Street-lamp.

 The street was littered with empty soda-cans and dry leaves; it was Fall. As he walked down the pavement, a slight chill passed through his body that had nothing to do with the fiercely cold wind blowing at his face. 

It was like he was pushing a boulder, every step he took against the wind only wearied him down, and the only fear adrift in his mind was of falling back; and never ever reaching home. But languidly, deliberately, he sauntered on.

It was pitch-dark and the only illumination on the street was of the street-lamp ahead; flickering haphazardly, yet with a strange regularity that was slightly unnerving. As he moved forward, pushing away the veils of tenebrosity and silence that shrouded him, he sniffed. And the sniff was something so unnatural, something so abnormal that he felt the ambience around him change; it was no longer this indistinct alley anymore.

He stopped. His sight caught hold of the bruise he had gotten earlier that day.It seemed so much older, so much more parched. He had aged a hundred years that day. Suddenly, from nowhere, came this overwhelming wave of guilt and melancholy that threatened to engulf him, and he was scared. And then, a voice inside his head said, " Keep walking, and it will all go away."

And so he did. A river of tears trickled down his bare cheek as he did so. He stopped again and looked up to see a single ray of sunshine piercing through the valleys that lay in front of him. It was then he said, 

"I'm sorry."

And he walked on.