SHORT STORY: Dead of the Night

Wednesday, March 2nd, 2016. Somewhere in Central Virginia.

Jim hears something rustling under the bed.

He ponders getting up to look, but decides against it. He shifts and turns over instead.

It started a few weeks ago. He started noticing some odd things here and there: his computer monitor would still be on after he’d been away all day; the books he left near the recliner would be shifted slightly one way or another; the way his clothes were folded when he pulled them out of his dresser was slightly different than the way he had put them in…

But that was nothing too unusual. Nothing worth worrying too much about.

“You OK, hon?” Jim’s wife, Susan, asks, squinting at him in the darkness.

“Yeah, Sus,” Jim says. “Just thought I heard somethin’.”

“Mmm… what time is it?” Susan asks.

“2:04,” Jim says.

“We need to get up in three hours, honey,” Susan says, burying her head in her pillow. “If you can’t get over your night paranoia, we’ll need to see a sleep specialist or something soon. This has been going on for, what, nine months now?”

Jim considers shooting back that it’s not paranoia and takes in a breath to do so, but he decides against it, instead sinking his head back onto the pillow.

If it had just been the little things, Jim would believe that night paranoia — or whatever — was the source, but there were other signs. Miles logged on the odometer while at work, when not even Susan would have access to his car. Missing food from the kitchen. Things weren’t adding up and, after calling an exterminator, Jim had exhausted all of the natural options.

That only left the supernatural ones.

Jim had been researching spirits online and, after cutting through a lot of hokum, found some decent resources.

Most evidence pointed towards some sort of demon, so Jim had hung up crosses and other sacred relics around the house. Susan told the houseguests that he had found religion.

Crosses won’t keep the problem out if the problem isn’t spiritual in nature, though.

Jim flips over one more time, desperate to find a comfortable sleeping position.

His guilt will not allow him to sleep, though.

Guilt over what, he wonders?

It’s especially bad tonight.

After a long while hears something breathing.

Not Susan; her breathing is soft and low tonight. No, this was something that was breathing like…

Like him.

Jim holds his breath as long as he can, listening hard.

No use.

I don’t need to breathe like he does.

Eventually, he starts breathing normally again. I match his rhythms: In… out. In… out.

With each breath, my physical form solidifies and gains structure.

I still lack human form, but that is no concern.

I shall take another soon.

After a few more breaths, it is time.

I slink my way out from under the bed, raising myself up its side to Jim’s face.

I prick him with my tail.

Jim opens his eyes.

They bolt open, wide with fear.

As soon as he opens his mouth to scream, I stuff myself down his throat, choking him.

He tries to struggle against me, but the sedative in my tail has paralyzed his arms and legs.

Within moments, he is dead.

I watch his heart stop beating from the inside.

I slide all the way into his body and, with the last of my energy stored in my old form, restart his heart.

I take in a sharp breath and blink my eyes, adjusting to life as a human.

Arms and legs! What a miraculous feeling!

“Hon, if you can’t sleep, maybe you should go for a walk,” Susan says.

“Don’t worry about it, Sus,” I say, doing my best to match Jim’s inflections.

My observation pays off. Susan doesn’t suspect anything. “OK,” she says.

“But, Jim…” Susan adds, sitting up now. “You didn’t really vote for that horrible man, did you?”

I smile. Susan will be saved from our invasion.

Good. Based on my observations, she is worthy of being spared.

“No, of course not,” I say, truthfully enough for myself, though not Jim. “Just a little joke.”

“OK, good,” she says, lying down again. “To be honest, that was going to start keeping me up, too.”

“Don’t worry, Sus,” I say. “His campaign’s going to die off soon enough.”

“They keep saying that, but…” Susan says.

“Trust me, Sus. It’ll all be OK.”

“…OK,” Susan says, putting her arms around me and squeezing.

Good riddance, Jim.