It was a cold summer night in 2014. I was eight years old at the time. My family and I were visiting my grandparents in the village because of the holiday, and we had planned a huge feast. The drive there was torturous. I had been awake for sixty-seven hours by the time we got in the car and started the journey. I was anxious; I felt dizzy, lightheaded, and nauseous. For an hour and a half, I stared out of the window, trying not to throw up. I counted every tree I saw — 629. That number still rings in my ears every time I think of that accursed day.
We arrived at the village safely and had a lot of "fun." If you could call sitting at a table for five hours, listening to drunk relatives argue about politics, fun, then yes — we had fun. My dad got drunk, so we decided to stay the night at my grandparents' house. I was lucky; I got the lone bed that stood in the corner of my uncle's room. The bed was uncomfortable and screeched every time I moved, so I picked a position and stuck to it. It must have been around 3 a.m., and yet I still couldn't fall asleep. I lay flat on my back, counting the dark spots on the ceiling. Cold air brushed against my arm — the window was slightly ajar. I wanted to get up and close it, but then I realized something truly terrifying: I could not move a muscle. I was paralyzed from the neck down.
A cold sweat broke out over my body. My heart began to race; I could hear the blood rushing in my ears. Suddenly, the door at the far end of the room creaked open. The room was massive — at least twenty meters long. And there, standing in the doorway, I saw a figure I instantly recognized: my grandmother, a frail woman of sixty-three.
Before I could open my mouth to speak, she asked,"Why aren't you asleep?"
There was something about her voice — it shook me to my core. I answered weakly,"I… I can't fall asleep."
She ignored my response and asked again, but this time her voice was deeper, distorted — almost demonic.
"WHY AREN'T YOU ASLEEP?!"
Terror gripped me. I didn't know what was happening. I wanted to scream, to run — but I was trapped. I closed my eyes tightly, hoping it would all go away. When I dared to open them again, what I saw froze my blood:
My grandmother was no longer at the door.She was standing on my chest.
Her weight pressed down on me, suffocating me, pinning me to the bed. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't move. I looked up at her face, desperate for comfort, and saw only darkness. Her face was gone — swallowed by a swirling void, an inescapable cloud of blackness.
Then, with a screech that sounded like death itself, she screamed one last time:
"GO TO SLEEP!!"
I jolted upright.
Everything was back to normal. The room was silent. The door at the end of the room was shut and locked. And my grandmother was nowhere to be seen.