Desired
Have you ever felt wanted, but by something you seriously did not want to be desired by? Perhaps someone is attracted to you, and you can’t get them to acknowledge your lack of interest. Maybe there’s someone at work that you don’t care for, but they always talk to you. These people do not truly ask for you though. That admirer hopes for your affection and companionship. That annoying person at work, they just want a friendship with you most likely. Can you say, that something truly wanted you? Not something from you, but you; flesh, blood, and mind. Willing to lie, intimidate, bribe; anything it could think of to get you. Believe me, it’s something no one should ever experience. My family and I moved into a large old house in our small town. Living there was a temporary arrangement. There was tension in the old house, and so my parents felt we should live somewhere else for a while. They just honestly felt that living somewhere else a bit nicer for a bit would relieve some stress. I was merely eight years old at the time. I actually was quite excited to live in the house. There was no ominous feeling. I felt no dread as I explored the two story dwelling. It was old, and so naturally, there was that slightly decayed look. At night there was a lot of creaking and other small noises. For the most part however, it was a normal house. I’d play my Nintendo 64 every night before going to bed, keep the TV on, and fall asleep easily. If I wasn’t at school, I was probably playing around in my room. My best friend didn’t like the house as much however. The first time my friend was over, him, my dad, and I discovered a compartment behind the wall in my parents’ bedroom. I was a scaredy cat, and didn’t want to go in. Feeling safer with the two however, I dared to venture into the compartment. It was cramped, too small for my dad to actually fit. My friend and I could, and there was nothing to be worried about. There was some red and black spray paint applied randomly, but otherwise it was just bare plywood and some exposed insulation. There was one thing in that compartment. Underneath a latch door, was some very grainy sand. Within this sand were buried army men, kinds I hadn’t seen before. My father tried to squeeze in further to look. “Well, looks like someone forgot about their hidden army men. I suppose you two can have them now.” The thing was, my friend and I both didn’t feel like taking those army men out. I didn’t really think about it then, but doing so now, it’s quite odd. Him and I both loved playing with army men for much of our childhood. Yet at that time, we both just unspokenly agreed to leave them. I really was ignorant, I just didn’t feel right about taking them. It was like they were still somebody else’s. To whomever they may have belonged to, I do not know. I was never able to learn who was there before us. That event to me was insignificant, I really thought nothing of it. Still the nights felt easy, and I got plenty of sleep. My friend on the other hand, did not sleep so well. Whenever he stayed the night, he always complained to me that there were sounds in the walls. He described merely that it sounded like something was moving inside of them. I’m really not sure what the sound was like, as I never heard them while he did. Even when he woke me up in the middle of the night over the sounds he heard, I heard nothing. The idea was still unsettling to me, even though I never heard it. I had come to know that the house held doors that were not in plain sight. There were small places you had to look to find. I always didn’t want to know though. I just stayed where I felt it was normal. I knew nothing of these other places. It was like I protected myself the way adults do — denial. I simply somehow did not accept anything could be odd. Ignorance is bliss they say, and so ignorant I was. It would be one night, however, that would break the calm for me. It was Easter night, and I was up a bit later than usual. Somewhere between nine and ten. It doesn’t seem late, but at that age my parents took making me go to bed early quite seriously. “I will not tell you again, go to bed. Do you want the Easter Bunny to come or not?” scolded my mother from the doorway to my room. “Yes mama, I’m just changing now.” So I went to bed with the TV on. I always just stared at it, falling asleep before an hour would have passed. I stared and watched Disney cartoons for some time, until finally I drifted off into sleep. This would be the last time I easily drifted off for quite a while. I awoke, and heard loud noises from the kitchen. All sorts of things opening and closing. I heard the rustle of tableware in the drawer. I heard cupboards being opened, then quickly shut. For a while, I just lay there, listening. It was actually very close to me. My room was oddly placed, the doorway went directly to the kitchen. Being only eight years old at the time, I innocently believed the Easter Bunny was finding hiding places for eggs. What got me to get out of bed, was