Bump In The Night

                                                

I woke up bolt upright. My heart is racing and I’m out of breath. My jaw feels like I have been clenching it again, the headache already starting to swell behind my eyes.

The sheets are damp from what I hope is just sweat this time. 

It appears to still be night or maybe early morning. The sun is still asleep and after I removed my clock it’s hard to tell exactly what time of day it is anymore.

I couldn’t stand waking every night knowing it was always the same time. It felt wrong somehow. I start to try and piece things together, why am I awake? Did I have another nightmare or was it something else? It’s hard to tell in my current state. I don’t remember dreaming, do I? 

No I don’t, so why? 

I went to bed as usual, nothing of note happened. 

Maybe just a restless mind is keeping me up. 

So very strange that it happens at this hour most nights now, like my mind and body know something i do not. 

Bump! A loud bang comes from the hallway just outside my room, it makes me jump and puts me even more on edge. 

Bump! Bump! 

It happens a second time and a third in quick succession, only this time a new sound proceeds the bang. A sound like velcro being torn slowly, that tearing and ripping sound when those little plastic hooks try to hold on and can’t under the strain. 

What is in my hallway? Is this the reason I am awake? I start to wonder about what it could be when I hear it again. 

Scrape…Bump!

This time the sound has me more alarmed than the other times i have heard it, this time it appears as if it is getting closer.                                        

At least, I think it’s getting closer. I can’t be sure in my state.

You know the one. 

When you have just woken up, the world is still blurry and slow. Everything seems slightly off or not how it should be. That kind of between dreams and consciousness. 

Scrape..bump.

This time I am sure I heard it, but for now, it seems that it is still at the other end of the hallway. Thank whoever needs thanking that it hasn’t moved closer.

It could be anything though, this is a very old house. 

It has been passed down through my family for generations now and I am the fortunate or maybe unfortunate current owner. 

I am the last remaining sister of three. So I could very well be the last owner. I am past the age of having children of my own. 

It could just be the pipes, houses do that don’t they. Make unusual noises in the middle of the night. 

My mind and imagination are always playing tricks on me these days. 

Why, just the other day I could have sworn I saw a reflection of someone in my mirror.

No one was there of course, just me and my echoes of the past, slips in the conscious. 

Scrape…bump.

I hear the noises again, my mind is such a silly thing. It is having a wonderful time creating sounds for me tonight. 

I hear it again two more times. 

You know, I am beginning to become alarmed at this. Each time I hear it, it appears as if the sound is getting closer, such a strange feeling, to be sitting in bed worrying about something I can’t be sure is really happening. 

The logical and sane thing to do here is to get out of bed and have a look. You know, just poke my head out the door and have a peak. 

It’s funny though, I can’t quite summon the courage to do so. How very strange, I didn’t ever consider, not once in my life, that I am a coward.

It would seem that I am truly the kind of person who would fear the worst and imagine something greater than what is actually happening. Strange to learn this so late in life, wouldn’t you say?

It could be anything couldn’t it? 

Who knows what lingers on in this house after dark, I’m usually asleep and completely unaware of such things. 

I really should just get up and have a look.

How bad could it possibly be?

I am going to get up.

I’m just being a very silly old lady right now, it can’t be that bad right? It’s probably nothing and I have just been imagining things again. 

What if it is something though? 

Something I don’t want to see? Like an intruder coming to steal all of my treasures and trinkets. 

It could even be more than one person. 

What about ghosts? 

They are real, some even have ill intent towards the living, even the ones coming to the end of living, especially those ones. 

Is that what it is? 

Could I be in the midst of a good old fashioned haunting? 

I knew someone once who had that happen to them, a haunting. They were never the same after. I told them, I said ‘you shouldn’t have looked, then you would have never known’. If I look, will that happen to me?

It could be an extraterrestrial, come to whisk me away and perform any number of experiments. They typically do not take the old but maybe this one is different. 

None of these are good thoughts and I should of course just stop thinking about them but I can’t. Maybe I should just roll over and close my eyes, nice and tight so nothing can get in, or perhaps I should hide under the sheets like they do in the movies. That always seems to work right? Nothing can get you if you can’t see it. 

Oh stop being silly and get up. Get out of bed and open the door and just have a look, i am already half out now and sleep would be impossible at this point. 

Okay, I am up and walking to the door. 

Scrape…bump.

The sound is closer as I approach the door.

If I was not so scared, I could have sworn I heard a soft knock on the other side. 

Maybe it is a friendly person who also can’t sleep?

I am reaching for the door handle now.

Turning it slowly, so slowly, I don’t want to be the scary thing now do i?

The door is now cracked open, I can see something on the other side, a shadow, a form of some sort waiting for me.

I take a breath and open the door fully, standing on the other side is…me?

What is happening? 

Have I finally lost my mind?

I am standing on the other side of the door, staring at myself staring at me. 

This can’t be right, it can’t be me, can it?

I understand what this is, I have died. I died and I am seeing my own ghost, a reflection of my last moments. 

It must be that.

An echo of life or death, or something in-between. Just a fragment, out of time with the rest of me.

I, we, stood there, staring into ourselves, was I a noise for her? 

She smiles, or maybe I smile. I reach out and we hold hands, smiling at each other. 

Are we both from the other side? 

From my perspective I guess we are. 

I step out into the hallway as she steps into the room, briefly my foot slides and then I step.

Scrape…bump.

I am her noise and she is mine, her self doubt and her ghost have become me.

Maybe I always have been? 

Isn’t that a funny thought?