We were sitting on the couch at my girlfriends place, nothing out of the ordinary, cuddling whilst watching a new horror movie. She was, as per usual, holding a Mickey Mouse cushion up to her face and peeking over it, hoping to glimpse the safe scenes and blocking out the boogeyman on the screen.
I must say, I’m not usually type to be scared by horror but they really nailed this one. (This was however untill they ruined it by including a scene where the, up untill that point terrifying, demon was sharpening it’s nails to a ridiculous tune)
After the movie she was absolutely horrified that something might go bump in the dark, so me being me I decided that it would be a good time to point out some (made up) shadows in the backyard and how they defenetly moved. She told me to knock it off and we went to bed.
That night she woke me up about five times to tell me she heard something, or saw something move in the shadows. I just comforted her and told her that there was nothing, and if there where, it would have to get me first. That seemed to calm her and we dozed off.
The next morning we were both exhausted and we looked the part. My girlfriends mother asked why we looked like we just came back from a hike around Mount Everest and my girlfriend explained to her that she was so scared last night, she couldn’t close her eyes without seeing a fiery red face right above hers. We laughed it off and we continued our breakfast as usual.
After I helped load the dishwasher, my girlfriend approached me with that exited and cheeky look a toddler gives you when they just found where you’ve hidden the candy jar. She smiled as she pulled out an old, white, homemade squid plushy.
“Look what I found! My sister was rummaging through some of our old stuff and found Mister Squiddles. When I was five, whenever I had nightmares, I’d hug with Mister Squiddles and poof, the terrors would fade. I never quite got why they stashed it in the attic.”
The plushy didn’t look comforting at all, on te contrary. It had been woven out of white wool, with a couple of red stripes as facial details, four long white tendrils, of which two had red wolen hands. The only cudly thing would have been the litle Santa hat on its head, but it was worn out, so it ended up giving the plush a more Hobo Santa feel.
I jokingly asked if she was preparing to burn the thing for being so worn down, but she got angry and gave me the finger. “No I loved this thing, are you out of your mind?”
That night I was horrified to find the thing tucked in nicely beneath the sheets. “What the hell is that doing there?! You can’tbe serious” I exclaimed. “Well I figured since I had such a terrible night last night, and you were being a Mister Scary pants” “Well, as long as that thing is in bed, I’m not!” I didn’t actually wanna spend a night on the couch so between that and this, I chose the squid.
That night I barely got any rest. I felt dreadfull, like someone was watching me. After an hour of drifting into wonderland and jumping awake in a sweat, I noticed two small red dots in the corner of the room. They must have been the size of pinhead, but they where there, up on the wall, nearly against the roof. Occasionally they disappeared, like they were eyes that blinked, each time dread and fear washing over me like a freezing ocean.
I was relieved when I finally got some shut eye before the sun woke us up. I told my girlfriend and she pointed at the smoke alarm in the corner. “It’s red light turns on when it’s dark, and “blinks” to show it is working. Your “monster” was just that” She laughed at my foolishness. We went on with our day and I didn’t think much more of it, untill the next night.
It visited me in my dreams. It hung over me, gigantic, it’s eyes red as blood, arms hanging over me, crushing me. I wanted to wake up but it pressed my chest so tightly that I couldn’t move.
I finally found the strenght and awoke from the nightmare. I scanned the dark room with a dim light from my phone, the plush was laying in a corner of the room, on the floor. I grabbed it and walked outside. It was a five minute walk from my girlfriends house to the park, but it felt like hours, the cold night air blowing against my exposed legs. As I entered the park, I saw my goal, an old rickety dock leading into a small lake. On my way I picked up a rock from the ponds edge. When I reached the end of the Jetty, I bound the arms of Mister Squiddles around the rock and threw it into the water. As I saw it sink into the murky depths, I felt relief, the dread let my body and I returned to my girlfriend’s house for some sleep. She had only just awoken from me entering the room, so I just told her I had gone to the bathroom.
As she drifted into sweeter dreams, my gaze drifted back to the corner. Suddenly realizing that the smoke alarm only had one light, blinking on a five second interval. Not ten minutes went by or the red light turned off for about 8 seconds, which was long enough a change to notice. When the light appeared again, it was blinking arithmetical, like it had the night before. And to my greater horror, there where two beady eye-like dots now instead of the one.
This night the dread was even stronger. The small glowing dots glowed brighter as I felt a sharp, stinging pain in my right leg, followed by the same, sting in my left leg. I thought it might be a form of sleep paralysis, but I quickly realized something else. Mister Squiddles had been in bed, right next to my girlfriend when we went to bed the day before, but this morning it layed on the ground, in a corner of the room, right beneath the smoke alarm. As I reached for my phone on the nightstand to illuminate the pitch-black room, I broke into a cold sweat.
There are moments in life where your curiosity takes over and discover something you’d rather have left unknown. Like a kid rushing into it’s parents room to investigate the screams and creaks. As I pressed the flashlight button on my phone, I had one of those moments.
Right in front of the smoke detector was the decrepit plushy, if you could even call it that. It hung upside down from the ceiling, it’s grotesquely long “arms” stretched across the entire ceiling, eventually running down the walls not too far from the bed, it’s eyes glowing a demonic, bloodshot red. The white wool looked as if it were soaked in blood, and I soon realized why.
The long, tentacles had slowly unraveled into a thousand strands so thin, they resembled the roots of a fungus rather then wool. The strands had reached so far they disappeared under our blanket. I ripped the blanket off of me and to my horror I saw them on my legs, slowly creeping upwards, piercing my skin. I looked next to me and saw my girlfriend. She had already been completely covered. They were pumping a red liquid I could only presume to be blood back to the main body. The “body” (for lack of a better term) was constantly swelling like a tick. I wanted to scream but my throat felt weak. I tried to pull the tendrils off but my arms wouldn’t move anymore, as I felt my consciousness floating into a deep sleep.
I haven’t told my girlfriend about this yet, since when I woke up there were no signs of damage on my skin. The stuffed “squid” was nowhere to be found, I think I’ve upset it so I’m gonna try setting up a camera tonight so wish me luck. I hope I can get proof before it “finishes it’s meal”