Brink of homelessness, constant moving houses, “struggle” meals, whatever. It’s been my whole life since I was born. So it’s not like anything new. I’m always looking for ways to make a little extra cash.
To be fair, when I was younger, that meant shoveling snow from people’s driveways, petsitting during vacations, stuff like that. Now that I’ve moved out, and have my own shithole to barely scrape by rent on, it means DoorDashing, selling bracelets I make out of random shit I find - after disinfecting it, of course - and donating blood or plasma or platelets every time I could.
None of those make much money. Food delivery is shit and barely anyone buys from me on Etsy. And, of course, you can only donate blood-related things so often. So I started scraping through all the internet for cash surveys.
It was never very much. A coupon for a free meal was all I was really looking for anyway. I’m underweight enough as it is, you know? I take what I can get. Sometimes all that is is a free sandwich.
At this point, it was pretty late. Maybe 1 in the morning. I wasn’t checking the clock much, I just wanted to scrape by to a certain amount of cash so I’d feel better about rent at the end of the week. I must’ve gone through 50 surveys already. It sucked.
My stomach grumbled kind of loudly. I just groaned, dropping my laptop at the foot of my bed and rolling over to lay on my chest with a pillow under me. Hopefully it would tame the growls long enough to finish another couple of surveys. No big deal, no big deal.
My eyes trailed lazily across the screen, cursor following it to a new link in my folder. At some point I had made a list of websites with lots of surveys, and I’d go through them often for new ones. The page opened up. Bright pop-ups flashed in my face in the dark room. I squinted at the screen, closing them one by one until I was left with a dark mode page with huge, funky fonts.
WELCOME TO THE SUPER INTERNET SURVEY!
Yeah, okay. I’m not sure why I saved this one. Whatever. Disregarding the thought, I clicked start.
Question 1: How much sleep do you get every night?
Okay, it’s just questions about sleeping habits. I clicked “5-6 hours” and it automatically moved me to the next question. I couldn’t go back, which was a little weird, but I brushed it off as the words popped up.
Question 2: What is your bedtime?
Now I did look at the clock. 1:37 am. Yeah, okay. I tapped “2-4am” and moved on once again. The words of the new question rolled across my screen.
Question 3: Do you like your room warm or cold when you sleep?
Warm. Obviously.
Question 4: What position do you sleep in?
Several images came up of different sleeping positions. I furrowed my brow. I kind of switch around every night, so I just picked a random one - I think it was right side sleeping - and moved on.
Question 5: Do you sleep with the door open, or closed?
My eyes drooped involuntarily as I read the question, accidentally clicking “Open”. Shit. Well, whatever. One tiny error in their data won’t do anything.
Question 6: How many pillows do you have?
Uhh. I glanced underneath me. One. One pillow. I click that and continue.
Question 7: Have you answered this question before?
What.
I stared at the screen, making sure I didn’t read it incorrectly. But no, that was definitely what it said.
Feeling some apprehension begin to creep over me, I clicked “No”.
Question 8: Do you often experience sleep paralysis?
I wouldn’t say often, but I also wouldn’t say rare. So I just clicked yes.
Question 9: You’re going to be shown a video. Please memorize the details of this video and answer the following questions.
The very millisecond I finished reading that, the video popped up, taking the whole screen over. It was completely silent and almost pitch black, the only light being from the open door and whatever source was down the hall. It leaked in on a small bed, where a woman was lying asleep on her back. I couldn’t quite make out her face, though how she was laying there seemed familiar. Behind her, I could see a shadow rising from the opposite side of the bed from where the camera position was.
I squinted at the screen as the video went on for well over a minute, the shadow coming up at a snail’s pace. Finally, it made a single, jerking movement towards the sleeping woman, and the video cut off.
I was pretty stunned, unsure of what to make of it. It was a little off putting, but what else was I meant to think? Another question came up just then, snapping me back out of my thoughts.
Question 9: How many people were in the video?
I considered for a second if the shadow counted as a person. Probably not, right? Maybe. My brain was too tired to think about it much more, so I just clicked “Two”.
