I am lying in bed with my head up against the footboard. This is due to the mattress pad on my bed being all kinds of messed up and myself having no motivation to fix it, thus leaving it half off the front part of my bed. It is dark. And suddenly the feeling that I am not alone creeps over me like a chill.
I look at my dresser behind me that backs up to the footboard of my bed. To its left is a gap between it and the wall. The perfect location for something to be watching me, or perhaps stretch in a gnarly finger towards me…I try to shake this thought out of my head. There is nothing there. The only ones in this room are my roommate, my pet rats and I. But the thought does not leave, and the feeling of an uncomfortable presence only grows. I cannot sleep, my eyes continuously snapping open to examine this gap. Then an idea strikes me. Triumphantly I lift my large stuffed bunny off the ground and wedge it into the gap, thus blocking the entire portion closest to my head. Excellent.
I now try to fall asleep. But the anxiety has not left me. Something could reach through the space above the bunny with a gangly arm, twisting down to meet me…thoughts of the bunny being pushed out of the gap by an unseen force frightened me as well. With a frustrated sigh I pull my blankets over my head, leaving a small hole open for me to breathe out of. I feel better this way…but I soon grow uncomfortable. I shift, so I am now facing the side of the room away from the wall. My paranoia does not like this at all. An entire open space of danger. My face could be clawed off by some unseen beastie while I slept. Again I tried to push these thoughts away, knowing they were illogical. But they wouldn’t go. Every time I’d begin to drift off into sleep I would be jolted awake with anxiety, heartbeat rapid, a sick feeling in my stomach as though woken by an alarm. DANGER DANGER DANGER my brain seemed to scream at me.
I was sick of it. I gave up and returned to the normal side of my bed, away from the gap and closer to my rats, a comforting presence. And I now prayed to God to send away any entity that may have snuck into the room. I then snap telepathically at anything potentially present, warning it that I didn’t have the time or patience for spirits. I finally curl up and fall asleep. But it is not a restful one, and in fact is not discernible from waking life because I am still in my bed in the dark fighting paranoia for hours within it. When I finally wake up it is noon and I am so exhausted I collapse right back into bed.