Scary Stories

Scary stories, huh? You guys want scary stories. All right then, I've got one for you, and I hope you enjoy it because you probably won't be sleeping for a while after I tell it. And no, it's not going to be like one of those damned urban legends that your friends are always sending you links to in your e-mail. You see, this is a true story of what happened to me and my cousin Dawood back in 2005.

Back then we were living in Egypt. I really love Cairo. It's a great city, it really is, but since we hardly had any money, we wound up staying in one of the many poor neighborhoods that all you Euro-American tourists never really see. So me and my cousin were always trying to think of ways we could make some extra money to get out of the slums. Usually it meant taking the occasional odd job here or there, but Dawood... he liked to think big. He always had some 'get rich' scheme going through his head. Not that any of them ever worked, mind you, but that never stopped him.

Anyway, as it turns out, I started dating this really cute Palestinian girl from the West Bank. The thing was, she had more money than either of us; a LOT more money in fact. You might recognize her last name if I were to write it. Her family was really famous in the region, and they owned a lot of businesses both in Palestine and other countries like Jordan, Syria and yes, even Egypt. And fortunately, they really must have taken a liking to me, because they set me up with a job in the city and everything. Things weren't great, mind you, but they were considerably better than they had been.

But that wasn't good enough for Dawood. No, he wouldn't settle for anything short of having as much money, fame and power as humanly possible. So when I tried to get him a job too, my asshole of a cousin turned it down and embarrassed both of us. I was pretty pissed at him for that. But my girlfriends' brother had other ideas. He took Dawood aside and told him about another surefire way to make a lot of money... quickly and off the radar, so to speak.

Now, you probably know about Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip. And you've probably even heard about the tunnels that smugglers use to transport goods past the Israelis. It turns out there is quite the black market in Palestine these days. People will spend huge amounts of cash just to buy cigarettes, movies, clothing, just about anything really. Or at least, those Palestinians who still have any money. And people who smuggle goods into the country -- both Palestinians and other nationalities - stand to make quite a tidy little profit at their expense.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, I was really against the idea. And it wasn't just ethical concerns either. Part of the reason that smugglers who ran the Israeli blockade could get away with charging those kind of fees was because it was dangerous. There was a very real risk of getting arrested, or more likely, simply being shot on the spot. Not to mention the fact that other smugglers were just as likely to try offing you as the border patrol. So I told Dawood that I didn't want any part of this, but he just kept pressuring me.

"Just one run," he said, "Then we'd be rich enough to retire. Trust me on this!"

If you have a cousin, or younger sibling, then you probably know how these things go all too well. Eventually, I just wound up giving in to him. I'm not even sure how it happened, really, but the next thing I knew, we were setting up for our first (and presumably only) run across the border into the Gaza Strip.

Somehow, Dawood managed to track down a really cheap old station wagon. He said it was preferable, since it had lots of space in back for storing our cargo (in this case, a huge stash of stolen cigarettes). That may have been true, but it was hardly an elegant looking vehicle. The once white paint had been corroded away, leaving irregular patches of rusty brown, and there were several dents here and there indicating where it had been through car accidents. And then there was the smell inside of it... But I guess decades of exposure to the harsh environment out in the Egyptian countryside will do that.

Since we were going to do an overland crossing from the Sinai, we made our way out there on the night of the new moon. Some of you out there might be thinking this was some sort of religious thing, or an old Arab superstition, but it's not. It was just a matter of pragmatism; no moon meant it was the darkest night of month. After choosing a suitable camp site and loading ourselves down with some emergency supplies in case we broke down or ran out of gas, we slowly started to creep towards the forbidden border.

Driving on half-forgotten back roads in the Middle East is no small challenge, especially when you have your headlights off to avoid attracting attention. We had to go very slowly indeed, but then, you also have to consider what would have happened to us if we were to get caught. Unfortunately, as exciting as this might sound to you sitting comfortably in front of your computer at home, it was mostly just boring. Boring and monotonous.

Dawood popped in an old tape of some Egyptian pop singers. Yes, people were still listening to cassette tapes in some parts of the world even in 2005. But this did little to relieve the boredom, as it was the same sort of poppy love songs over and over again. Finally, I got so tired of it that I popped out the tape and tossed it out the window. Dawood was a little pissed at me, so we just wound up driving in utter silence for what seemed like an eternity.

