Footsteps and voices

Published April 22, 2009

When I explore abandoned buildings alone, I always hear footsteps. Or voices. It is half paranoia, half fantasy.

So when I heard footsteps, I stood rigidly, willing my body to chameleonize with the wall—but most of my brain dismissed my fears, since I always hear footsteps, but they are never truly there.

But then I heard voices. And footsteps—definitely footsteps, not creeks or the settling sounds of rubble getting comfortable. The voices and steps came up the stairs towards my floor—maybe three or four people total. I considered twelve different plans of action, but my body remained still. The voices grew closer, closer, farther, farther, up the stairs. I heard them thump above me, and then they faded away.

I continued taking photographs, exploring acres of an abandoned factory complex—the Xanadu of abandoned factories, really—but I was constantly aware that these people were somewhere nearby. Around the next corner. Behind me. I felt comforted by the dull weight of my tripod, and somewhere in the back of my mind I resolved to do more push-ups.

And then I saw them. I was walking between two buildings, and three children were walking towards me. Teenagers. Fourteen, perhaps. They stopped. I stopped. There was a girl, a boy walking beside her, and a second boy with a bicycle.

We stood thirty meters apart. I waved. They nodded. And we all moved on.