Log

I've never met the hat or shadow man but I'm sure they're very nice. Up until recently I've never had a clear, reoccuring character making itself known during my episodes but things have changed I guess.

Not every night, but enough nights to be noticeable I've seen it in the doorway to our bedroom. Maybe I've watched too many movies featuring cultists in the woods lately and my hat man has become this.

A near caricature of what you'd expect from someone who is probably selling their soul to some obscure folklore demon off the beaten trail. The only difference being its height. I have high ceilings and a doorway to match and this thing still needs to crouch. It braces itself against the top of the frame, a suspiciously charcoaled hand gripping the wood and its head ducking just inside where I can stare straight into its bottomless face. The rope holding its robes together cinching its waist as it leans forward and lingers.

Then it starts chanting. Two words over and over that sound like some antique language in a baritone layered voice and a pace for endurance rather than impact. Steady and sure in its notes until eventually a large black bird swoops under its arm to splash into my ceiling.

At this point I throw myself out of the paralysis and it takes its leave.

They came from the ceiling. Tasting like an attic unsettled and feeling dust particles drift down to land on me, pinned to the bed as usual. Next was the sound of small scratches on wood, a chorus of squeaking and the pitter patter of little feet until the weight of them brought them down onto my torso. I felt the impact and could only stare down my nose to just catch the bundles of fur that had swarmed my body.

They were musty, rapid. I could feel their tiny claws, the way the flesh of those little paw pads pulled away from my skin, catching for a moment on the sweat of it. Particles dancing off their backs from wherever they came from and falling off my sides onto the bed.

I could feel their naked tails pulling through the space between my fingers and toes, dragging over me as they panicked. It tickled a bit. I'm not very tickish but I guess the tiny hairs and discomfort of it all were enough. They eventually tumbled off of me, the bed, and into the night releasing me from the episode.

I weighed what felt like 1000lbs in my bed and heard the door creak open. It sounded wet and looked like an oversized amphibious humanoid crawling toward me. It was too big (I've always had a weird fear of giants) and too grey but that could have been because night mutes everything and my mind was playing tricks on me again.

When you can't move your head and neck it feels like a mountain of strain pushing your eyes to see whats just at the edge of your peripheral vision. Seems kind of cruel that everything but my eyes would be paralyzed, and I guess but just barely my lungs.

It was only a couple of crustacean style strides for something that size to get to the edge of my bed. It gingerly took my forearm into it's mouth and held eye contact. Unblinking and gentle. It's mouth became my sole focus because the teeth were so human. Shallow hills of molars pressed into my skin and it's mouth wept. I could feel the saliva warming and cooling against the pattern of it's breath

I felt those teeth all through gym class that morning