a call of nature. I slid out of bed, half awake, half asleep, headed for the bathroom. As soon as I walked into the kitchen however, a powerful thud was made in the room. I stopped, wondering if the Easter Bunny would be upset with me. There was indeed something in that kitchen with me. The Easter Bunny isn’t real though. I would have preferred that it was this friendly character of the childish imagination. What I saw however, was nothing remotely close. As I peered into that dimly lit room, I saw a dark figure. At first, you perhaps would try to call it a shadow. This does not describe the dark entity correctly, however. Shadows are merely breaks in light, and are stuck clinging to surfaces. This thing, it was a pitch black silhouette, crouching like a predator in the open space. I was taken aback, but not as scared as I should have been. I was still half asleep, and couldn’t seem to take in what was happening in full. I simply stood there looking at it half dreaming. It, in return, simply stayed crouched in the shadows, staring back at me. It hid in the darkest part of the room, and yet the reason I could see it, was because it was darker than its own surroundings. To this day, I cannot believe what I did that night. I slowly walked to the nearby bathroom, relieved myself, then hazily started walking back to my room. I halfway glanced at the ominous figure. It simply looked back at me, not moving, making no sound. Then as I crawled back into bed, I heard steps, and saw an elongated figure slowly pass by my bedroom doorway. Unnaturally shaped, unnaturally moving, and cold air sweeping through my room. It was like it didn’t really walk past, but stretched itself over. Knowing myself, I should have been in a fit of terror, but I simply went back to sleep. That next morning, what happened during the night didn’t even occur to me. I simply went on with the egg hunt of Easter at first. Then I did remember eventually however, I remembered vaguely. I remembered the loud rummaging noises. I looked in these places, and in none of them were eggs found. My parents tried hinting to me that they hadn’t hidden any in the kitchen, without spoiling the holiday for me. “But I heard it in these places.” I explained to them last night with some lack of recall. My parents just dismissed it, finding my story odd but sure it was just my imagination or a dream nonetheless. After the day had passed, I started to think about last night. A sickening pressure built up within me. For some reason, I was being totally unaware of things that I should have been terrified by. I was always a very paranoid child. Even the silliest scary movies would make it impossible for me to sleep at night. One time my dad jokingly put me in the bathroom with the lights off, pitch dark. I screamed at the top of my lungs. He never did those kinds of things after that. My dad always liked playing jokes on us, but he didn’t ever exploit that fear again. I really was not at all hard to scare. After these thoughts crossed my mind that afternoon, I asked myself a question. Just why wasn’t I afraid before? That was easily the most horrifying thing that had ever happened to me. This house had unnatural feelings now. I finally felt fear, I finally realized what was happening. I never slept well in that house again. At night now, I would lay awake for long periods of time. I felt like I heard so much more noise than before. Every night was like this, and nothing more. It was enough to leave me on edge, but my anxiety would die down a little each night. My fear would quickly rise up once more however, after I had the dream. I woke up in the middle of the night. I saw a boy through my doorway, running around frantically. “Get out! Get out! Leave me alone!” I clearly heard. The boy wasn’t speaking to me. He seemed to know I was there, but his attention wasn’t fixated on me.
There was something else in the house. Suddenly, I saw the same dark unnatural figure from that night. It drooped over the boy, and in pure terror he ran off, disappearing. The dream was already a nightmare at this point. Then, the figure stopped, dead silence took place. I felt it turn, its gaze came upon me. Then, slowly it forced itself over to me. How it moved, it’s impossible to really describe well with words. It stretched, and oozed, and seemingly hovered slowly. I was paralyzed with fear. It came closer and closer. Even when it came into the light, it remained a solid black shape. Then the light disappeared, but I could see it still. Nothing was darker than it; it was a vacuum of light.  