Have you ever had a sleep paralysis daemon come out of the wall by your bed and lunge at you at full speed ? I have…..
I was watching TV late one night, I think they showed how dog food was made in a factory, and I didn’t notice it at first, but something was starting to take shape in the outer edge of my peripheral vision, something dark, something hanging from the ceiling, something like a rope..
In my very sleepy state I actually didn’t think much of it, I was just thinking “oh that has always been there, it’s fine” so I just continued to watch the TV program that was droning on, it wasn’t until a thought started creeping around somewhere in my skull that “No… no, that thing hasn’t always been there” and I started turning my head to get a better look at it… I wish I hadn’t.
What I saw was an unnaturally tall woman, she was as pale as my white wall, but you could see her contours and outlines, she was skinny and bony, wearing a white tattered wedding dress, by the time my eyes reached her face, all I could see was a big smile and sunken in eyes… or empty holes.. it was hard to tell because my blood started really pumping at this moment, that’s when she opened her mouth, screamed at me and lunged at me.
Me being a big tough guy that most people would say is absolutely fearless… well that was one of the few times I was really afraid.. so all I could do was to curl up into a big ball and close my eyes, just awaiting and anticipating the impact of her.. but it never came..
What did come though was the sound of rattling chains, and sweaty pressure around my wrists and ankles.. pinning me down to my bed, making me unable to move.. that’s what it felt like at least..
When I did open my eyes up again my entire room was normal, my TV being slightly to the left of my bed, but still facing me, next to it, a window which showed that it was still pitch black outside, and next to that, a long white perfectly normal wall with nothing on it.. I’m not much for decorations, and I didn’t really have much to decorate that wall with either, however right then and there I did decide that I would cover that wall with as much things as I possibly could, starting with a bookshelf that would be big enough to cover most of the wall..
The thing is though, it didn’t stop there, the next time I fell asleep I dreamt that I was back in school, I was around 8 years old, we were on a bus trip to a amusement park, in the middle of wintertime.
The bus driver was driving through a dense Forrest on a very straight but lonely road, not really any other traffic to speak of, we were just goofing off, throwing papers at each other and screaming and laughing as you do as a child, however the engine of the bus suddenly died and it had to do an emergency stop in a clearing along the road in the otherwise dense forrest . The teacher started yelling out at everyone to be quiet and to settle down, that they would have the bus fixed as soon as possible. This was back in the day where cellphones and internet wasn’t widely common, so everyone became restless pretty quickly and started fighting again, since it was taking such a long time to fix the engine.
Since the teacher understood that this would happen, she told everyone to get out of the bus and play in the snow and leave the bus driver alone, so we did.
I threw several snowballs at my best friend, he threw some back, though there was a rock in one of them that actually hit me straight in the eye, that’s when I decided that we should stop throwing snowballs and start playing something different instead, I wanted to play hide and seek, which my best friend at the time very quickly actually agreed to, despite it not being one of his favorite games, he did suggest to go exploring instead.
I thought that sounded like a much better idea, we walked around and scouted for a while concluding that since the clearing was pretty flat, there was no good places to hide anyway. That’s when I started to smell something, a mix between tar and burnt wood, and I noticed my friend pointing at something in the distance, he started to run towards it..
When we came closer, we saw that it was a pretty big black wooden cabin, the entire thing just reeked of tar, it seemed really really old, like it had sat there untouched for the last 150 years or so, naturally we both got curious of what could be in it, but when we took the first steps up the small stairs to ge to the door, it suddenly opened and my childhood mind was thinking “that’s one scary black witch”.
She was entirely dressed in the darkest black I’ve ever seen, you couldn’t see her face, and I don’t know how I knew she was a witch or if it was just my 8 year old self assuming this. What happened though was that I woke up, breathing heavy, heart trying to beat itself out of my chest, sweat drenching every single part of my body… and I’d only slept for one hour..
Even though it was still in the middle of the night, I decided that it would be best to take a shower, my brain couldn’t stop thinking about this dream the entire time though, I mean, it was so vivid, felt so real.. maybe it was a repressed memory ? I just couldn’t get any more sleep that night..
An entire week went by in a hurry with no nightmares, starting to think that they had stopped and I finally started relaxing again, that’s when another nightmare hit me. It wasn’t exactly the same dream, but close, it was summertime this time, I was running on a road, a long narrow straight road, I didn’t know what I was running from, but I knew I had to run as fast as I could.. I started seeing pine trees next to the road, but instead of the sweet scent of pine, all the air smelled like was rotting flesh, which made me panic a bit, pushing my legs even faster.
