I am from a small island nation where the economy is not too good nor too bad. Our education systems are free and if you are smart enough (or able to cramp gigabytes of information in your head) you may be able to get a chance at attending university.
Free.
And it’s no joke.
I was one of the lucky ones. I somehow got into do a degree (which I will not mention for personal reasons). Still, free university comes with a catch. You can’t choose it. You get what they give you, even if it’s on the other side of the island. It’s a beggars can’t be choosers policy. You get good marks of your A/L exams, you can choose where to go. Others, you can choose where you go to too, but your first choices will be ignored if your level is not upto standard for that particular university.
For me, I had to travel to the other corner of the country. The thing is, eventhough my country is small and tiny and no one probably never even heard of it, there are also of races and religions intermixed. Some places have more of one race than the other, where they speak a different language altogether.
For me and my parents, it was terrifying. My uni was in a different area, an eight our ride away from home, where the locals had a different culture and language altogether.
Still, first years were given a mercy from universities.
We are given hostels.
When I first learned of it, I expected a small cramped house with a dark room and paint peeling off the walls. There whould be one window with a creaking bed and washrooms that would either always dirty or smelly. But to my surprise, the hostels were great. It was a four person room, with bunk beds above and a table top with drawers below as a part of the bed (it was quite novel) and two good public washrooms per floor. The building was new, there was even a study area and facilities to order food. Even security was well thought through, with a guard in the bottom floor at the entrance and a twenty four hour warden available and residing in the building for safety.
For me, it was so much better than my expectations. And my roommates were great. We got together by accident, but we got along very well.
The thing was, eventhough our hostel was perfect, there were things that were quite disturbing.
Like that one time where a bunch girls were having a midnight surprise birthday party when they suddenly screamed. Everyone woke up, even the boys from the boy’s hostel on the other side.
The girls said that they saw a hand creeping in from under the air vents below the window.
The party was held on the fourth floor.
Our hostel had balconies facing the back. No one could imagine how anyone could climb four stories. And the land behind the hostel was just empty shrubland. And there were no footprints below, nor signs of anyone trying to climb up or down.
Another day, a girl in the second floor saw a humanoid silhouette behind the balcony door. The top half of the door was glass and there were two windows on either side of the door, which opened to the balcony. So it was possible to see of there was anything or anyone on the balcony.
And so, rules had to be implemented. No one was allowed to keep the balcony doors open after dark. A security guard would always petrol the building after seven, flashing their torchlight at the open balcony doors.
Everyone thought it was just a sick pervert who was desperate enough to climb into a girls’ hostel. I couldn’t imagine what the guy was even hoping to see.
The incidents were forgotten. They were just by some perverts. Nothing more.
But one day, we forgot to close the balcony door.
We always came back from campus all tired and sometimes, most of us fall asleep. But not everyone. Out of the four of us, at least one person stays awake.
It was different that day.
Everyone fell asleep at about five in the evening, it was a long day of lectures and practicals. So no one was there to close the balcony door by seven. The rooms were hot during the day, and the only source of wind was from the balcony windows and doors, especially the door. So we kept it open till the guards yelled at us to close it.
I, unfortunately, was a light sleeper. It was easy to wake me up. Something, maybe an instinct, woke me up that night. It was dark. It seems the lights were gone (it happens in our country). But I was drowsy and the ceiling fan was obviously not working so closing the door meant we would sweat till we dehydrate.
And so I just laid there, the only source of light from the full moon outside. A cool breeze blew in. Everyone else was sleep. There wasn’t a sound outside. It was probably ten at night. Or maybe eleven.
I thought that maybe I should close the door. It was an open invitation to any perverts otherwise.
That was when I saw the shadow. I was lying to my side, my face somewhat facing the balcony.
A shadow was climbing through a the left side of the balcony. First it was a long leg. Then a thin long arm. A head. A long neck. It crept slowly. So slow that there wasn’t a sound.
I held my breath. I laid on top of the bunk bed, maybe six feet off the floor, just staring as the creature finally stepped into the balcony.
Our balcony.
My mind was cursing. I wanted to climb down the bed and just shut the door. But my limbs remained frozen. I was closer to the door. There were three other people with me. If anyone had a chance to knock whatever creature it was, it would be me. I was the tallest and the buffy one out of the four of us.
But something was telling me to keep still. Be pretend I was sleep.
The shadow simply stared inside. Not moving an inch. As if it was waiting. For something. I felt my heart beating painfully in my chest. It would have been reassuring if it looked human. I mean, it was humanoid, but it’s limbs were too long and spindly, it was too tall for a normal person. For some reason, it didn’t feel human. It didn’t seem human
All of a sudden, the lights came.
We slept with the lights and the fan turned on. So the moment the electricity started to work, the lights flickered into life, lighting the whole room. The shadow jumped down. The fan started to beat.
I waited. I waited till my heart calmed down before I rushed down and closed the door. My stumbling woke up my roommates. I told them that we would get into trouble if anyone saw that the door was open.
I never told anyone about what happened. I couldn’t tell whether it was a dream, my imagination or my paranoia working tricks on me. But if what I saw was real, then whoever repaired the electricity grid sort of saved our lives, or my sanity.
We never left the door open after that. I made sure of it. We don’t live in the hostel now. We had to find our own boarding in the third year.
I still close and lock every door around. Whatever it is that lives here, whether human or paranormal, I didn’t want to see it again. I am waiting to go back home after I get my degree. I just hope nothing like that happens again.