It came finally right to my face. With a knot in my throat, and sweat all over my body, I tried to squeak out a single question. “Who are-” was all I muttered, and then it enveloped me, and the dream ended. I woke up then, covered in sweat, and my heart beating faster than ever. I was quick to call for my parents that night. Luckily that was the only nightmare I had in that house. Well, the only significant one. I had a few other bad dreams, but they didn’t have that thing in them. I know that it was in that house that my misfortune began. A few other disturbing things would happen. Of course, the nights always were restless. I heard noises, but never to the full extent. Even then, the sounds in the walls my friend spoke of, I never heard. It was like, something wanted to be there with me, without me knowing. At this point I certainly believed the house was haunted. Indeed it was, from the very start of us living there, it was. The difference being, while we lived there, one entity belonged, and the other didn’t. One was there originally, and the other wasn’t. The original was a harmless resident, the other a malevolent predator. One morning I woke up, and one of those army men was on my shelf. I never took any of them out, nor did my friend. Mom wouldn’t have bothered, so I assumed Dad must have done it. When I questioned him about it though, he gave me a confused look. “I never got it out, I wouldn’t force myself in there just to get one army man.” I was confused, and with the way things had been going, somewhat disturbed. That night I had another dream, it wasn’t too nightmarish, in fact it scared me more after I woke up. In my dream, that same boy came in, he had tears on his face. He was pale, and looked like he hadn’t slept in days with purple bags under his bloodshot eyes. He stared straight at me, and in a weak sobbing voice said “I gave you nothing.” A strange sort of sound I can’t described started getting louder and louder, and the boy continuously faded. “Don’t – don’t let this happen to you.” Then he was gone, faded out completely. The dream either ended there or I simply couldn’t remember anything after that point of it. Even though I was only eight years old, I knew what the boy was talking about. It just made sense to me, and I think you know what it meant already. My family was getting better, and so my parents decided it was time to move back into our old house. I left that army man behind, where it belonged. I thought my worries would be over from there. I never had a weird experience in our actual home. It was a trailer house, a bit run down. Nothing unnatural however save for a place before it that burned down. As far as we knew, no one had died in the fire. Our house in short, had no dark history to suggest anything out of the ordinary could loom over it. I brought something back with me however, and as you know, it definitely wasn’t that army man. Things were as I expected them to be after we moved back into our old house. There was nothing to terrify me. I was more worried about my parents going back to their irritable selves actually. They didn’t like the house, they never really had. They couldn’t afford to get something they liked however, and so that’s where we stayed. I spent most of my time either playing outside or in my room. I had mostly put the frightening events from the house we rented out of mind already. There were some things that had changed about me though. For one, no matter what I did it took me ages to fall asleep at night. I’d simply lay there. I actually wasn’t even scared, I just simply didn’t fall asleep. I had trouble falling asleep before after watching a scary movie with my family perhaps, but never like this. I’d lay there for hours after I went to bed wide awake for no apparent reason. It was an issue, but as far as my fear went, I was still fine. Sadly, I only had it this easy for about two weeks. Strange things started happening once again in very subtle manners at first. One day, I was looking through my mother’s music albums. I was reading the back of one plastic reflective cover, when suddenly I noticed a black figure run behind me very quickly. It startled me, but after thinking about it for a while I decided that as brief as it was, it could have easily been my imagination. Sometimes a whole room would seem to be wrapped and covered in darkness for a mere moment, but I brushed this off also. Things only kept getting worse of course. First of all, my paranoia started to return. At night my sleep became even worse as I simply felt terrified. I would lay there, constantly scanning my room for hours. I always felt like if I didn’t watch my dark room diligently, something would surely take advantage of my vulnerability and do something awful. Every day I absolutely dreaded having to go to bed. My only sanctuary was the light shed by the television in my room, and the bathroom light that faintly shown through my doorway. Fortunately at this point, my terror really did seem to stem from nothing. The real oddities remained subtle things during the day. Feelings of being watched, noticing things out of place once in a small while, sometimes feeling uncomfortable being alone in a room suddenly for no apparent reason. These were all things that I knew my parents would simply be annoyed by if I told them.
