Honor the Horrors of the Internet

The Clown in the Window

My name is Alex Pierce. This story occurred in 1992, when I was about eleven years old. We lived on 18970 Bechard Place in Cerritos, CA, in a two-story split-level home, where my brother (Dylan) and I slept in neighboring rooms upstairs. My brother was known for his wild imagination and would constantly make up stories, but he was actually asleep when this particular incident occurred.

Before I go into full detail explaining what happened that night, I will tell you that my brother actually claimed he had a "clownish" imaginary friend and constantly referred to him as if he were an actual human, even offering him food at the dinner-table. I usually thought it as a mere childish gesture and my mother and I would just watch him and contently play along.

On February 7 (Friday), my brother woke me in the middle of the night, claiming that a clown was "playing peekaboo" with him from his bedroom window and told me that it was "funner with more people". I had no idea what he was talking about and was quite honestly scared, but I held his hand, turned on the lights, and entered his bedroom.

"Look!" he exclaimed, pointing at the window, "It's the clown!"

He just stood there, pointing, laughing, but I was completely dumbfounded. No one was at the window and, even when he claimed the clown was speaking, I couldn't hear anything. I assumed he was merely sleep-talking and motioned him back into bed, assuring him that there was no one there.

Little more than a half-hour later, he entered my room again and stood at the door motionless. When I snapped at him, he jumped back and claimed once again that a clown was at the window and that he needed my help, because apparently it wouldn't leave him alone. At this point, I was rather more pestered than frightened.

I entered his room again and jokingly said, "Be gone! You are not wanted here, clown!"

Suddenly, however, there was a loud banging at the window, which subsequently spooked my brother. The two of us both hurried down the staircase, as the banging continued. Our panicked voices abruptly woke my mother, who sat up in bed when the two of us entered her bedroom doorway.

"What's wrong?" she asked nervously.

We both tried to explain the incident, but we were breathless and too frightened to speak coherently. Instead, we dragged her across the room and demanded she come upstairs with us.

By then, however, the banging had already ended. We both explained what had happened at this point and she gave us a worried expression. She explained to us that when she was about our age, her older sisters played a prank on her by hauling her down into the basement.

When she had relieved herself of panic and slumped down onto the floor, a clown suddenly appeared, peeking in on her from a side-window, and began murmuring softly.

Shivers went through me as she told us her encounter and, to be honest, this was the first time I had ever experienced such hopeless fear. We moved out soon afterwards and never had any incidents since, but we were both left quite in shock.