The Shadow Puppet

Phasing out the film that I had watched probably over a hundred times, I began to focus on my shadow which was flickering on the wall directly behind me. I raised my hand and my shadow mirrored my actions. I began to create shapes using my hands and body movements, a swan, an elephant, and a dog. I turned back around, loading up Pokemon on my Gameboy and continued to play when suddenly the power cut out.

My house has a meter that required you to put money into it via a payment card. Otherwise, the power would cut out. Luckily, I was sure that we still had some credit in the emergency backup.

"MUM!... MUM!" I called out... There was no response.

She must have been sleeping. Okay, I'll put it back on myself, I thought. I stood up and walked slowly to my door. It was locked via a latch at the top, as it had been most nights. I was at a point in my adolescence where I wasn't quite a full-fledged teenager, but where I still felt I should rebel a little, that I needed my privacy. My mother told me to never lock my door without a good reason. She was right.

I reached up and pulled the latch across. I was just tall enough to do this if I stood on my tiptoes. I pulled my door open slowly and was presented with the upstairs landing, completely in darkness with very little light creeping in and a silence that was almost deafening. My bedroom was directly across from the stairs connected by a small hall with a bathroom to the left-hand side. My mother's room was across the landing to the left of the stairs, I could see that her door was slightly ajar but there was no movement or sound coming from inside.

"Mum?" I said almost cautiously. Again no answer.

"Maybe she has gone out," I thought to myself. No, I doubt she would have gone out without telling me first. I am an only child and she was a single parent. It had been just me and my mother since our dog died a few months before. Alder was a Staffordshire bull terrier. She was kind, loyal, our protector, and my best friend. I missed her terribly. There wasn't anybody else in the house, or at least there shouldn't have been.

I began to slowly creep down the hallway, briefly pausing before passing the bathroom. Every time I passed the bathroom at night, my imagination would go into overdrive. Even though there was a window in the bathroom, it would always be so dark that it was almost impossible to see inside. I always imagined that there would be a time that I walked past it without looking and something would reach out, pull me in and close the door. I prepared myself and jumped past. I wasn't going to let it be today.

I was now standing at the top of the stairs. I took a single step and then froze. I saw something. Something moved. It was a shadow and it went into the dining room. I suddenly had goosebumps running along my arms and felt a sudden shiver down my spine. "Maybe it was mum going to put the power back on," I thought to myself, trying to build up the courage to continue. I took two more steps down, being as quiet as possible and stepping as softly as I could. I paused again, thinking that if it was mum, surely the power would be back on by now. I listened to the silence of the living room and heard nothing. It must have been my imagination.

Arriving at the bottom of the stairs with the doorway to the dining room just to my left, I slowly peek around the door frame. I saw nothing but darkness, nobody was there, and it was silent. I began to laugh a little. "My eyes sure do play tricks on me," I thought, smiling and reassuring myself that I was safe in the process. The meter was in a cupboard between the kitchen and a door which accessed the cellar. I pulled open the door and flipped the switch. The meter beeped. The room lit up and the house came back to life with a sudden jolt.

Walking back up the stairs, I noticed the familiar flickers of light coming from my room. The television had turned back on, the soft hum of the static ringing through the hall and down to me, getting slightly louder with every step. I swim in the sound, comforted by what could be considered my own personal lullaby. All my fears float away. I'm so relaxed by the familiar sights and sounds that I don't even do my usual bathroom check.

Now back in my room, I rewind the videotape that was playing earlier and press play. I closed the door and climbed into bed, rolling over and closing my eyes. I began to drift off, giving my body the rest that it desired when suddenly, I woke up. It felt as if it had been an instant since I closed my eyes, but the movie was over so I must have been asleep for a while. "I should probably turn the television off and try to go back to sleep," I thought to myself. I reached out to switch off the television when a sudden dread washed over me. Turning my face ever so slightly, I noticed something in the corner of my eye. I saw a shadow on my wall. I quickly scanned the room, looking for anything that could be casting this shadow. I didn't notice anything that could have explained it. I looked back at the shadow on the wall, it has moved, no, it is moving. Dancing on the wall, it began to create shapes, a swan, an elephant, and a dog.