“It’s just your imagination” or “You need to quit finding things to scare you.” Those are the kind of things they would have said I’m sure. Honestly, I kept telling myself that. I was trying to be as rational as an eight year old could be about it. My real feeling about it however? I didn’t feel safe at all, and my gut instinct knew something was not right in the house. Whatever it was that was disturbing things, it was becoming more bold. One evening, I was playing some video games. I’ll admit I was a bit of a game junkie at that age. It was just getting dark, and I decided to wrap it up as I knew I’d be eating dinner soon most likely. I had a hook in my room for hanging up my wired controller. As I did hang it up, as soon as I let go, something shocking happened. It was like two other hands grabbed the controller and its wire immediately after I did. It quickly yanked it left, right, left, right. In a split second reaction time I fled from my room. My only thought was to reach mom and dad so I could be safe from whatever it was that just seized my gaming controller. I found them down the hall to my left in the living room. “Don’t run in the house like some spaz for christ’s sake!” exclaimed my father, lounging on the couch with my mother. I contemplated telling them what happened, but I knew they wouldn’t want to hear it. I simply apologized then just watched the television with them, ate dinner, then avoiding going back to my room for as long as possible. I tried to get away with sleeping in the living room, but my mom nudged me to go to my room even though I pretended to already be asleep. My heart was pounding as I entered. My gaming controller was dangling from the hook, except now it was hanging on the right instead of the left side. My stomach twisted even more. Looking back it now, it seems insignificant, but at that time it was terrifying. I slowly slid into bed, had my television up playing cartoons as loud as I could get away with, and then I simply laid there. I constantly scanned around, more paranoid than ever before. I could feel the wrongness. I could feel how I was in danger, like I was some sheep unknowingly laying next to a wolf. Nothing happened that night however. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure that… “it” was still there, but it was merciful enough that night to just drool over me, out of sight. It was getting harder and harder to sleep, and thus harder to function normally. I’d have no ability to focus during the last weeks of school, and at home I frustrated my parents a lot with my tendency to always be out of it. I started seeing things at night, and I don’t know if it was my sleep deprivation or something real. I think that’s part of what added to the terror, my imagination and reality were getting more difficult to tell apart. To make it even worse, I think that’s what it wanted. At this point, I just thought something was wrong with me. On one night, I would lay there as usual, paranoid and watchful as usual. Over time however, my eyelids grew heavier, and heavier, until finally, I fell asleep. I found myself in a dream. I was sitting in a room, in front my of piano I had started learning to play on not long ago. I for some reason, needed to talk to my mom. I don’t know why, note this was a dream, and it doesn’t entirely make sense. I sat up from the piano bench, and called for my mother. Down the hall I saw her peek around the corner. Immediately I felt uncomfortable, as the way she peeked was disturbing. She had a crazed look in her eye, and a artificial smile that no human would actually make. “Mom…?”  I barely managed to utter. I waited there, staring at her, while she eerily stared back at me with that crazed look and a maniac’s smile. Then suddenly she whipped around the corner, and from there it was the worst nightmare I had ever had. A loud shrill noise and rhythmic clanging rang throughout at an unbearable volume suddenly. I stared at my mother, and the dread that gripped my heart was so intense, I almost literally felt like my heart was about to explode. Her body made grotesque sounds of bones snapping out of place, things sliding around, fluids moving around inside her. Her face became more demonic than human, and she was hunched over like some animal. Anomalies were all over her, nothing fitting in place naturally. She quickly advanced toward me, every movement making more disgusting popping and cracking sounds. In her eyes I could see nothing but pure evil, a sadistic desire. The feeling of terror and dread was so pure and strong, it was a real feeling in my chest. When I snapped awake right before my “mother” reached me, my chest almost hurt, and I could feel my heart beating harder than ever. What made it even worse… I couldn’t yell for mom. She would have made my panic even worse. I couldn’t call for my dad without calling for her as well. I had no one to reach out to. I was so scared, I felt like crying. Suddenly, I heard a faint knocking sound. Something was whispering a single word, and at first I couldn’t tell what. I made it out after listening as hard as I could. “Chrissstopheeer…” it faintly whispered. My heart sank at the recognition of my name being pronounced with that eerie elongation. “Christopher honey… are you ok? It sounded like you had a very bad dream…”
