For as long as I can remember, I’ve seen things on the periphery of my vision—motes floating in the shadows, flashes of film, elongated figures nodding in agreement. #ScaryStories #horror #rt @gothamghosts 
On the day I saw my doppleganger turn the corner into an alley, the edge of my vision had been shaky.
This was a day that started with snow and piercing cold, no number of layers enough to keep the Chicago winter away, my flesh numb, the cogs in my head slow to turn.
It was a day where night descended quickly, the Blue Line train shrieking as it pierced the concrete tunnel, the earth around me suffocating.
It had been a day of near misses, when I look back on it now.
The tree branch snapping in the cold, and shattering on the frozen ground; the CTA bus barreling forward, oblivious; a car running a red light, slamming into a UPS truck, followed by a glass and metal cacophony.
So when I followed my echo into the alley between the Polish restaurant and the corner market, fluorescent lights flickering in the gloom, it was not without a layer of uncertainty.
My twin stood at the end of the alleyway, his back to me, wearing the same outfit that I had on—blue jeans, tattered boots, and a black leather jacket—the grey knit hat on his head bobbing up and down as if crying, or perhaps eating something.
The closer I got to him the more the alley shimmered—my eyes watering as the wind picked up, emotions bubbling to the surface.
For so long my life has been on hold—one failure after another, invisible walls going up whenever I’d have an iota of success, everything fractured and futile.
That day felt like a homecoming, like I could finally let it all go—the buzzing just behind my left ear, the itch on my right arm that never really went away, the fracture in my spine that asked me to bend over carefully, lest I break.
I wanted to ask him so many questions, but when I opened my mouth, something entirely unexpected came out.
There was the long, slow dial and screech of my computer trying to connect to the internet, cables snaking through a dark, viscous liquid, a sharp pain at the base of my neck.
There was the spilling out of tiny spiders, their black, furry bodies evacuating my shell in a panic—skittering across my frame, as my mouth remained stuck open, eyes wide, tears streaming down my face.
There was the throbbing that started in my throat, and spread to my lips, my hand coming up to my mouth, the chapped skin on my lips, a hair stuck, an edge exposed, my fingers gently probing, then pulling, unspooling until I was fully revealed.
When I left the alley, it was awkward at first, like a fawn learning to walk, but I quickly acclimated to my surroundings.
In my blue jeans and shiny boots, my black leather jacket, a grey knit cap on top of my head, there was only a moment of hesitation, as I glanced back down that alley, squinting to see the pile of material that lumped at the end of the alley.
That had nothing to do with me, I thought. And I turned around, never looking back.