Suddenly paralyzed by fear, I didn't dare look away. Before my eyes, it morphed back into its human-looking shape, except now it was much taller, more slender, and its fingers were pointed and almost sharp looking. It almost looked as though somebody was holding multiple pairs of scissors in their hands. It made no sound, not even when it moved. It stood there for about ten seconds, still, unmoving, looking like it had been painted onto the wall, but still flickering in the light of the television. It began to slink over towards the door. With every step it took, it seemed to rise up the wall, almost like it was climbing stairs. It was now hunched over the door to my bedroom, its lower half on the wall and its upper half on my ceiling. One of its claw-like hands stretched out towards the door and stopped at the latch. My television suddenly turned itself off. I gasped and swung my head around to look out of instinct. Nothing was there. I realised it was probably just set to sleep mode. I always slept with it playing in the background. Before I had the chance to turn back around, I heard a noise. The room and the shadow were now less visible, with just a small amount of moonlight beaming into the bedroom from behind the curtains, but I knew what that noise was. It was the latch. It was locking the door. That thing was locking my bedroom door.

As a car passed in the distance, maybe a street away, a flash of light filled the room, allowing me to see the shadow and the door clearly for a brief moment. I saw one of its claws slowly pushing the latch shut and noticed a smile in the area that would be its face if it were a human's shadow. It was smiling, with such a menacing grin. The light breaking it up in such a way that it looked as if this thing had small shark-like teeth. Just then, a horrifying thought suddenly crossed my mind: "It's locking me in with it, so there is no way I can escape, and that's what it wants. It's happy." Without thinking, I suddenly jumped up and threw myself towards the light switch by the door. The shadow whirled around and flew across the wall towards me. Its smile vanished.

Click. The room fills with bright light. I panned around seeing no signs of the shadow. That thing is gone. I picked myself up and, in a state of panic, I slid the latch and swung open the door. I peer out onto the landing. It was pitch black, except for a small area of the hallway leading to the stairs, a result of the light pouring out from my bedroom. I took one step out and began to scan my surroundings frantically when the light in my bedroom goes out without warning. I couldn't see so I quickly felt for the wall, maneuvering back to the light switch. I flicked the switch but nothing happened.

Suddenly the silence was broken, and I heard a loud slam that came from downstairs, I gasped, and felt my heart skip a beat. "Did it cut the power?" I thought, fighting back the urge to cry. As my eyes began to slowly adjust to the darkness, I saw a shadow shooting along the walls and up the stairs coming straight for me. It was so fast that I felt like if I had blinked, I would have missed it. I slammed the door shut with everything I had, and pressed against it, hoping to keep that thing out. A moment later, the door was opened with such force that I was flung across the room. I felt an immense pain as my head hit the wall and then landed on something soft. I felt blood running down my face as my vision went blurry.

I felt a sharp pain coming from the back of my head as I opened my eyes. It was dark and the house was quiet. "Did I just fall asleep again? Was I just dreaming?" I asked myself. Well, not dreaming. It was more like a nightmare. I attempted to pick myself up but my body wouldn't move. I tried again but to no avail. I couldn't move my body at all. I saw something in the corner of my eye, but couldn't get up to get a better view. Though I already knew what it was, it was real and it was coming for me, again. It had come into my line of sight, it was crawling across the ceiling. It was smiling again, an even bigger grin than before. I let out a scream.

"MUM, HELP ME PLEASE!"

At least I thought I did. No sound came out. It was above me now. Even though it had no eyes, I could feel it staring at me. It was fixated on me like a predator stalking its prey. Now that it was so close to me, I could smell it. It was somehow damp and musty but also dry and smoke like. If this smell was a place, nothing could survive it. I could feel its malice pouring into the room. It almost felt like it was on top of me, crushing me. It was getting hard to breathe. I thought that I was going to die. I couldn't fight it anymore, my eyes started to close. The last thing I remember before being plunged into darkness was its smile. Its disgusting, malicious, evil smile, and the sound of a dog barking in the distance.

I opened my eyes and found myself staring at the ceiling again. The shadow seemed to have gone. I tried yet again to get up but again it felt impossible. The smell had gone and I could breathe again. I started to relax ever so slightly when something caught my attention. I could see it again in the corner of my eye except for this time, it was different. I wasn't afraid and I didn't sense the same evil intent as before. It almost felt familiar. Its shape was different now, too. It almost looked like a dog.

I didn't sleep that night. I laid awake, terrified, the whole time not able to move, while the dog-like shadow sat perfectly still, before vanishing when the sun came up. Every night after that incident I slept with my light on, but would always wake up to it having been switched off, with the dog shadow back in its position, guarding my door. What happened to the other shadow? Well, the thing that once disguised itself as my shadow, that malicious, evil entity would come back too. Night after night, it would creep out of the bathroom and crawl across the walls, inching closer and closer to my old friend and me.

End.

(This short is inspired by nightmares and episodes of sleep paralysis that I experienced as a child. This is my first real attempt at writing a short story so please be kind and thank you for taking the time to read this.)