        I recognized the voice as my mother’s, and suddenly despite the nightmare I had just had, I felt relief. I suppose it takes a lot to really be scared of your own mom. She was far better than what I thought it might be at first. “Mom…?” I faintly said. It wasn’t really normal of her to talk to me without actually coming in my room, and the way she talked sounded off. She did come in after that however. “She” quietly and gracefully floated into the room. It looked like her at first. Then I saw it. Her eyes were nothing but hollow sockets. I didn’t run away though. I really should have, but I think I was just in so much shock, I didn’t really believe it. All I could do were choke out a few words. “Who – who are you?” She – I mean it, gave me an awful smile. It was long, from ear to ear, and sort of wavy, like some poorly made clay figure. “I’m your mother of course.” I felt a strong feeling to retort. This thing was definitely not my mother. I didn’t know what it was, but it was not my mother, it couldn’t even have been human. All I knew was, it wanted to trick me, and I wasn’t going to play along. “No you’re not!” It simply gazed deeper at me with those infinitely dark hollow eye sockets. Its brows furrowed, its mouth distorted into this disturbing frown, and spoke again. “And you…” It spoke soft, and gently. It was without a care in a world, like it was the most innocent and caring voice you could ever have heard. Then, its voiced changed to be more fitting of the expression on its face. Its voice became warped, thick, and deep. “-you are mine!” With that it reached out for me and I screamed on the top of my lungs. I ducked under its reach and ran out the hallway. My parents were quick to turn their lights on I could see as I headed for their room. I didn’t bother looking behind me. At first they were quite concerned. After I started to exclaim to them what happened, my mother sighed, and father scowled at me. “Chris, you’re nine years old now, it’s time to grow up. If you can’t get over these imaginary fears, we’re going to have to get you some help. Do you want people to think you’re crazy?” “No dad…” I said with great shame. “Alright, listen, we’re tired. Go back to bed and get some sleep so you aren’t a zombie tomorrow.” There was absolutely nothing that would bring me back to my room. The amount of rejection I had of that idea was so strong, I would have rather slept in a sewer. “No! Please! I can’t, please just tonight let me sleep with you guys!” My dad looked angry now. “You can’t be serious, you need to gr-”
        “Jeremy” my mother piped in, “just this night should be fine, he’s obviously had a very vivid nightmare. You can be understanding of that.” My father sighed and relaxed his face. “Alright Chris, but tomorrow you’ve got to get over this. Promise me Chris.” “I promise dad.” I climbed into bed with them and lay there, feeling safer than I ever had in ages. They both quickly fell back asleep from what I could tell. I felt relaxed, but I still had trouble sleeping in the room that was darker than I was used to sleeping in. I gazed out the doorway. My heart skipped a beat. Past my parents doorway, standing away at an angle in the hallway, was my fake mother. It simply stood there with a stoic expression, staring straight at me. It whispered, projecting its voice at me. “I was going to give you so much. I was going to show you things no one else can. We need each other Christopher. You need me as much as I want you.” I simply stayed in bed, staying as close to my mom as I could, with hot wet tears running down my face. It went like that for some time. It told me about how it wanted to show me things. That I would love it if I only trusted it. It asked me to come see it, made bribes. There of course was absolutely no way I was going to believe anything it said. After a while, it started to get darker. It grew impatient, telling me if I didn’t come to it, it would grab me itself. “Fine, cling to your pathetic mother you calf. What does she give you that I can’t?” The dark distorted voice started to return, and it began to lose the form of my mother and looked more like that infinitely dark shadow I had seen before. “Mark me boy, you can’t hide from me. You will be left alone, and there will be no one to help you.” With that, it began fade to out. By that, I mean the shadow sort of just faded into the darkness, so that it didn’t stand out as an even darker part of the shadows. The next day I managed to stay the night at a friend’s house. Right after that, I spent two weeks at my grandparents. I avoided having to sleep alone in a room for as long as possible. Some of those nights I had more nightmares. In one, I was back in my house. I was alone in the living room, sitting on the couch. The shadow appeared in the doorway adjacent to the hall, boring into me with two eternal