I don´t want to sleep. This headache is killing me. Writing will help me keep awake. Yes, that way I won´t sleep, no, no I won´t, no.
Where was I? Ah yes, the first night, Friday. My parents decided it was a perfect night to go out to the movies, or with friends, to dinner? Yeah something like that. I stayed at home alone, perfect, I would be able to do whatever I wanted, everyone loves staying at home alone, all night long.
Loud music, frozen pizza for dinner and my good friend the internet to keep me company.
That was the first night.
Foot steeps loud and clear. Thum thum thum. I lowered the laptop volume and listen carefully. Nothing, silence, what you usually expect to listen at tree in the morning. At that moment I blamed my imagination and the drowsiness, that’s what you do when strange things happen, yes, when you don´t want to think about it that much. Ridiculous, you´ll see, I live in a two storey house, my room on the second floor and there´s no access to the roof because there´s nothing to go up for.
I did the sensible thing, which was, go to sleep, it was late after all. I closed my eyes and the incident went lost in some place inside my head.
A whole week. Seven days. Hours… many hours.
Ha. I miss that week. What a nice week it was.
Second night, Friday. Since dinner last week was such a success, my parents decided to repeat the experience. Hahaha. I was so happy. And it came back. Oh of course it came back, and it wouldn´t go away this time.
The process repeated itself. I listened the steps. There was no doubt about it. Someone was walking on the roof above my room. Slow, heavy, persisten. It walked thum thum. Hehe thum.
Hours passed, no, minutes, long veeery long. I felt cold. Fear. I got up from the desk and ran to close the window and curtains of my room, then locked the door. Then I did the first think that came to mind. Publish it on Tumblr. Ah… that made me feel better, now the “world” would know about it. Comments apeared soon, anons even faster.
“Are you ok?” “Did you saw something?” “We want pictures!” “I bet it´s Slenderman having a night stroll.” “Attention hore” “lol just go to sleep bitch” “I´ll see you on tomorrows heading u ded.”.
I closed the computer, all of that was useless. I felt stupid, what was I expecting to happen? Common sense please, the causer was probably a cat, that was more logic. I went to bed and turned off the light.
Let´s say I didn´t slept that well. I kept hearing the steps inside my dream, woke up, and went back to sleep after hearing nothing. I didn´t really rested until I saw the light of my parents car through the curtains. They entered the house. I heard soft footsteps dragging on the floor of my bedroom carpet. I assumed it was mom. I was so tired and relieved that I didn´t bother to confirm
Saturday, nine o'clock ... ah ... I rested so little ... I tried in vain to return to sleep. Unmotivated, I remember thinking to go on a nice warm bath, a nice mental picture of which I woke up after I crashed against the door. When trying to turn the knob to open, the lock stopped me. Right, pfff, I closed it after hearing the footsteps. I removed the lock and continued my lazy walk. I am so stupid. S.T.U.P…I.D. I halted at the moment I passed my parents' room. Let's see, if my room was locked from the inside and in the morning it was still closed, oh. That thought bothered me all day long, worse after mom refused to have entered my room when they arrived last night.
I went to bed early, tired, obviously, that happens when you don´t sleep well. I confirmed that both window and door were closed and locked. I checked one, two, three times, onetwothree. I turned off the light and covered my head up with the blankets.
Dreaming felt so real, cold, so cold, that hand on my face. I woke up surrounded by darkness, the feeling of being watched over me.
I know you know the feeling, do not lie. I saw the time on the clock by the bed. 3:00 a.m. I heard it! Steps, those steps. I listened carefully, not moving, not breathing. But they didn´t came back. I began to believe it had been part of the dream. And I saw it. From the corner of my eye, a dark tall figure standing by the door.
I panicked. There could be no one inside, I closed, I closed, closed. It took me a whole bunch of minutes to gather the courage to see it directly.
It disappeared. I sat back leaning against the bed headboard. Nothing. I carefully studied the whole room. Nothing. Trembling, I got out of bed to check everything was closed. And it was.
The next morning I decided to talk to my parents. Steps? What steps? They got angry at me, they shouted at me for not warning them, what if, because of MY fault someone got into the house? If that ever happened again I should awake them, it could have been a thief, or worse, some crazy murderer. That night I would be ready.
I went to bed with a book. No music, no computer, awake, alert, I could still deal with the fatigue, it wouldn´t be hard. Hours and hours and nothing. Tick-tack. I saw the clock just when it struck three in the morning. Tight on time I heard it. My heart jumped inside my chest. I ran to the door and down the hall to my parents' room. Thum thum thum. There was no way they haven´t heard that.