The screen flashed neon red multiple times in my face, practically blinding me.
“There were three.”
What? Okay, whatever, I must’ve missed something. I sigh and hit the realization that this wasn’t worth it. This stupid survey was getting weird.
I went to close the window, but when I clicked the X in the corner, I was suddenly bombarded with all the pop-up ads I had closed before - along with some new ones now begging me to stay.
Groaning, I began closing all the ads, pretty annoyed. When they were all gone, though, and I went to leave the survey again, my cursor wouldn’t go up. Like in a video game when you reach the invisible border barrier, it just bounced back repeatedly, not letting me exit.
Okay. Fine. I’ll do a few more questions and figure something out. Two can play at this game, weird browser survey.
Question 10: Who was in the video?
I wondered briefly how the hell I was supposed to know that, until I read the possible answers.
A. You
B. Vivian
C. Todd
D. Jeannette
Vivian is my sister. Todd is my dad. Jeannette is my mom.
I felt my heart freeze up inside my chest. Immediately, I slammed the laptop shut, pushing it aside and letting it fall off the bed. Now that I had the thought in my head, I knew who was in that video. It was my mother. She’d always slept like that, with the door wide open. But she had died three months back from sickness.
I laid there on my stomach for a little while longer, convincing myself I had imagined those names being on my screen from exhaustion. It was nothing. I turned over, reaching down to the floor to retrieve my laptop. My fingers brushed against the carpeted floor, then the bedskirt, then something warm and smooth. I grabbed it, assuming it was my laptop. It was not.
I pulled it off the ground, only for an entire leg to come into my view. I yelled out, dropping it immediately. For one thing, how the fuck did I mistake a human leg for my laptop? Secondly, WHAT THE FUCK OH MY GOD SOMEONE IS UNDER MY BED.
Slowly, I backed away from where I dropped the leg. I could only go so far without falling off the bed, so I just sat at the very edge, halfway hanging off as I stared at the other side. My bedroom was dark. Without the light of my laptop, I couldn’t see much of anything.
Nothing happened. It was silent.
Several minutes passed. Maybe ten went by before I worked up the courage to even just look away - now letting me see that my laptop was sitting where my pillow would be if I hadn’t been clutching it to my chest.
Well. I’m not getting any more sleep tonight anyway.
I reached over, picking my laptop up and opening it. The same screen and question were still open. Hesitantly, or maybe idiotically, I clicked Jeannette.
Question 11: Are you alone?
I chose to be realistic with myself, and clicked on “No”. It didn’t flash red at me again, so I assumed that’s the correct answer.
Question 12: Are you going to look under the bed?
I hit “No” again.
It didn’t flash red. It just said “Okay.” across the screen, and then “You have completed the Super Internet Survey.”
I wanted to feel relieved, but nothing within me does. My chest pounded violently, my breathing unstable. What was I supposed to do now?
Slowly, I crawled forward again, peeking over the opposite edge of the bed. There was nothing there. No leg or anything. Did I imagine it? What else could I have possibly touched?
I said I wasn’t going to look under the bed. So I didn’t. No matter how much I wanted to.
Placing my laptop onto my desk, I laid down on my side, facing the opposite wall. Staring. Eventually I closed my eyes, trying to settle in.
I wasn’t sure how much time passed before I heard my bedroom door start to creak open. A thin line of light started to peek onto my face.
The instant I noticed that, I sprang out of bed, flipping the lights on - grabbing my phone and keys, barely bothering to slip my shoes on as I bolted out the door. I slammed the front entrance shut, locking it, and running to the elevator in a panic. Getting the hell out of there as fast as I possibly could.
I’m sitting at one of those 24-hour diners now, since it’s a block away from my apartment. I still feel adrenaline pumping through me. That video playing back in my head.
I feel like I’m missing something, but there’s no way in hell I’m even going to open my laptop right now, let alone go back to the apartment. I’m not sure I’ll ever even be able to sleep again.