green eyes. A thunderous demonic roar erupted through the room, and my chest felt like it was being tore open. The purest form of dread and terror was funneling inside of me, so strong it felt worse than the anticipation of death. I screamed and then woke up suddenly, in pure silence. The next dream, I was in a room I didn’t recognize with my mother and a stranger. I meandered around the room like a bored child would, when suddenly, two pitch black arms stretched across the floor and grabbed me, they came from a black void on the wall. Those same green eyes were present inside the void. I screamed, and screamed for my mother. She didn’t even acknowledge me. No matter how much I fought tooth and claw, no matter how hard I screamed, I was always dragged back towards the void, and my mother did nothing. The same feeling of absolute dread, pure and ancient terror, filled my being. I gave up, and right before I was dragged into the void, I woke up. When I finally came back home, it was a happy reunion with my parents. I think they were happy to be away from my issues for a while, but they missed me. I went through the day as normally as I could, and I did feel a bit better despite the awful nightmares I had been having. When it was time for me to go to sleep however, I was still terrified. After that night of the thing trying to take me, I simply could not bring myself to sleep in that room again. I scanned around constantly, waiting for something terrible to happen. Much to my astonishment however, nothing happened. Nothing happened the next night either. Nothing for the next, nothing for the next month, nothing even happened within the next year. My life went back to normal. I was 12 years old, and had come to think that the horrifying events from when I was eight and nine years old were simply products of my own mind. I really didn’t want to believe that it was real. Alas, I would be punished for betraying my own senses. I’ve never been confirmed to have any issues with my mental health. Believe me, I got myself tested after I grew up. If I ever was ill that way, I made a full recovery after my childhood. I have good reason to believe that I was healthy then as well sadly. One evening I was home alone, my parents were out of town grocery shopping in a bigger city about an hour away. They could buy things there that weren’t available where we lived. I never liked going shopping with them, so I chose to stay home alone. It was about eight at night, and I was simply in my room watching television. Suddenly, I heard my mothers voice. “Christopher, can you come help us honey?” Normally I could hear my parents in the driveway before they came inside, but I figured I must’ve been really out of it watching television. It was typical for me to help them bring groceries inside as soon as they got home. “Coming!” I said as I then walked down the hallway to the kitchen. My mother was at the table with her back turned to me, she seemed to be looking down. I noticed she was alone. “Where’s dad?” I inquired. “He’s going to the bathroom, come he-” I quickly tuned her out however. I had a quick nervous feeling as I realized that I had used the bathroom and didn’t flush. I ran back down the hall as fast as I could to the bathroom, then saw that dad wasn’t there. A thought popped in the back of my mind. “God no, oh please god no.” I walked over to the bathroom window. and I ever so quietly strained to see out the distorted glass. I hoped with all my might that I would see my parent’s familiar car parked outside. – The car port was empty. At this point, I knew what was in the kitchen, and I began to tear up. I had two ways of getting out of the house. There was the kitchen door, obviously out of the question. My other option was to run back into the hallway and into the living room, where the only door out was. This was still difficult, as I would have to get closer to it by going back down the hall. I felt a strong conviction to get out however, and quickly acted. I quietly but quickly paced down the hall. It was standing there waiting for me. Those hollow eyes, those infinitely dark, empty sockets. They bored into my own eyes, as if they were ready to devour me whole. “Chris, I asked for your help.” “Get away from me! I know what you are!” “Don’t talk to me like that boy, get over here, now!” “Leave me alone!” I quickly turned the other way back down the hall and ran into my room. I locked the door and quickly dragged my dresser in the way. I could hear it walking slowly towards my door. Thud. Thud. Thud. I backed away as far as I could from the door, whimpering and curled up in the corner. “Let me in Chris. I’m not angry, I promise.” I didn’t respond, I just hoped with all conviction that it would go away. I could see two black shoes through the crack of the door melt away into shadow. “Let me in Chris, quit fucking with me!” “What do you want from me!” There was a pause. All I could hear was my heart beat and the television in my room. Then suddenly, in a dark