The Man In My Dreams

My sleep was not a peaceful one.

Images of vicious sights danced through my mind, walking up and down my memories and revisiting them with a cruel imagination. Youthful birthday parties became blood-soaked massacres. Graduations became graveyards. Moving out became running away.

Through it all, was that man – that thing. Standing, far back: in the treeline of my childhood house, in a faraway window of my college campus, across the street from my parents home as I waved goodbye.

Shadowy, distorted, inconsistent, but always there, like an overwhelming presence, like a force of nature condensed and coalesced into an infinitely dense event horizon, always dragging my focus towards it.

When I woke, it was with a heart drenched in panic, images of that indiscernible figure still imprinted onto the heavy darkness that my fresh eyes could not penetrate. I sat for a minute, catching my breath, letting my heart slow. But even still, as the shadowy lines of my door and my closet and all my little furnishings came in, that tattoo on my vision didn’t dissipate. In fact, it hardened, solidified; even as the rest of my room came into focus, my desk remained hazy, uncertain, and through that haze I was certain I saw it. Saw him, crouching behind my chair, peeking his face over the table I studied at.

The only perceivable detail of that mirage was a large, toothy, white grin.

I slammed my hand onto my bedside table, igniting my familiar lamp with a loud thud. In the light, I looked over, and my desk was as vacant as ever, the only thing hiding were art essays that were desperately overdue.

Throwing off the covers, I swung my legs out of bed, sitting on the edge and taking a moment to catch my breath, letting the nightmares wash away like a dirty stain. Dreams never stick for long.

As cool night air washed into my lungs, I felt the dryness of thirst on my tongue. Rising, slipping on my slippers, I decided it might do me some good to get a glass of water from the kitchen. To calm the nerves and ground the mind, I told myself.

Entering the kitchen, I fumbled for the light switch, flicking it, the singular yellow light-bulb stammering to life. It’s warm gaze flickered on, on and off, and for the briefest moment I waited with baited breath to see something in my kitchen: something crouching behind my granite kitchen table, something sitting at my small, dark oaken table, even something peering from the crevices of my ancient oven. With each flutter of illumination, my heart threatened to stop. What would I see?

Nothing. I was probably over-thinking. It was all just a dream, a figment of the mind. Not something that can haunt me or hurt me, I had told myself. Just a dream.

I went over to the sink, its familiar rusted faucet a comforting pylon of normality. I grabbed a cup, filled it, and took the cup over to my kitchen window that overlooked the city around me.

Drip, drip, drip

The city was quiet. Empty, even. Not a car whizzed by, not a pedestrian walking, even from my high-rise vantage point.

Drip, drip, drip.

The water was unpleasantly warm, with a metal tinge which the landlord assured me had no immediate health effects.

Drip, drip, drip.

Focusing back on the streets, I saw I was mistaken; there was a person down there, about 4 streets away from my apartment. Just standing, under a streetlight. Standing. Still as could be. Even though they were right under the streetlight, though, not a detail of their form was discernible. It was like light itself recessed from that sole figure….

Drip, drip, drip.

I turned. What was that noise? Had I forgotten to turn off the tap? But no, even several feet away, even in the dim illumination of light, I could see the faucet was completely twisted shut.

.

.

.

The dripping had stopped now, at least. Weird, but not my problem, I thought. I turned back to the world outside.

He had moved. 3 streets closer, in fact. The man from before – I could tell it was a man. I wasn’t sure how. Its features were still indiscernible, light still recessed from him. I couldn’t tell if he was 5 feet tall or 6, skinny or gargantuan, the dimensions of his frame flickering like a candle. I couldn’t see what he was wearing – if anything at all. It was like this man, this thing, was some forgotten part of reality, some component that the lords of this universe had forgotten to acknowledge.

Or, perhaps, tried to forget—My heart stopped at that thought,

Drip, drip, drip.

Now the dripping was starting to bother me. I whirled around. Where was it coming from?

The tap, I saw, was still firmly twisted shut. Was there a leak from the floor above? My eyes scanned the roof, looking for a patch of wet on the ceiling, or-

He was in my house.

He, was in my house.

In the corner of the room, perched up against the ceiling, holding himself aloft like a spider, was the man.

Shadows drew around him – or grew from him – making him impossible to perceive, like trying to see through the eye of a storm. His teeth were bared, a glimmering white beacon of reflective murder. From that wide and smiling maw, saliva drooled out.

Drip, drip, drip.

Right onto the tiles of my floor, a puddle of Deaths own desire.

I woke again with a start, taking in one big gasping breath. My heart hammered against my chest. My body drenched in sweat. I felt a pool of warmth between my loins.

It was still dark. Not suffocating darkness, not a maelstrom that wrapped around that thing. The normal darkness, the kind that you were like a cloak on a midnight walk or that lulls you into sleep.

I sat in that darkness for a long, long time; or maybe just moments. It was indiscernible between seconds and eternity, but I sat cradled in the black, letting my heart simmer.

Soon, to my embarrassment, the sour stench of piss had reached my nostrils. I could not stay like this forever, I knew; should not, my dignity reminded me. I got out of bed, slowly, carefully. Carefully peeled off the sweat-drenched sheets, gently slung my legs over the edge into the inky abyss of night. I rose, and slowly walked out.

Drip, drip, drip.

My blood ran cold, I swear I could feel ice rushing through my veins. My heart, once violently beating, was now in stasis, suffering its own fight-flight-freeze.

It was just the tap. I could see it from the doorway, a slow dribble of water from the faucet. Warmth hesitantly flowed through me again.

I showered, got changed into fresh clothes, and stripped all the sheets from my bed. It was late, I knew, but I had no other sheets. Packing them into a plastic bag, I set out for the familiar laundromat.

The trip was comforting. The familiarity of the halls, or the occasional squeak of the old elevator and the flickering lights. They were familiar flaws. Grounding.

I got to the bottom floor, walked across the red carpet and out the automatic sliding doors, and walked the mercifully short walk to the laundromat.

The usual bakeries, family grocers, thrift shops and novelty attractions lined the streets, illuminated in the street-lights warm yellow glow as I passed each one.

Something wasn’t right though.

This was a city – there should be people. Cars. Pedestrians. Even at night, a city should never sleep.

I was suddenly far less comfortable, as my hair stood on end.

Desperate to be inside, I turned the last corner and entered the laundromat. Still, no one was here. The machines were all still and silent. I approached one, far at the back, emptied the plastic bag of clothing into the opening, and slammed it shut. I inserted a couple of coins –- as archaic a system as that is in this modern era – and prepared to wait.

I felt a sudden pressure on me.

I turned, facing the front of the store now.

The streets were empty.

The world itself felt empty.

Empty except for one.

Across the road from where I stood. Standing under the large steel lamp, yet obscured in darkness. Every sense I had shunned the idea of paying it heed, but I stared at it like it was a car crash I couldn’t tear myself from.

Indiscernible, unremarkable, a blot of ink on the world as I knew it. An error in the natural order.

He stood, smiling. Teeth as white as I remember.

He took one big, pronounced step. A loud click echoed as sole met asphalt. Another step, another click. Another. Another. Slowly, precisely.

I hoped to whatever god that I would wake up, that this was just another dream.

I do not think god is brave enough for this.