3:00am.
My wife and I are asleep in our room, and our two boys 4 and 6 years are asleep in their room. We have one length of the king sized bed pushed against the wall, as it was too big in a proper position to fully accommodate the rest of our furniture. Sizing down was not an option yet, as we end up more often than not waking up with one or both of them sprawled up in our bed. My wife slept next to the wall, as I needed the luxury of being able to sit up and get off the bed right away, as my day started just before dawn.
“Creak… Thud” a soft but familiar sound of our bedroom door open and slam into the door stopper woke me up. I wear a night mask to sleep so I couldn’t see neither did I bother to take it off and glance to check who it was. I tried to guess which one of our little troublemakers it might be as I waited for the familiar sensation of a kid climb and settle next to the parent of their choice of that night.
“Mom? I’m scared, I heard a scary noise in our bathroom.” Whispered my older son, standing by the edge of my side of the bed, clearly scared out of his wits by the tone. I reached my arm out to him, eyes still shut under the mask, and gently pulled him up to the bed and tucked him in the middle of us. “Don’t worry it’s probably the wind”, I comforted him. “But but…” he protested as he hugged me, but sleep won him over and he quickly drifted back to sleep.
I lay the next few minutes awake, wondering if there was any reason for concern behind his complaint of the noise, maybe a window or balcony door left open. I contemplated whether to get up and do a full sweep of the house, as there has been a string of burglaries through the neighborhood recently. I listened in closely to see if I could hear any noise, to justify the trouble of finally pulling the night mask off and getting up from the bed. As I layed in my self imposed darkness, I felt an eery chill breeze in the room, but as I caught on the low hum of the air conditioning unit in our room I quickly deducted it was just doing its job.
“thwack”
There it was, ever so softly to still have me doubt whether I heard it or whether it was in my mind. “Fine” I thought to myself, “let’s check it out”. I sat up, finally peeling off the cover off darkness from my eyes. I look for the a neon green/yellow smudge across the blur of where our table was, successfully locating my spectacles and putting it on to see everything in clear vision. I have a very bad case of near sightedness without my glasses, and everything that is not an inch of my face becomes a blur. We sleep with the lights off, however the various tiny LEDs of our appliances like the air conditioner and phone charging docks was just enough to provide the light for me to see. I checked our windows first, then moved out into the living room.
We lived in a two bedroom apartment on the third floor, and while the chances of getting burgled was lower than those exposed on the ground floor and first floors, it was still higher than I was comfortable with. I checked our only and main door outside, and then the sliding full sized windows in the living room balcony. All of our windows and sliding balcony doors are covered with curtains to maintain our privacy from the adjacent apartments. Everything in the living room waslocked as it should be.
“Thwack”
Louder this time, I figured instantly what happened and quickly looked at the door of our kids room. I open the door softly and made a beeline to their balcony. There, ever so slightly their sliding doors was open for the wind to push their door into the frame and make the noise whenever a wind gust picked up. I shut it, checked on my younger one, check their bathroom windows, and quickly made my way back to our room. I checked the time, 3:07am. “Oof, that creepy witching hour”, I thought so to myself, a fact that always lingered in the back of my mind whenever I woke up in the middle of the night, no thanks to the long list of horror movies I loved to watch. I put my phone away, climbed back into bed, pulled on the night mask to block all the pesky little lights from the electronics and fell asleep.
The next thing I remember felt instant yet slow. I was having an uneventful dream, just me standing somewhere around in our town with no indication of the terror that was about to unfold in the next few seconds in real life. I was still in that dream when I heard my older son, who was now sleeping next to me whisper again and again. “Dad I’m really scared dad I’m really scared”. I heard my wife yell my name out loud, and I instantly sat up, peeling the night mask off my face as my head was locked up towards the ceiling of our room. A heavy sense of dread enveloped my face and shoulders as if someone or something clung onto my back, and yet this mysterious terror floated right above us in the ceiling as well. I felt the urgent need to protect my wife and child from whatever this evil entity was, and I fought for what felt the longest time to fight off it’s grasp and banish it as I kept yelling the words “AUZUBILLAH MINASHAITAN NI RAJEEM” (I seek refuge in Allah from the outcast Shaitan (devil)). My wife proceeded to shout my name and slap me hard again and again with both hands on my shoulders, trying to shake me out of my paralysis. Finally I realized that it was only now that I actually managed to say the words, and broke free. I quickly got up from the bed, my face still locked up towards whatever the blur of a clear energy it was without my prescription glasses on, and it felt like whatever it was had leapt off me and spun around the room before dissipating out of our balcony windows.
I quickly grabbed my spectacles and put it on and turn on the lights, scanning around the room to make sure we are safe and whatever it was, was gone. Next I quickly ran into my son’s room to make sure the younger one was safe. He was fast asleep in his bed, no indication of any disturbance from the event that had just transpired next door. I scoop him up and carried him back to our bed, so that we all were safe together. My wife tucked in the kids whilst still sitting up on her side of the bed, and then turned to look at me her face full of fear and worry.
“What happened?” She asked.
“I…I don’t know. I don’t know. Did you see anything? Did you feel anything?” I replied, still in shock and trembling, all the hair on my skin still standing electrified with the worst case of goosebumps that have set in.
“No, I didn’t see anything. All I heard was our son said he was scared and then you started grunting and shouting something. What were you trying to say?”
“I was saying Auzubillah, trying to at least. I think I only managed to actually say it out loud and break free after my fourth or fifth attempt.” I came to realization as I slowly recalled the event again.
“Was this another episode of your sleep paralysis? You never sat up like this before. Did you feel or sss anything evil or malicious?” She continued her investigation.
“No…no… No. I don’t know. I don’t know if it was just a dream or in my head and I couldn’t see clearly without my glasses so I really don’t know.”
The more I thought about it, the more confused I was about what was real or just an instance of my mind playing a trick on me. One thing was definite for sure. I would be scared of the dark for nights to come.