Green Night

Green Night by David A. Riley

Everything seems normal as I look over at my peacefully sleeping wife, but should you drift into a dream that takes place in the room you presently occupy, it might be difficult to be sure if you’ve fallen asleep or not. Across the room, the fan hums, sending a light breeze that ripples the sheet covering Sandra’s body, but it’s having little impact on the summer heat. She lets out a sleeping sigh as she turns to keep the wind off her face. If I didn’t know that the slightest caress would wake her, I’d run a hand along her exposed thigh.

All I want is the same eight hours of sleep everyone else claims they get.

A sugar rush has likely caused this sleepless night. I usually avoid fizzy drinks, but the old man with the kind eyes in the store had declared, 'You only live once.' Now I’m lying here with a half-finished can of cheap soda sat on the bedside table while I stare at the walls.

Not an evening passes when I don’t get the urge to remove the ticking clock from our bedroom wall, open a window, and Frisbee it out into the night, but Sandra can’t sleep without the collection of sounds from the fan, the clock, and the dehumidifier.

As if all that wasn’t distracting enough, Sandra also needs a nightlight. In case you’re wondering, yes, we do have one of those weird toilet lights that sit inside the bowl so she can see inside before she takes a seat. Though born in England, Sandra was raised in a part of Africa where it pays to check the toilet before you sit down. We’ve joked about the possibility of a snake making its way through the pipe-works of our London home, and after years of persuasion, I’d coaxed her down from needing that light a few years back. Then there was a news story where the very thing Sandra was most afraid of happened to someone not far from where we live. We’ve had a light inside the toilet bowl ever since.

The compromise we reached in the bedroom was the tiny blue dot that sits atop the dehumidifier as if we needed the light to let us know the device was on. Who designs these things? There’s always some light to let you know a machine is functioning when there’s always another obvious indication. It doesn’t affect my sleep, though, so we keep the device on in the corner. With the machine’s low drone masked by the fan, I don’t mind making these minor concessions, but I don’t know what irks me more. Is it the sounds of the machines that whir through the night? Or is it the notion that I might be used to their ensemble after years of lying next to this beautiful woman?

I just want to sleep.

Laziness must have got the better of me. I notice everything in the room tonight as a second source of light beams into our bedroom through a crack at the top of the curtains. The light shines onto the clock-face where the hour hand has just passed the ‘3’. On the end of each clock-hand is a thin green luminescent strip, dulled by a decade of use, but the strips remember their former glow when light shines on them.

The crack of light from the streetlamp reveals shadows all over the room. I’m sure it’s just my imagination, but if it weren’t for that light coming through the gap at the top of the curtain, I might not have noticed the shadow standing on my wife’s side at the foot of the bed.

I must be dreaming. There’s nothing there. It’s just a trick of light. There’s no way anyone could have made it in here without my metal baseball bat or me knowing. But even if I did know, I can’t move. Something is holding me in place.

Sandra’s distressed moans usually rouse me. She gets night terrors from time to time and tells me that the presence in them resembles a black formless mass, like the one I see standing at the foot of the bed now. I’d wake her if I could, but once awake, she’d shake, she’d sweat, and her heart would bang in her chest. I’d feel it all as I held her, trying to calm her fears. And though she’s told me numerous times that she couldn’t get through these events without me, I feel utterly useless now. It's like I’m being held down by a large invisible man with more hands than me. Its overwhelming weight presses down. Sandra has described this sensation of not being able to move. 'Forceful, oppressive, menacing.' Only now do I understand her terror.

What I’m feeling doesn’t matter. Whatever this is, I must protect my wife. The invisible presence locks me in place, though, and I snap a bite in its direction, fighting to break free of its vice grip. I don’t have the strength or the leverage, but I realize I can still shout.

I scream long and loud, and my voice goes hoarse as I attempt to wake my wife. She hears nothing, but her moans intensify. Surprisingly, the weight on top of me lessens as the shadow at the foot of the bed leans forward and slowly begins creeping up Sandra’s body. Then suddenly, the weight leaves me entirely, and I’m able to move freely. Without thinking, without my bat, I lunge in the direction of the shadow before it can take her. But as I do, the shadow disappears, and somehow, I’m calmly lying down looking over at the clock. To my left, my wife is sleeping peacefully. Was that a dream?

This is why I don’t drink fizzy drinks; I tell myself as I reach over to the bedside table and take a swig of the flat off-brand cola.

