Nina

The warm, yellow glow of the bedside lamp was a lie, and Nina knew it. It painted her room in safe, familiar colors, bleaching the shadows from the corners and holding the deep, impenetrable black of the closet at bay. But it was a temporary fix, a band-aid on a fear that felt as fundamental as breathing. Tonight, like every night, she moved through her rituals with a practiced, silent urgency.

One last bathroom trip, the hallway light feeling glaring and insufficient. The click-clack of her refilled water bottle placed precisely on the coaster. The minty sting of toothpaste, spit out with a force that felt like she was trying to expel her own cowardice. Then, the main events.

She dragged her wooden desk chair, its legs scraping a protest against the floor, and wedged it firmly under the closet doorknob. She gave the knob a testing jiggle. Solid. A flimsy barricade against the void, but it was all she had.

Finally, settled under the covers, she performed the final sacrament. She extended her phone, strapped to its selfie stick, over the side of the bed. The screen illuminated the dusty floorboards as she slowly panned it under the bed, her own wide, brown eyes watching the live feed on the screen. Dust bunnies. A single lost sock. The reassuring, boring underbelly of her box spring. Nothing. She retracted the stick, let out a breath she didn't realize she’d been holding, and placed the phone on her nightstand.

She settled back into her pillows, pulling the duvet up to her chin. See? You’re fine. It’s just a room.

Then the lamp died.

It wasn't a gentle fade. It was a sharp, startling pop, followed by an immediate and absolute plunge into gloom. The afterimage of the bulb burned a white spot in her vision, making the surrounding darkness thicker, more profound. The shapes of her room—the dresser, the desk—shed their familiar forms and became hulking silhouettes, hunched and waiting. The only light now was the faint, orange-tinted bleed from a streetlamp far outside, casting long, distorted shadows that seemed to twitch and breathe.

Her heart immediately kicked into a frantic, hammering rhythm against her ribs, so loud she could feel the pulse in her ears. "It's just the bulb, you idiot," she whispered into the silence, her voice sounding small and pathetic. "Calm the hell down. It's just a bulb."

Screeeeeech.

Nina jolted, a full-body flinch that rattled her teeth. The branch of the old oak tree scraped its long, bony fingers against her windowpane. She slapped a hand over her pounding heart. "Jesus Christ! Stupid fucking tree," she hissed, the profanity a tiny shield. "I'm having Dad cut that down tomorrow. I don't care if it's the only one that gives shade in the whole goddamn yard."

Scraaaaaape.

Her breath hitched in her throat, sharp and painful.

That wasn't the tree.

That was inside.

The sound was low, deliberate. The slow, grating drag of wood on wood. The sound of chair legs being pushed back against their will. The thought was a sliver of ice sliding directly into her gut. No. No, no, no. You didn't just check. The chair is there. It's fine. You're fine.

Thud.

A soft, final sound. The sound of the chair giving up, toppling over onto the rug.

Every muscle in her body locked solid. Her fingers, clenched in the duvet, were frozen claws. The closet door was open. It wasn't a question, not a possibility. It was a simple, unchangeable fact that paralyzed her. The bubble of her covers, her cocoon of manufactured safety, had been popped. The black void of the open closet door was now the most terrifying thing in the universe, a mouth waiting to swallow her whole.

And then she heard it. A new sound, separate from the frantic thumping of her own heart.

A wet, slick, on the hardwood floor. As something scurried or slithered from the closet to under her bed in a rush.

Her eyes, wide and straining in the dark, her entire world shrank to the space beneath her. She swore she could feel it moving around underneath her bed. A faint vibration traveled through the bed frame as something brushes the underside of the box springs. From the floor, there was a soft clatter as her phone fell or was pulled from her beside stand.

A small, pathetic whimper escaped her lips. She couldn't move. She couldn't breathe.

Nina finally broke. A choked gasp ripped from her throat and she yanked her legs up, scrambling backward until her back hit the headboard with a jarring thud. She fumbled for the edges of the duvet, shoving her entire head underneath, curling into a tight ball as she screwed her eyelids shut.

"It's not real. It's not real. It can't be real" she chanted into the dark beneath the blanket, the words a desperate mantra against the whatever was beneath her bed.

