The evening was long gone. Night was closing in on the city. In a dingy backstreet dull streetlights were throwing long slanting shadows over the few people walking on it.

There were only a few of them, though. It was at the back of the bustling heart of the city. Only those living on and around the street ever walked it.

Thibaut walked down the street slowly. He was holding a rolled canvas in his left hand. He shivered as a gust of cold wind swept down the street and hit him mercilessly. His worn out clothes offered a flimsy protection against the freezing winter night. He hurried his steps. He had to reach the warm shelter of his room as soon as possible.

At the bend of the street stood a street light, throwing an eerie glow of dull yellow around it. A man was standing beneath it. He was holding a long rolled object in his left hand. From a distance the object looked familiar to Thibaut.

He drew nearer and as he was passing the man, he could not help but look at the man’s hand, holding the familiar-looking object. His eyes took in the frayed edges of the coat-sleeve, the worn-out glove, the rolled white object…

A rolled canvas! Held in a hand that was so familiar to him!

Stunned, he looked up at the face of the man. It was half-hidden in the shadow thrown by the tattered edges of an old hat.

Still he could see who the man was. There was no mistake in it!

He was staring at himself!

The doppelganger continued to stare at him with cold unblinking eyes. A stifled cry escaped Thibaut’s lips. He staggered back and started to run down the street. He had to flee as far as possible…

He was breathing hard when he reached his room. He felt his heart hammering against his chest. Pulling off his gloves and throwing away his hat, Thibaut went to the basin and splashed cold water on his face. He was trying hard to calm down his mind.

But his mind was already on a fiery ride. It rolled and rolled through the dark crevices of foreboding and premonition. Why did he have to face a doppelganger all on a sudden? He kept on asking himself.

That night he had a strange dream.

In his dream, he walked through a valley lit up by a dull glowing light. Queer trees raised their heads here and there. The ground beneath was stony.

He walked forward on the rough stony path. Wind blew hard and kept thrusting him forward. For some reason unknown to him, he wanted to move forward, to find out what lay at the end of the valley.

At the far end of the valley, stood a tall tree. Beneath the tree sat a man scribbling something in a paper. As Thibaut stood in front of him, the man looked up. A cold shiver went down Thibaut’s spine as the doppelganger looked up at him and said in a cold voice, “Today at 6-15 in the evening your life will come to its end.”

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

As he spoke, the earth seemed to spiral around Thibaut and he tumbled through a dark tunnel. An inhuman cry burst from his throat and he cried himself awake. He sat panting on his bed, his shirt soaked in sweat and clinging to his body.

What, in the name of God, was happening with him?

He could not understand it. Still, his heart was heavy with an unknown feeling. He looked at the clock. It was 3-30 in the morning. Still enough time was left to catch a few hours’ good sleep. But he could not sleep anymore.

What was going to happen with him? Was anything going to happen at all? Who would provide him with an answer?

The morning slowly rolled into day. Then the day trudged towards evening.

As evening approached, Thibaut started to become restless. A heavy sense of premonition slowly gripped him and stifled him. He started to grasp for relief. He looked at the clock again and again.

The hour hand of the clock was trudging towards 4 already. Thibaut felt his restlessness growing into a blanket of fog, stifling his breath out. Time was moving slowly as if trudging through a pool of fetish water. What could he do to ignore its passage?

He was sitting at his small office and trying to finish a sketch. He was a random commercial artist eking out an existence and trying to save enough money to start his own studio someday.

“Why is this happening to me?” Thibaut asked in his mind. “Sure, I am insignificant enough to attract the wrath of Fate or something?”

Thibaut took out his cell phone. He set an alarm for 6-15, put the phone back in his pocket and tried to concentrate on the job at his hand.

The day’s light slowly died outside the window. Thibaut looked up from his work. He was more restless than ever. He decided to put up his work and call it a day.

Thibaut walked through the maze of alleys and backstreets. The evening shadows followed at his footsteps and became darker and darker.

At one point the alley he was walking through, crossed a dark and desolate road. Thibaut reached the mouth of intersection and looked both ways before starting to cross. At the far end of his right hand side he saw the dim headlight of an approaching vehicle. It was still far away, so he started to cross the road.

Just then a shrill noise came from inside his pocket and the cell phone inside it started to vibrate.

The alarm he had set for 6-15 had gone off.

It went on and on. Without thinking anything, Thibaut stopped in the middle of the road and started taking out the phone.

From the far right end of the road the huge truck came screeching at Thibaut. It hit him directly. For a second, his body was airborne. Then it smashed into the side of the road and lay there motionless.

The broken watch at his wrist showed the time. It was 6-15.