A cemetery is a strange place. Not for the obvious reasons that you would think. Of course, they are filled with dead bodies, and are an overall gloomy place to visit, but that’s not what intrigues me about them.
I was sitting on the train, starring out the window, when we passed a cemetery. What was strange about this one was the fact that it had a solid 8-foot wall with barbed wired spiraled around the top. It got me to wondering: Who are they trying to keep out?
As curious as a cat, I couldn’t help but to check things out.
That evening, I walked the several blocks from my apartment to the cemetery with the concrete wall. At first there didn’t appear to be a gate, to get into the cemetery, which I found very peculiar, but nonetheless more intriguing. I continued to walk along the wall that never seemed to end.
I turned the corner and found myself staring down a dark street. The street lamps appeared to be out, and there wasn’t a person in sight. I hesitated for a moment, and then continued along the concrete wall. The further I walked, the darker it became. All the light seemed to extinguish as I walked on. I ran my fingers along the wall as I walked, the darkness was overwhelming and making it hard to see.
Finally, I felt the wall disappear beneath my fingers and I was startled by the sudden cold that seized my fingers. Realizing that I was now touching a cold, iron gate, I gave a little chuckle. Giving the door a little push, it creaked open.
I suddenly felt unsettled. It seemed strange that a cemetery with such measures to keep people out would overlook such a thing as an unlocked gate. Figuring it was luck I stepped inside the unnaturally dark cemetery.
As soon as I took two steps into the cemetery, what little light there was to begin with seemed to extinguish and the hair in my lungs was sucked right out. Panic crept up my spine as every hair on my body began to vibrate with apprehension.
Something wasn’t right.
I turned around to leave, only to realize that the gate I had come through had disappeared. Only darkness remained where the gate once stood. Turning around quickly, I felt the cold air surround me like a blanket. A suffocating blanket.
Fear paralyzed me, but only for a moment. The very next moment a sound, then a touch, made me scream out loud. Only, the scream didn’t carry like it normally would when a person is standing in the middle of a deserted cemetery where you could hear a spider spinning its web. Instead, it fell flat as if the cold night air absorbed it as soon as it left my lips.
I tried to run, but my legs were rooted in their spot. I couldn’t move. The ominous air was smothering me, stealing the air from my lungs, bit by bit.
Suddenly—long, icy fingers gripped my throat and all went black. I took in a mouthful of cold hair and heard myself gasp.
Finally, I felt myself picking up my legs to move. I began to run as fast as I could. Headstones and monuments jumped out at me as I ran with out knowledge of where I was going. Statues of angels and stone gargoyles seemed to be reaching out for me as I ran—pain searing in my chest, the cold air tearing at my lungs.
I heard the leaves shuffling behind me as I ran, but I was too scared to see if someone, or something, was following me. With a loud crack, and a cry of pain I hit what felt like a brick wall. In fact, it was an 8-foot high, concrete wall. I had found it.
A wave of hope overwhelmed me as I began to run along the wall, looking for a gate, like the one that let me in. I ran for what seemed like miles and nothing. No way, out. I jumped, trying to grab onto something, in order to climb the wall, but found nothing. I took a breath, and looked to each side, fear and panic threatening to overcome me. I could see something to my right.
Maybe, just maybe, if I could climb on top, I could climb over the wall. I ran to the stone mausoleum that stood next to the wall. As I was climbing to the top of the stone structure, I looked at my escape route and cried out in despair.
I had forgotten. Barbed wire glinted menacingly in the darkness. There was no way out.
And that’s when I realized. The cemetery wasn’t trying to keep people out.
It wanted to keep me in.