When I was 15, I went through a phase. I was obsessed with all things paranormal; ouija boards, séances, local “haunted” areas, basically any dumb thing associated with paranormal shit was something I indulged in. During this phase I honestly had a lot of little things happen to me that freaked me out, so much that I eventually stopped everything. This is the thing that made me quit.
In hindsight, it probably won’t seem scary to anyone else, but when it happened to me I physically couldn’t stop shaking. I was up late in my room one night, just scrolling through Instagram and texting friends. It was pretty late, like 2-3am if I remember correctly, when I suddenly started hearing a noise from outside my window. This struck me as very odd, because in all my years at that house I NEVER heard anything outside my window aside from your typical, ambient nature noises. My window was on the second floor, so nothing was close enough to scrape against it, there was nothing for animals to sit on outside of it, there was no way for anything to do anything to it. If there was some way to tamper with it, it would have happened long before this point. As soon as the noise started I was confused more than anything, wondering where this strange sound was coming from. I noticed it came from the direction of my window, so I walked towards it, and when I realized what the sound was I froze.
Something was breathing outside of my window.
Every part of my body went numb, I started sweating, every breath started to burn and I could hear my own heart pounding as if I had just ran several miles. I contemplated opening the blinds to see what was there, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
I had no idea what to do. I was frozen with fear. I started texting one of my friends, the only one I talked to about paranormal stuff, and I asked him if he was trying to mess with me by breathing outside my window. He was the only one that knew all the stuff I did, and he lived close enough to walk to my house by foot. It was the most plausible option.
I got a text back.
“What? What are you talking about?”
I felt like I was about to throw up. Another text came in.
“Are you okay?”
He started trying to call me. My ringer went off and suddenly the breathing outside my window stopped. I had no idea if this was worse or better. I rejected the call as quickly as I physically could, and there was complete silence. I was so fucking scared. Every second felt like 10 minutes. Then the breathing started again. Now it was closer, I think, and heavier. Harder. It almost sounded angry. I was petrified. I will never forget that sound for as long as I live. I remember walking towards my bedroom door and when I got to it, I heard the breathing stop. I turned to look toward my window, still shaken about what the fuck that could mean.
And then I heard it again. Closer, now.
It was outside my bedroom door.