I hate when I can’t sleep. I roll over in bed and wait to see if I fall asleep. When my body finally shuts down, but sometimes that moment just doesn’t come, but now I have a slightly different perspective on this experience after my own insomnia may have saved my life.
It happened in 2006 in the middle of winter. I used to live on the ground floor so I was used to people walking 1 meter next to my window. When I first moved in I was really annoyed by people talking. It drove me crazy and the blinds could only cover a certain part of the movement.
Through the gaps, you could see that people were walking there, but surprisingly, it only took a few months before I got used to it and started to simply ignore it. So it still happened here and there that he walked by in the middle of the night and scared me a little, but it wasn’t as bad as it was at the beginning. But then I started to have an uncomfortable feeling.
At first, it was nothing special. Just strange thoughts in the middle of the night as if someone was staring at me from the window, but I didn’t see anyone. But I guess that’s how a lot of people feel when they live alone and look into the darkness at night.
But that feeling didn’t go away. Regardless, I felt like someone was watching me. Sometimes I slightly raised the blinds to see if anyone was really there. But nothing, just a dark street illuminated by the orange glow of a lamp. It went on like this for maybe a few weeks, I’m not even sure how long, but the feeling still didn’t go away. During the day everything was fine. but as the time approached night and the streets emptied.
I felt as if someone was there. I thought about what it was worth. Maybe horror movies that just ate into my brain or just some change in life that just forced that feeling into my head. At that moment, I had no idea that I was right.
They say that when someone is looking at you, you can tell/feel it even if they are standing behind you, I’m not sure if it’s true but I felt it and as it turned out I was seriously right. One night I felt someone’s gaze again digging into my head so I raised the blinds again and looked outside where there was usually only an empty and darkened street. Now someone was seriously standing.
He was far away and I couldn’t make out anything about him like a shadow standing in the distance staring at me. Some of you might say that I should solve it, that I should do something, but at that moment, I was just trying to explain it to you, maybe it was just a coincidence, just a person on the street, he wasn’t even close to my apartment, he was just standing in the distance I thought he was staring at me, and when I looked outside again, he wasn’t there anymore.
It scared me a little, yes, but it didn’t seem so strange to me on the other hand. For the next few nights, nothing happened, but the feeling that someone was watching you didn’t go away. When I looked outside again no one was there again so I just chalked it up to my imagination but a few days later when I looked again the figure was there again. this time it was a bit closer but I still couldn’t see it.
I decided not to turn around, do not leave the window and just watch what he will do. I could stand there for about 30 minutes.
The figure was staring at me and I was staring at her, but she didn’t even move as if she wasn’t alive. I finally gave up and walked away from the window and when I came back he was GONE again. That was the moment when it started to scare me, as soon as it started to get dark every day I stared outside and just waited for him to be there one day and this time he was even closer. It was maybe this time I could see his face.
He was staring at me and just smiling… that was the moment I started to get scared. I left the window and after a while came back, I expected him to be gone, but when I slowly moved the blinds, an EYE was staring at me. He was standing right in front of my window… AND HE WAS STILL SMILING. I jumped and ran to get the phone to call the police.
I ran into the next room and froze when I heard a knock on the window behind me. He was there. He was banging on the window harder and harder, I was looking for the phone and listening to him keep banging on me when I heard a knock on the window in the other room. there were more of them. I couldn’t find my phone so I thought maybe I left it in the bathroom. I ran into the bathroom when I heard glass shattering.
I knew they were inside so I did the only thing I could think of, I locked myself in the bathroom and waited. There was no phone in the bathroom, I HAD NO WAY TO CALL HELP AND SOMEHOW TO GET OUT AND THE ONLY THING SEPARATING THEM WAS THE DOOR. THERE WAS A KNOCK AND I FELT MY HEARTBEAT START TO ACCELERATE. I COULDN’T DO ANYTHING. I WAS JUST WAITING. THE THUMBING INTENSIFIED AND GRADUALLY CHANGED TO THUMBING RATHER THAN KNOCKING.
THAT WOULD BE THE MOMENT WHEN I FELL ON THE GROUND AND STARTED CRYING. THEY WERE BATTLING THE DOOR TRYING TO GET IN AND I WAS JUST LYING ON THE GROUND WAITING FOR THEM TO BREAK THEM DOWN. IT WAS THE WORST FEELING OF MY LIFE.
And then the pounding somehow stopped out of nowhere. And then I heard the phone ring through the door. I was waiting in the bathroom and nothing was happening. and then the doorbell rang “Kevin are you ok?” I recognized that voice, it was my neighbor and my RESCUE.
That was the moment when I had the courage to climb out. I unlocked the door and told him someone was in my flat, I told him they broke the windows and got in and ran away when the doorbell rang but he said he didn’t hear any glass breaking or banging on the door he only heard me screaming and he was right .
The windows were not broken and no one was inside. That day I just said that I probably just had a nightmare and to this day I like to believe that it was true. that my brain was playing with me. BUT I KNOW IT WAS REAL. When I moved out. I moved to a completely different apartment on the fifth floor and the feeling that someone was watching me disappeared.
To this day, I don’t know if it was real, but the possibility of it SCARED ME. Sometimes in the middle of the night, I still wait for a toucan on the window. but nothing like that has happened so far. Every now and then I raise the blinds and look outside. Sometimes I have the feeling that I see someone in the distance, a figure standing there, but from a distance, I can’t tell if my mind is just playing tricks.
Maybe they are out there waiting and watching me, but I’m trying to believe that they aren’t