The rain tapped a gentle, erratic rhythm against the windowpane, a soothing lullaby that almost managed to mask the low grumble of the approaching storm. Janey was sprawled across the comforter, a vision of casual grace, her blonde hair fanning out like a halo. The soft glow from Nina’s bedside lamp caught the curve of her hip and the swell of her chest, a reminder to Nina of how unevenly puberty had distributed its gifts.

“Really, Nina? How long are we going to keep doing this?” Janey asked, her voice laced with a familiar, fond exasperation as Nina reached for the selfie stick. “You check every night and there is never anything there.”

Nina ignored the comment, her focus absolute as she extended the stick over the side of the bed, her eyes glued to the phone’s screen. The little ritual was embarrassing, sure, but the thought of skipping it made her stomach clench. “Humor me,” she muttered.

With a sigh that was more theatrical than annoyed, Janey rolled onto her stomach and leaned precariously over the edge of the bed. She hooked a finger under the floral-print bed skirt and lifted it, plunging her head into the space below. “Ooo, spooky,” she intoned, her voice muffled. “I see one… two… three dust bunnies. A very scary lost sock. And… yep, that’s it. The coast is clear, captain.”

Nina retracted the stick, a flush of relief warming her cheeks. “Okay, okay. Thank you.” She placed the phone and stick carefully on the nightstand, as if putting the fear itself to bed.

They settled back against the pillows, the conversation drifting to the important things: the way Liam Chen’s smile made Nina’s stomach do flip-flops, the bizarre and lingering stares from their English teacher, Mrs. Oats. “I swear,” Nina whispered, “she looks at us like she’s trying to solve a math problem written on our faces.”

A tremendous crack of thunder split the night, so loud it seemed to shake the very foundations of the house. Nina yelped, flinching violently and grabbing Janey’s arm, pulling herself into the other girl’s side in a tight, involuntary embrace. A second later, she giggled, breathy and nervous. “Shit. Sorry.”

Janey just chuckled, patting her back. “It’s just noise, you dork.”

They relaxed back into the pillows. A brilliant fork of lightning flashed, illuminating the room in a sudden, silent, blue-white snapshot. One-one-thousand… The subsequent boom of thunder was deeper this time, a resonant drumroll that made them both jump and then giggle in shared surprise. The rain intensified, a steady downpour now, and for a few minutes, it was peaceful. The sound was a lullaby, and the warm pool of light from the lamp felt like a secure little island.

Then the lamp stuttered.

Its light flickered, dipped, surged weakly, and died with a final, soft pop.

The room was plunged into a blackness so complete it felt solid. The familiar orange glow from the streetlamp was gone; the entire block had lost power.

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” Nina hissed, her body going rigid. Her fists clenched in the sheets, knuckles white.

“It’s okay,” Janey said, her voice calm and sure in the oppressive dark. She found Nina’s shoulder and gave it a firm, reassuring squeeze. “It’s just a power outage. It’ll come back on. There’s nothing to worry about.”

Thunk.

The noise was small, compact, and utterly distinct from the storm. It came from the direction of the closet.

The easy comfort in Janey’s touch vanished. Her hand froze on Nina’s shoulder. In the absolute silence that followed, broken only by the relentless patter of the rain, neither of them moved. Neither of them breathed. The single, small noise from the closet hung in the air between them, shattering every assurance.

For a single, suspended heartbeat, there was only the drumming of the rain.

Then.

Screeeeeech—

The sound was a nail dragged down the chalkboard of Nina’s soul. It was the slow, grating screech of wood forced against wood, the unmistakable noise of the chair legs being shoved backward, inch by torturous inch, across the hardwood floor.

Janey’s hand tightened on Nina’s shoulder, her nails digging in through the thin fabric of the t-shirt.

Clatter.

The sound was final. The chair had fallen.

The closet door was open.

The black rectangle of the doorway, which had always been a contained threat, now gaped wide. It was a void, deeper and blacker than the room's own darkness, a tear in the fabric of reality that seemed to swallow the very idea of light. The faint, storm-gray ambience from the window died at its threshold, refusing to penetrate the absolute blackness within.

And from that void came a new sound: a soft, dry rustling. The sound of something shifting. Something large. Something stirring in the profound blackness where no one and nothing should be.

Nina whispered, her small frame shaking "See I'm not fucking crazy."