It wasn’t sunny nor a long way through the village. It wasn’t dark though, the streetlights saw to that. No, it was more the knowledge that someone at some point went missing in this country. Lost without a trace, hotel room undisturbed. My friend got in my head with her story.
It was only a twenty minute walk and if anyone should be afraid, it should be the sad soul that tips me into borderline rage. I told myself that it’s ok to walk alone in the not-that-darkness. The jungle went from nothing to prominent and the streetlights became further and further between.
When I arrived, it was an oasis in the forest. Two guards were bored at the gate and the raw asphalt turned to carefully laid bricks. There was a palace to walk into and a friendly waiter to serve the Sauvignon Blanc and shrimp tacos. A waterfall plätschert into the pool. People were playing tennis.
After I had eaten, I asked the waiter to call me a taxi. The darkness was darker, you see, and the friend of a friend had been missing for over a decade. Thirty minutes later the taxi had called for the third time and the waiter said I should just wait, things don’t move so quickly here.
I’d paid the bill ages ago. I stood in front of the palace and there was no taxi. For too many minutes. No taxi was coming.
“Alright then, brain, let’s you and me have a chat about this situation,” I said to my overactive imagination. “If anyone should be afraid, it’s those who would fuck with us.”
It had been a good forty minutes, so I headed out towards the road. It was darker than the darkness should have been. The flat jungle leaves shuttered in the wind. The street lamps left oceans of black outside of their spectral spheres.
A kid rode by on his bike. “Good night,” he said, in English. And then he laughed his sinister laugh.