I don’t remember my dreams. I’d be lucky if I recalled two or three a year. They always seem to revolve around future events. That’s why I keep notepads to write them down. Sandra jokes that if I’m dreaming the future, maybe I’ll see lottery numbers.

‘That’s not the sort of thing you want to forget.’ If only I could see the numbers.

Tonight’s events are nothing like those dreams. This is something else, and it’s focused on my wife. I'd prefer to focus on her too, so I draw Sandra close. She nestles into the little spoon position, stirs, and returns to her sleep, but beyond her, something is off. The fan hums its natural rhythm, the clock ticks the seconds away, and though I can barely hear the machine, the dehumidifier’s green light indicates that it’s still on.

Wait, green light? The machine’s light is meant to be blue.

The shadow reappears at the bottom of the bed, and Sandra lets out a fearful groan, but I can move this time, so I force myself up, which attracts the shadow’s attention. It looms, staring at me. Then after a few seconds, it fades into the darkness, leaving the room still once more. Then I’m lying next to my wife again, as though I'd never moved, staring at the clock, unable to sleep.

The shadow returns, but this time it’s on my side of the bed. It’s not advancing as it had towards my wife, so Sandra doesn’t whimper. That doesn’t mean there’s any less danger. I lean forward again, but the shadow stands unflinching. It's not afraid of me. I’ve got something for that. My bat is just behind me, but as I reach for it and bring it to bear, the bat shines luminous green. And just like that, the shadow is gone again. My bat is resting in its usual position, and I’m lying here next to my sleeping wife.

Please, God, just let me sleep.

By now, the can by my side is near empty, so I swig what’s left and head to the bathroom, half expecting the toilet light to follow the same pattern of the evening so far, but it holds the deep red color it’s meant to, so maybe I’m not dreaming anymore.

On my return, the empty can on my bedside is glowing green. Whatever’s going on, I don’t know how to stop it. Would waking Sandra help? All I know right now is that if this thing is here for my wife, I’m going to have to stay awake.

Unknowingly, God had granted my sleep request, yet I find myself awakening again, thinking to note these events before they fade from my memory. I fish for a notepad inside my bedside drawer, flicking through pages of half-remembered events that are yet to occur—forgotten dreams of the future. Reaching for my pen, I hesitate as it takes on the same eerie green glow, but there's nothing else to write with, so I take the pen and manage to write two words in the notepad before I wake again, staring at the clock.

Neither the notepad nor the pen is glowing this time, thank God, but as I turn the pages, words and letters glow in that same sickly color. Okay, this must mean there’s some sort of pattern, but as I return to the first page and pick out Sandra’s glowing name, I’m awakened yet again. Staring. At. The. Clock.

I grab the notepad from the drawer again and decide to read the first page. It's a dream about Sandra, but where I had written her name was a part I had added after the original writing. That dream described how I’d first met Sandra. She was a student working in a coffee shop, but I can’t see faces in my dreams. Not just human faces. This includes pets, numbers, and even clocks, meaning I don’t know when my dreams are set, but I do recognize a person’s energy. Everyone’s spirit is unique, so the beautiful woman serving me stands out whether I can see her face or not.

During our first dates, I remember trying to avoid telling Sandra how beautiful her eyes are. They’re truly stunning, but instead, I fumbled my way through asking what she was studying. Later, when I returned to review the page, I realized the moments I'd written were of our first interactions, so I added Sandra’s name.

Returning the notepad, I softly climb out of bed and peer through the bedroom curtains. We live on a relatively quiet street that’s straight for miles, but Boy-Racers love it. They blitz down our road without a concern for those that live here, and I can already hear the next car on its way, but I barely catch a glimpse of it as it passes, and I lose its green taillights down the street.

You know what happens next. I wake up in bed staring at the clock, frustration building.

The pattern continues through the night. The shadow would appear at the end of the bed, and then I would search the room for the next green glowing object. When I find it, the whole scenario would start again on a seemingly endless loop.

Sandra’s kisses wake me the following morning. Despite promising myself I’d stay awake, I’m fast asleep when the sun rises, completely unaware if the loops have ended or not, but my wife has had a good night’s sleep. I’m okay with this. Slowly I come too, and Sandra teases me gleefully. I’m usually the morning person between us, and as she springs out of bed, I turn over and reach for my notepad. None of what I’d attempted to write through the night appears inside.

Sandra flings open the curtains, letting the morning sun's warmth fill the room before she jumps back into bed. The smile on her lips is my joy as she cups my face in her hands. Her Emerald eyes shimmer in the morning light.

End?