I don't know how long things went on like that, but as I felt myself beginning to drift off, I suddenly saw a dark figure walk out onto the road in front of us. I don't think that Dawood saw it, because he didn't seem to be making any effort to avoid it.

"Look out," I screamed, causing Dawood to veer off the road, just missing a collision with this mysterious figure.

As we sped past it... him... whatever it was, I looked over and saw that it seemed to be an old man wearing a dark colored gelabiyya. I remember being confused as to what the hell he was doing out there in the middle of nowhere.

"Shit," exclaimed Dawood, "What the hell was that?"

"I don't know," I shrugged, "But maybe we should go back. You almost hit him. I mean... he could be hurt or something."

"Oh! Hell no! What if he's Israeli! What if he's fucking IDF! Do you want to get us killed!"

"I don't think he's IDF," I replied, "I mean they don't go out walking alone. Wouldn't they have stopped us by now? Besides he looked like he was Arab."

"Yeah," Dawood snorted, "That's so much better, isn't it? So instead of getting arrested we'd just wind up getting shot by the Egyptian cops!"

"Dude, he's wearing a fucking gelabiyya. I don't think he's border patrol or anything. Probably just some old man. We really should make sure he's okay!"

Something I said must have finally gotten through to Dawood, because he wound up making a u-turn and driving back to check on the old man we nearly ran over. I really wish that he hadn't.

When we finally got back there, the old man was still standing in the same spot, completely motionless. He seemed to be unfazed by our car coming back around. It really freaked us out, actually. Dawood nervously pulled alongside of him and rolled down his window.

"Merhaba," he said, "Sorry about almost hitting you back there. We honestly didn't even see you. Are you okay?"

The man said nothing. He simply stared at us with a blank expression on his face.

" Are you okay," Dawood repeated.

He was starting to get a little angry. I could tell by the tone in his voice.

"Maybe he's deaf," I said.

"Like he can't hear us?"

The man looked over at me, as if to acknowledge that he could in fact hear us. I don't know, there was just something spooky about the whole situation. And it was just then that I noticed there was something... off about this man. Not just his behavior, but his appearance too. His eyes, his nose, his mouth... all of it seemed somehow weird and out of proportion. Like he wasn't a real person or something. But what happened next really freaked us out.

The man leaned over into the car and grinned at us... not a friendly smile, no. More like a menacing grin as if he knew something that we didn't. The man's face started to twist and contort, taking on a truly horrific appearance. His mouth kept stretching inhumanly wide, and his eyes seemed to get bigger, as if they were about to pop out of his head.

"I am them," he said in a monotone voice, "And they are coming! Soon they will be here, and so will I!"

Needless to say, we were completely freaked out by this point. Dawood just put his foot to the pedal, speeding off. Too terrified to say anything, I looked back to see if we'd left the man (if it could even be called that) behind us. To my shock, there was nothing back there. It was as if he had disappeared into thin air. I didn't have much time to think about it, because suddenly there were lights in the sky, and damn were they bright. Bright enough to light up the whole freaking desert. That was when Dawood really started to freak out.

"Shit," he said, "It's the IDF! They're coming for us!"

He started to go faster, swerving over the barely used road and hitting every bump along the way. I was afraid we were going to crash or something. But I was more afraid of the lights... you see, they weren't helicopter lights. I don't know what they were, but they weren't making any sound, and they were going faster than anything I'd ever seen before. And they just kept following us, as if they were waiting... waiting for something. Or maybe waiting for us to do something.

Everything got really weird after that. I don't know how long we drove along that road, trying to get away from whatever the hell those lights were, but at some point everything just stopped. Abruptly. We just stopped moving, and a blindingly white light filled the car.

That was it. I don't know what happened in that whole time, because when I woke up, it was day again and I was back in Cairo, still safely inside of the car. Groggily, I turned over and looked toward the driver's seat. Dawood was nowhere to be found. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw what looked to be the reflection of a man sitting behind me in the rearview mirror. Not just any man, but the creepy guy that we had seen the night before. And he was still laughing. Jolted awake by fear, I turned around only to see that the seat was (thankfully) empty.

I don't pretend to know what happened that night, and I'm not sure that I want to either. Dawood turned up a couple of days later, wandering through the backstreets of Cairo. He's never been the same since then. In fact, he still won't talk about what happened on that night. He doesn't even go out of the apartment after dark either. And me? I'm still plagued by nightmares of spindly, insect-like beings hovering over me, horrific machines and a white light that singes away flesh.

Dear God, what happened on that strange and terrible night?