One night I found myself too ill to sleep in my bed. A mild fever and stomachache had kept me up all night. I alternated between flopping around uncomfortably on the sofa in the basement and in the bathroom laying on the tile floor willing myself to get better. The basement in my house had never been a creepy place. My family had taken great care to turn it into a comfortable living space instead of the image of a creepy damp basement often given to us by television and movies.
After being awake for hours, I finally drifted off into a comfortable sleep. That’s when the dreams started. I was with a group of friends. They told me they just killed somebody and needed help. In my dream when I heard the news, I started shaking uncontrollably. I woke up shivering. I pulled the blankets around me. I reminded myself it was just a dream and there was nothing to worry about. The dream did have me shaken so, I turned on a bright reading light on the table next to me. Within a few minutes I had drifted off to sleep again.
I had another dream. The same thing. My friends showed me the dead body. They said they wanted me to help them put it in the trunk of a car. I told them I couldn’t help. I was crying. I could feel the wet tears streaming down my face. I was shaking again. In my dream, as I finally dared to glance into the trunk of the car, my eyes flew open. I was suddenly awake. I was facing the back of the couch. I could feel something leaning over me. I could feel it watching me. Its face was rotted, smelling, putrid. It was leaning over my face. I dare not turn over for fear of coming face-to-face with this paranormal entity.
In that moment, when I finally willed myself to reopen my eyes, the power went out. The bright light I had turned on to help protect me from the dark suddenly flashed out. This wasn’t just a side effect of the fever or flu medications. I was in the dark. I was cold. Then as suddenly as the power went out it came back. The light was on once again and the room felt normal.
I took the opportunity to run upstairs and wake my mother. I took one look at her digital alarm clock and caught my breath. It wasn’t flashing. I walked into the kitchen to look at the digital clock on the microwave and stove. They weren’t flashing. The power hadn’t gone out. My light had simply gone off.