booming voice, it gave me its answer. “I want you, you are mine calf!” With that, the power in the house went out. My television and the lights both went out, and my terror exploded. My door burst open and my dresser flew against the wall, nearly hitting me. I screamed, and felt two ice cold hands grab my ankles. All I could see were two green orbs above me. I gripped the floor as hard as I could, fighting with all my strength to stay put. It dragged me out of my room with ease anyways. It took me down the carpet hallway, some of my fingernails were torn off as I gripped the floor. At this point, I could process only one emotion, one thought. Fear, the desire to escape. It dragged me out of the door outside, and with a shadowy tendril it stitched my mouth close. All I could let out now were muffled moans of pain and terror. It continued speaking to me in its dark voice, but this time instead of it being a demonic boom, it was like a subtle whisper in the wind. “We will have so much fun together Christopher. I’m so happy we’ll finally be together.” I strained to see where it was taking me. I gasped in my mind when I saw where. We were headed towards my neighbour’s old well. “Down, down, down we’ll go! Don’t worry, you’ll never be alone again!” I tried to scream in response, but I simply felt more warm blood from my lips drip down me as my pleas for help were muffled. “You had me worried little calf. I thought I was going to actually lose you. No one gets away from me.” It began to speak with an almost tired voice. “I’ve been doing this, for far, far too long to lose.” We weren’t far from the well. At this point I was so exhausted I couldn’t even fight anymore. We reached the well, and it stopped. Its gaze turned to me. Our eyes locked together, and I submitted to my fate. It let go of me, and I couldn’t bring myself to get up to run again. “Oh Christopher… we’ve been so hungry.” Then suddenly, light flooded around us, and it quickly escaped down the well. My parents slammed on their brakes in the middle of the driveway and ran to me. I passed out after that. My parents didn’t see the shadow, that was no surprise. My injuries were real however. My parents were terrified and had rushed me to the hospital after calling the police. The police led an investigation for whoever broke in and potentially tried to murder me. Obviously, they didn’t find anyone. To this day, my lips are incredibly scarred from the numerous stitching holes. Everyone was shocked by my wounds. I told the truth, but they all were convinced I was suffering from severe trauma, and simply couldn’t remember things correctly. I really do wish they were right. I wasn’t alone again for quite some time, as my parents were horrified by the possibility that someone was out there still, preying on me. They never left me home alone, and they were very considerate of my fears. By the time I was fifteen, the thing was gone completely. I think it really did move on. I’m retelling this story now because – because I want people to understand that this, or even worse perhaps these, are very dangerous. First of all, no I don’t know what it was. I’ve read about a lot of demons from different religions and cultures. I’ve read about all sorts of evil paranormal entities. While I find common characteristics at times, I’ve never been able to determine what it actually was based on told accounts. Whatever it was though, I have a feeling that it was – very, very old. Like it was an ancient natural predator of humanity. The feelings I have, the things I suspect, are the result of my gut feelings from experiencing it. I think it preys on children and on children only. Once you become a teenager, the chance that it will chase after you are slim. It’s very familiar with humans, it has observed them for ages. It will attempt to mimic people its victim knows, but chances are it won’t do a good job. As well as it knows its prey, it is so different from them that it will always seem off when it tries to lie. I’m quite sure its never been human before. It seemed to possess a dominance over the boy in the old house. I think he was a lingering spirit. Don’t bother going to visit him, he probably was devoured. If anyone out there has encountered this thing like I have, please let me know. I’d be very interested to hear about your experience. I forgot about it for years, but I find myself worrying about it again. You see, I have a wife and kids of my own now. This morning, my oldest son came to me, and he told me something I did not ever want to hear. “Daddy, last night there was a big scary shadow, and it tried to play with me. He said you and him were old friends, and that it was ok. I don’t like him.” I really don’t know what I’m going to do… but I know what it was. Nobody is going to be sleeping alone tonight. Someone else’s daughter has already gone missing this week… Copyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on Creepypasta.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed under any circumstance.