Outside the Light

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I crouch just outside the light. Facing into the darkness toward the unknown out there. Others lie sleeping quietly in their sleeping bags or sit chatting idly by the campfire.
They don’t know that I’m here. My sleeping bag is filled with clothes and my knapsack.
They wouldn’t understand why I watch. Nor would they believe me if I told them what I know.
I’ve tried, believe me, many times with others much the same as these. Even those closest to me think I’m slightly paranoid, slightly off kilter in my ideas. No harm can come to them. They’ve never offended anyone, neither varied in their thinking from the consensus, the status quo. Never have they asked “please sir, may I have some more”. Go along to get along is their creed.
Five days on, two days off, every week. Week after week, the same old thing, the same old people, nothing ever changes for them.

But I watch, not just tonight, but while they're off living their short, pathetic, little lives.

Once I was much like them, going day by day to the job assigned to me. But, that was before…….

A night bird calls, my eyes turn slowly in that direction, my ears listening………listening for anything unusual. Nothing. Just more of the quietness, more of the dark, yet it waits, out there, somewhere. Somewhere…. ahead.