They were asleep. The hard part was waking them up and when I made it, they almost chased me out screaming. They heard nothing, they were certain it was all a dream or a sound down the street and not the roof, the eco cause strange effects at night. Now go to sleep, in a few hours you have to go to school. Defeated, I returned to my room. I went to bed and tried to sleep, ignoring the feeling of being watched.
I heard them, footsteps on the carpet. I was so tired, didn´t want to go to school. The bed sank under the weight of another body. I need to sleep mom. It leaned over me. I opened my eyes and saw nothing. But... but there it was, behind my back, someone was bending over my body. I wanted to scream, hit that thing, get rid of it. My body wouldn´t respond, I could not move.
Knocks on the door woke me. Soaked in sweat I jolted up and started the search for the intruder, ready to fight for my life. Nothing. Mom came in claiming how late it was and that, if it took me one minute to get ready, she would not ride me to school. I nodded, I couldn´t speak, still sure something had gotten inside my room.
It wasn´t a dream, nononono, I do know it was not. I know because, you know why? Oh it was not the last time, ha no, that thing keep popping up. In the reflection of the bathroom mirror, his black silhouette hidden behind the door. During some classes it was there, on the corner of my eye, sometimes it was, sometimes it wasn´t, I could never know if he would appear.
My friends asked what was wrong, I didn´t wanted to bother them, and if I told them, they would have laugh at me. I blame it on the lack of sleep because of noisy neighbors. When night arrived, I´d sleep. Determination gave me strength. I would find out what was going on with the steps.
Upon returning home, I took advantage of my parents working until later after meal time. I got the stairs from the cellar and prepared myself to go up the roof. I needed evidence; I would show them someone have been walking on our roof. Some stranger with a sick sense of humor, or a stalker. I decided to arm myself with a broom, yes a broom indeed, I would have preferred the classic baseball bat with nails, but we cannot have everything we want in life.
Slowly, carefully, I went up step by step. At first glance, the area was free of, of everything, just like a roof must look like. I walked carefully, not wanting to slip and break my neck. I walked on all fours looking for suspicious shoeprints. I found a few leaves from the neighboring tree, dirt, grime, bird shit. That was good, yes, I was convinced that this was a good sign, if someone had been up here there would have been some kind of tracks. I give myself encouragement.
It caught my attention the sunshine bouncing off on something. Have you heard that curiosity killed the cat? I have ... hehehe ... I picked up the small object. A candle lamp with broken glass, rusty, dusty. It was the first time I ever saw it, it was not from any part of the house, or a neighbor I knew about, not from the outside at least. I turned it around; I traced the broken glass with my fingertips. I wanted to keep it, I didn´t cared where it had come from, that was the clue I wanted, whatever strolled through the roof at night, leaved behind the lamp. Now I had something that was his, maybe I could do something about it.
There are many tales of ghosts which are controlled with a personal object. I laughed at my thought. I sensed movement in the corner of the eye, I got distracted. Tripped and almost fell two stories high. Ha.
Who could have knew, that does not sound so bad right now.
I cursed, my heart pounding. The lamp slid down to the grass, accompanied by my temporary courage. That thing I saw, it had to be the odd shadow that followed me throughout the day, but more visible than before. Tall, hell it sure was tall, and bones? Ok finding the lamp surely stirred up my imagination.
The feeling of success vanished when the clock marked three in the morning. Experiencing suffocation, I sat up and looked at the ceiling. The steps, the steps! I wanted to cry. I curled up and covered my ears with both hands. Then I suddenly remembered. I opened the drawer of the nightstand and took the candle lamp out carefully not to drop any shard of glass. Now I would take action. I opened the window, the night breeze filled my lungs. Cold.
“Go away! Let me sleep or…or…! I´ll call the police!” Silence. I felt angry, annoyed of getting no answer back. “I have your lamp! If you don´t go away I´ll…I´ll break it!” Ha… haha… wow, what a wonderful threat, I´m so creative. THUM. Loud hits on the roof followed by silence. I panicked, closed the window and curtains. Bad idea, very bad idea. As I turn back there it was, near the door. Bent down, it narrowly exceeded the entrance frame high. His body was a deformed mass that... no, that was not his body. It was a blanket covering him, a cape of black, slimy flesh. My vision became blurred. The floor was moving under my feet.
