The Twigh Light Zone

The Twig Light Zone

By: Kevin Martin

Six A.M., I awake to my alarm clock buzzing in my ear; I have one of those clocks that get louder the longer they ring and usually starts my day off on a bad note. Yawning, I sit, up rub my eyes and notice that my wife is not in the bed. “That’s strange.” I think to myself. “It’s quite early for her to be up.”

I get out of bed and stumble down the stairs expecting to hear my family going about their business. “Good morning!” I shout from the bottom of the steps. I don’t notice that no one answers because I’m too occupied trying to open the child gate. “Morning, I said!” There is no reply. I shrug it off assuming they left and decided to leave me sleep in.

The only thing that’s really on my mind right now is caffeine, so I begin to fumble with the coffee pot. Yawning and stretching, I look through the back window into our driveway; my wife’s car is still there. “What the…” I mutter as I open our back door. There’s no way her sister is awake by now, and that’s the only person I can think of who’d she be with.

Standing on our back deck, I notice something else that’s odd. I can hear what seems to be fifty other alarm cocks ringing, and all the neighbor-hood dogs are barking at the doors of their houses. I go back inside to get the phone and trip over my daughters’ school bag. This is really strange, why would she not have her books if she’s at school?

I dial my sister- in- law’s phone number hoping to gain some sort of clarity. It just rings and rings until the voice message comes on. At this point I’m beginning to panic. I turn on the TV only to see fuzz and hear static, no channel is coming through. After searching each channel and dialing every phone number I can think of, I decide to try the internet. I can get online easy enough, but the websites haven’t been updated since the day before, which is weird for news sites.

I sit on my living-room chair and stare down at my one-year-old son’s toys that are strewn across the floor. My eyes gather tears as the truth comes to me. I am all alone. I’ll never see my family or friends again. Do I really exist if there is no one here to exist for? Why should I exist if there’s nobody to exist with?

The End