeing the consequences of sin I never did.

[What do you think about the narration? Please, I need an honest comment.]