I woke up with sore muscles, laid down by the side of the window. A sharp pain in my hand. I cut with of the broken glasses of the lamp, which so far, I held tightly close to my chest. I cried until I had to get ready for school.
It did not matter the hour I went to sleep, that is if I succeeded on falling asleep, at three in the morning I woke up hearing footsteps. Then the nightmares took place. Some nights I felt the silhouette choke me until sunrise, unable to remove it, completely trapped.
I blamed it on the lamp, I tried to get rid of it, oh how much I tried.
But it was worse. One day I threw it out the window and felt a bony hand holding my arm with extraordinary force. I stumbled down the stairs to the first floor while trying to retrieve it. I ignored as much as I could the bruising in the shape of a hand I found on my arm when I went to bathe that night.
The third Friday morning people started noticing something was wrong with me. To stay awake during class was impossible. My skin paled down to a sickly hue, highlighting the growing dark circles around my eyes, and the purple marks on my skin increased in number, in every place the sleepwalker grab me in dreams. It's just a bit of insomnia, nightmares will end soon, must be stress. Heh ... I do not remember at what point I named it. If he is the sleepwalker I should be the insomniac. Hehe.
After lunch, I dragged my body up to my room. I locked the door, it was no use, but I felt safer that way. I dressed to a large shirt and pajama pants. The sun still shone high, I couldn’t care less, my priority was sleeping. I fell on the bed without bothering to throw the covers over me. I watched the strange lamp on my desk. I hate it. My eyelids dropped. How sweet.
Thum thum thum No. No. Nonono. I was barely able to open my eyes, to see the blurry darkness that now reigned in the room. Family silhouette standing by the doorway. A dream, reality, my brain could not distinguish. The sleepwalker did not limit himself to just crush me with his long body. I clearly felt a bony hand caress my face and hair. He brought closer his face, veiled by darkness. Oh but what glittering eyes it had, two blue lights, little stars.
Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are…
His touch was cold, he gave off a metallic smell. It grabbed my shoulders and started to aggressively shake my body. I woke up with a scream, knocking on the door, my parents requiring for me to open right away, demanding to know what was happening. I believe they had to break the lock, I could not stop weeping, holding myself in fetal position, covering my ears, the footsteps were louder than their voices.
I told them about the nightmares, the dark silhouette, the footsteps. Every detail but the lamp. My parents looked at each other nervously, they watched my trembling body, the red eyes. Both tried to calm me down. Dad blame the hallucinations to the lack of rest, mom said she would get some medications to help me sleep. I tried to believe them, but couldn´t. While talking to them I saw him. As clear and solid as that night when I threatened to break his lamp. Now I could see the details, it seemed to blink and move continuously. His blanket made of living matter, moving, yellow bones stood out here and there, like ghoulish decorations. Crouched, face hidden by a threadbare hood, pale and dry hair, and two blue stars shining.
Dad left the room to call the doctor, passed by him without even flinching a muscle.
Mom forced me to stay in bed before going after Dad.
The sleepwalker didn´t move all. He had eyes only for me. Me. For me.
I took the lamp and I offered it, I stretched my arms at him and asked him to take it and leave. I cried. I screamed. He did not move. Nothing changed. I closed my tired eyes. I fell asleep a. mo.men.t. Waking up I retreated. He had walked closer. I threw the lamp at it.
Since that day, seven days ago exactly, I counted carefully, every time I sleep, even if it is a few seconds, he closes the distance between us. That's why, ah, that´s why I started writing right? Haha, I completely forgot.
I can barely see what I’m doing, everything is so blurry. Tomorrow I will reach a week of no sleep at all. Seven days is a week. I stopped going to school, I must stay awake. I threw away the medication for insomnia; I will not let it approach me, even if his footsteps echoes through the night, I hear them inside my head.
I keep wandering around the room at the pace dictated by the steps. I´m gonna go to the ceiling with the lamp, I still have it, right now resting on my lap. Yes, and I´ll throw it far, far, veryveryvery far away from here. And it will go away ... Yes I will throw that lamp.
Because.
If I fall asleep…………
Was him this close before? I sdfkçñlasnsdf asd
I can see his eyes shining
Shine
Twinkle twinkle little star
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..stps…steps…pp………………………….In my head
How I wonder what you areee
He
Hehehe
I feel so good. So much better…
He.
It is a lovely night.
Ah…There it is again.
Thum thum thum
Can you hear them?
Thum thum thum
Can you hear my steps. Here I am, my footsteps, with you.
Thum
Thum
Thum