Creepypasta Stories

A Parent's Plea

Throughout my years of reading people's stories of this nature, I have noticed that many of them speak from the perspective of a child. This is entirely apt: we've all been children, we've all had the strange and unexplainable experiences before we "grew up" and convinced ourselves we'd figured out how the world worked.

As children, the rules are flexible. Monsters, flying, magic are all perfectly acceptable in our worlds until the droll, seriousness of 'science' takes over.

Please forgive me if I depart from this perspective and assume that of a parent, a father. I realise that many of you good readers, for plentiful reasons, have not had this experience. Those of you who have will agree that the becoming of a parent bestows upon one the weight of all responsibility. You are the one upon whom all the power of protection, reassurance and care rests. You have in your charge a unique and precious entity, your duty to preserve and nourish it. It is a sacred and terrifying burden. Thus is was with Corley.

When my first son - how I miss him! - was born, I confess I felt lost and terrified as well as the happier emotions new parenthood brings. But plenty of others do it, I thought. Millions all over the world, throughout history, have raised children and they managed. Poorer, less educated, even less evolved animals do it all the time! I would be fine!

Oh would it were so.

The first few months were the typical mundane, hectic, calm, chaotic, messy, joyous and absurd times of modern parenting. Corley was a difficult sleeper at first; hated sleeping alone. I can sense the parents reading this smile knowingly - for aren't all babies like this? They have to be trained to sleep alone, heartbreaking though it might be. In infancy, Corley would scream for hours if he was separated from his mother or me; long after we had passed out from exhaustion, we would wake to hear him screaming. Eventually we relented. Surely any damage done by sleeping with his parents would be less than the obvious discomfort he felt screaming all night.

He developed into a spirited, highly energetic toddler. He was tireless, rough and boisterous but just as loving and relational as one could hope for. He was a little delayed in walking, and speaking, but every child is different aren't they? Don't rush them, says the literature. They'll get there in their own time. And of course, he did. For a time.

Now reader, please allow me a small indulgence. You've heard about the horrors of parenthood: the sleeplessness, soiled nappies, drudgery, boredom. You've also heard about the "joy", and the "amazement" and any number of superlative words of "wonder" that it brings. Thus it was when Corley started talking. More so, understanding. It is known that babies and children absorb huge amounts of information before they venture into language themselves. A new word, a colour, a concept. I was especially moved when he identified with me enough to give me a name: "Bab".

The most special part of this for me was that instant of connection between two minds - that brief eye contact where he understood something, and I saw that he did, and he saw that I saw, and so on into that endless feedback loop that signifies the connection of two minds. We adults do that every day of course, with our friends and colleagues; but when you see it happen for the first time with your own child... then, you understand why we go on about it so.

And this must be when it started. Of course I didn't realise at the time - who would with their first child? - that something was amiss. Shortly after I had begun to see these 'connections' regularly, I noticed that Corley would often shift his gaze from mine to a space in the room just over my shoulder. The look of understanding in his eyes would deepen. His smile would broaden. The first time I had assumed that his mother was behind me, and he was reacting to her. He would still acknowledge me of course, but his greatest recognition was reserved for that vacant space behind me, up by the ceiling, or at the top of the curtains.