Fear is all around us

The Darkness

True

This is a story from my childhood, one which I have not told anyone except for my wife; just thinking about it still sends shivers down my spine. I grew up in a small house with just my mother. It was a nice little house with two bedrooms upstairs, a small living room and kitchen on the main floor, and a basement where I kept all of my toys. The basement had a small storage room in the back, lit by a single light bulb. It wasn't until I was seven years old that I started to get scared to go down there.

It was a dark, rainy night as I played with my Lego's in the basement. Rain water slowly dripped through the window and down the cement wall. It was cold down there that night, more so than usual; I was wrapped up in my hoodie and a blanket as I played. While attempting to build an airplane out of my Lego's, I suddenly got a chill down my spine followed by the overwhelming feeling of being watched. I turned and looked behind me toward the dark storage room. Something drew my attention to the room, but I couldn't see what it was. It seemed darker than usual; I didn't think a room could get that dark, especially with the lights on in the room adjacent to it. It almost seemed like there was something in there drawing away all of the light, sucking it in like a black hole. I stared into the darkness at seemingly nothing, until I saw something move. I didn't know what it was, but it seemed even darker than the room. I saw it for just a second before it disappeared; as it did, I could see light slowly start to trickle into the room. This terrified me, so I ran upstairs to the living room to seek comfort from my mother. When I told her what I had seen, she just told me that it was my mind playing tricks on me because of the heavy rain outside.

I went to bed that night not thinking much about what had happened in the basement. I lay back in my bed and closed my eyes just like on any other night, and I fell asleep rather quickly. Although I fell asleep like it was a normal night, the night was less than normal; I woke up that night with the feeling of being watched. I opened my eyes to see nothing but darkness; I couldn't even see the light from the street light outside of my window. Thinking that maybe my blinds were closed, I looked across my room for the soft, green glow of my alarm clock, but it wasn't there. At that moment, I realized that this was a lot like the darkness I had seen in the basement and that scared me. My fear doubled in an instant when I thought I saw movement in the darkness. In my terror from seeing that there was something in my room, I pulled my blankets over my head and screamed. In the midst of my screams I heard my door open, and the soft call from my mother. As she sat down on my bed, I slowly pulled my blankets off from over my head and looked around my room. The light had returned to my room and I could now see the soft glow of my clock blinking at 2:17am, and the light from the street light outside my window with my blinds fully open. My mother asked me what was wrong, and I told her what had happened; reassuringly, she told me that it was just a nightmare and to go back to sleep. She gently kissed my forehead and left my room, closing the door behind her. It was hard for me to fall asleep after that, so I just watched my clock slowly tick away the minutes.

This went on for about two or three months, staying at this level of activity; nothing more than the feeling of being watched in the darkness, however, that all changed on Halloween night. It was a typical Ontario Halloween night; cold, windy and rainy. I had returned home that night from trick-or-treating with my mom at about eight o'clock and went down to the basement to play with my toys for a bit before bed. I could hear the rain tap against the basement window, and the wind whistling as it blew between my house and my neighbour's house. Something was unsettling in the basement that night, more so than usual. As I played I thought I heard sounds coming from the storage room, but every time I looked there was nothing; this was nothing strange to me as it's been happening for the last few months, so I continued to play. I played for about ten minutes when the power suddenly went out, and that's when everything changed. As soon as the power went out, I heard more movement from the storage room behind me. I immediately looked behind me to see a quick flash of red light, and then darkness. As I stared, I could hear footsteps from the dark room, but I could see nothing. The footsteps slowly made their way toward me, the darkness somehow getting darker as they approached, until they suddenly stopped. I moved my eyes around the room, careful not to move any other part of my body in fear that whatever this was would see me. I looked around the room, trying to see what this thing was, but I could see nothing; it was so dark I couldn't even see my feet. I wanted to run upstairs to the safety of my mother, but I was frozen in fear so I didn't move a muscle or even breathe.