My lungs started to burn intensely, and I could feel my legs slowing down, I risked a peek behind me and a pack, at least five, big wolfs with silver/gray colored fur was running right at me, they were barking like dogs though, which got me pushing my legs even faster than before, however I tripped when I turned my head back towards the where I was running and I fell, hitting my head really hard against the asphalt, a weird indescribable taste filling my mouth..
There was something in the air though, a smell of tar and burnt wood again, I thought “oh no” as I lay there on the ground, looking over to my left and seeing that dammed black cabin again, trying to get my body to move, I realized it was too late, one of the wolves had made a jump right at me and landed with its teeth digging straight into my shoulder, as the second one had jumped digging it’s teeth into my chest, last thing I heard was bones cracking and an intense burning pain as flesh was ripping off before I woke up again safe and sound in my bed, the weird taste of my head hitting the ground still lingering in my mouth.
This dream though, it made me unable to sleep for two days.
I did have one more dream about this cabin though, it was roughly two months later, however during these two months, I did see strange things in my peripheral vision during the daytime, things that shouldn’t be there, I saw the white lady several times, in doorways as I walked past, behind me in the mirror when I was brushing my teeth, strange handprints on the walls, strange indistinguishable black but almost transparent creatures behind people, but always when I turned my head to get a better look, they were gone as fast as they showed themselves, and sometimes during the night just as I was falling asleep I could hear distant wolves howling, making me question both my sanity and my hearing.
However, I still have to tell you about that third dream about that cabin. As I said, it was roughly two months after the second dream, and this time I was roughly the age of 16 and I was just in front of the cabin, about to take the steps into the cabin itself, but I wasn’t alone, my friend James was there with me, he also had his girlfriend with him, he said that it was time for me to go in to this place.. I hesitantly opened the door, remembering what happened in the first dream, and there was nobody there, everything was black and reeked of tar still, but all three of us went in. I found a light in the ceiling and turned it on, James and his girlfriend decided to go upstairs to find the beds, they did not sleep that night, they did share a bed all night though, so I decided it was best if I slept downstairs, I woke up the following morning, in the dream, and everything was just fine, the weather was beautiful outside, I could still feel the warmth of the summer sun hitting my face as I woke up.
That morning I went over to my parents house, they greeted me as usual, but both said that I looked terrible, I told them that I hadn’t been sleeping very well and also told them about that recurring nightmare, obviously leaving out a certain bit about that last one.
My fathers face went pale and said “son, when you were a kid, you had an imaginary friend that you called the girl, do you remember that ? You told us she took many different shapes and sizes but was always very protective of you, even if she scared the life out of you sometimes”
A sudden flash flood of memories started flowing in.
“Yes I do remember her”
A particular memory came to mind, when I was a young child my bedroom was upstairs, it was pretty small, but had a very big window facing the morning sun, there was always a mess of toys and electronic equipment that I used to take apart for fun on the floor, my bed was right next to the big window, tucked into a corner with the entrance door visible directly ahead of me as I lay in that bed. I always wanted someone to stay the night with me in there just to watch me as I fell asleep, sometimes my siblings did, they promised to stay through the entire night.. they never did..
Because in this particular memory, I had just fallen asleep after my sister had promised to watch over me for the night. She had of course left to get some sleep when I had woken up in the middle of the night, but I saw to my right, a big oddly shaped wall which usually was a bright peach color, which now in the moonlight was now a light gray.. I stared at that wall for a while trying to figure out what was wrong with it, when shapes started to form in it. The shape of a person, a person whose coming closer and closer until she was right in my face, screaming from the top of her lungs.. this was her.. the girl..
As my father said, she had many different shapes and sizes, most of the time she was a happy little girl in a red summer dress, she liked to ride around in the car and play fun games in the backyard. However back then, that particular occurance had scared my father enough that I got another bedroom, on the ground floor, a couple of days later, that oddly shaped wall caught on fire, it was an old unused chimney where a faulty wire had apparently ignited the old and dry insulation in it.
That memory was so many years ago, and she was gone for a really long time in my life.. You see the reason I am writing this is because since recently I am able to see her again, in fact she won’t disappear, she is always in the corner of my eye now, a white bony lady, her smile getting bigger and more sinister for each day..
I am not afraid anymore, but I have a feeling she wants to kill me..
So if anyone you know starts talking about an imaginary friend in a red summer dress.. get them help, immediately.