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The Painted

The_Last_Phantom
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Synopsis
Ever since I remember I have always been intrigued by antiquated places. The kind of places that are abandoned with no trace of the human touch yet are crowded by the shadows of the past. The ancientness, the haunting yet captivating stillness that is shrouded in mystery has always called to me. The distant voice that sounds deceptively familiar echoes in the hallways travelling room to room with every intention of being heard and so I followed the echo taking me home. To a place that I have spent decades living in and yet don’t know how to find. It belongs to the deepest and darkest corner of my mind. To a place that is secluded from everyone like a hidden treasure in the heart of a majestic mountain or a lost shrine of an ancient and forgotten God, a place that I cannot enter yet know of its existence or at least I thought I could not until that morning…
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Chapter 1 - The Phone Call

It was a cold autumn morning and the sun, probably still exhausted had forgotten to wake up again.

The sky looked cold and lonely and the crash of thunder every now and then was nothing less from agonizing, but it was still another typical Monday for me and by that, I mean I was still in the period of hibernation, sleeping and hiding away from all the activities that a person must do in order to be considered a contributing member of the society.

But was it really my fault that I was experiencing an enormous writer's block? It was probably the biggest I have experienced in my 5-year-old writing career.

I must say I was losing this battle, slowly accepting defeat, and letting the enemy decide my fate. Would it make me give up writing? Not that there was much to give up in the first place.

I had swallowed this bitter pill called reality long ago that I wasn't talented enough or perhaps I wasn't creative enough to become successful and that I was a 27-year-old broke writer who would very soon become homeless, in exactly 23 hours and 35 minutes.

I can already paint a picture of my morbid future and it is getting more vivid by the second. Finally, my anxiety decided it had enough and made me experience a great panic attack and yet there was nothing I could do, there was nowhere for me to go.

You see that's what anxiety does, it creates this illusion that there is something you can always do even when you can't and even when you know this you will still fall victim to this curse and there is no running from it because it is your own mind and I have yet to learn how to escape it.

I was deep in thought securely nestled into my blankets, hiding in the comforts of my bed when the muffled sound of the phone ringing broke the deafening silence and disturbed my peace.

I slowly crept out of bed and pulled the shabby grey curtains aside. The room had finally gotten some light after days of darkness.

I'm sure the bed bugs are thanking me for that. I slowly glanced around the room, it was a mess, and I was a bigger mess but there was nothing surprising in that but what was surprising was the fact that I was able to locate the phone in the first 15 seconds of it ringing, now that was a record which I would surely never break.

Among the unwashed filthy plates and utensils that scattered the floor the remains of a stained ragged carpet could be seen.

While slowly glancing at the caller Id I picked up a leather-bound book from the ground and placed it on the small dusty shelf beside the bed. Upon the first glance I was convinced almost instantly to turn off the phone and go back to bed.

My blood boiled and I started to slowly nibble on my chipped nails after picking up the phone and pressing it to my ear.