There's somebody standing in the corner of my room.
Well, "standing" may be the wrong word. There's someone IN the corner of my room. The lights are off; only moonshine streaming through the window above my bed gives shape to the darkness there. It's bulky; that much I know. It's BIG, bigger than me. The size of its shadow dwarfs my small frame, or would anyway, if I dared move from beneath the covers of my linen sheets.
Feet tucked safely in, the monsters under my bed can't get me, but if I move the alien - for surely that's...
He likes his own room, but he likes mine more. He's five. Half the time, if he had his way he would climb back inside me. He can never get close enough. Half the time. The other half he's complaining. Scowling. "You're interfering with my personal space!" Like he's breaking up with me.
So when he stands there, waiting, in the corner, and he asks if he can share our room, our bed, our space, I do what any rational human would do. And that's to pick him up and hold him, smell his head, that getting-bigger head, and say,...
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room. That's what she told me most days and as normal, I ignored her. I presumed she was talking about her reflection who she believed another person, a friend. Dementia steals the life force. She was no longer the woman I knew anymore, just a small petulant child to take care of. One that could look sweet and innocent but could take a knife to me if she fancied. She spent all day in her bedroom talking to the mirror, packing and unpacking strange old suitcases, oblivious to the fact she was...
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room.
Did you not hear me?
Let me say it again.
There is somebody standing in the corner of my room.
A blonde little girl sucking her thumb and staring back at me with these big brown eyes. She wears a ragged green dress that she held fisted in the hand that wasn't in her mouth.
"Hi," she muttered around her thumb. "Someone told me you could help me."
I stared back at her dumbstruck with my jaw on the floor. After I picked it up I asked, "Who exactly are you?"...
A figure made of darkness, shadow. Silent. As I try to ignore my phantom I diligently type at my keyboard, words flow, meaningless and easy. This job is slowly driving me mad. I shiver and tell myself it has nothing to do with the shade silently observing me. How could it? There is no shade. If I were to turn, look directly at it, that would be the end. Or the beginning I suppose, rather depends on how you look at it. The end of sanity, the beginning of full fledged madness. How many years have I struggled to ignore...
Who is that person in the corner of my room? is it a person? is it an animal of somekind? Perhaps I should have looked more closely. I mean, come on? How did that person, that thing, get into my room? If it is a person, I'll bet it's the kind of person who thinks its funny to disturn a teacher's class when they are tyriong to do an activity that will benefit eveyrone, because on the STAAR test, well...you know what that test is all about. if it is a person, and that person did make me upsetin that...
And I don't think that they are going anywhere anytime soon. Now that the 5am hour is upon me, I feel as if maybe the person standing in the corner of my room will be able to lift me out of bed. He's done it before, and today I really feel like I might need a little extra help.
My room is a very lively place; it is where I feel the safest. Not only do I do my best work in my room, but this man is in my room, like he always is, night after night. He no...
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room. He tells me things. He tells me to do things. Sometimes, he tells me other people are lying. He tells me not to tell anyone he's there. And I listen, because he's scary. But I think they're starting to figure out.
They see my eyes dart his way when he speaks. They see my confusion when I try to separate the voices. They see my hesitation when he tells me they're wrong. I think they're starting to figure it out, and I can't let that happen. He told me I can't....
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room.
The 'experts' can talk all they like about Sleep Paralysis but I'm not convinced. I want to believe them, I really do, but that 'somebody' has always been there.
It's my first memory and will probably be my last. A shadow, a presence looming over my life. Never speaking but all seeing and so very dark.
Spritualists want to convince me it's my 'guardian angel' but I'm not convinced. I don't feel very guarded by it. Quite the opposite.
I should have never acknowledged it, never mentioned it, never tried to...
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room. I have no idea who they are. I don't recognise the outline, the shape. I think the figure is a woman. She, if she is a she, is tall and slim, almost skeletal, like a witch. This thought scares me. I don't want to be visited by a witch, especially not the ghost of a dead witch. Which is worse? A live witch, with a wand and a broom? Or a ghost witch, with neither because she is no longer a physical substance? Would the live witch or the ghost witch...
There's somebody standing in the corner of my room.