The Stranger In My Room

The branches clawed at the slate-gray sky, swaying in the grip of a warm breeze. Above, the moon hid its pale, watchful eye behind a veil of rapidly moving black clouds, their edges glowing with an otherworldly luminescence, as if the sky itself was a canvas for some mad artist's nightmare. The scene had the feel of a dream—or was it a nightmare?—from a world not quite our own, where reality twisted into something terrifying.

I told myself this wasn’t real, that I would wake up any minute in my bed, my beautiful Dorothy by my side. But the dream, if that's what it was, had a grip on me that wouldn't let go. Unjustly, I felt a pull toward the woods, a magnetic force that I couldn't resist. My feet moved of their own accord, as if they were being puppeteered by some unseen force.

The branches swayed harder now, even though the wind had died to a whisper. There was an unnatural movement to them, as if they were not mere branches but the arms of giants, beckoning me deeper into their shadowy realm.

I tried to call out for Dorothy, but my voice was swallowed by the oppressive silence that swept through the forest. The trees closed in around me, their branches intertwining. I was a prisoner in this haunted place, a fly caught in the web.

As I went deeper, the woods seemed to shift and change, as if my life itself was being rewritten. Shadows watched me with hungry eyes. I knew then that I was not alone, that something terrible is in the heart of this forest, waiting for me to stumble into its jaws.

I couldn't stop moving forward, drawn inexorably towards whatever lay at the center of this nightmare. The branches continued to wave, their movements growing more frantic, more desperate. They were no longer inviting me in; they were trying to stab me with their jagged, stick-like arms. I clenched my eyes closed and prepared for the afterlife. Nothing. I peeled one eye open and it was black, there were no more branches spearing towards me, there was just nothing. I looked all around and saw only the velvet void of nothing. I looked up and thought I saw the moon, it should have been the moon if I were in normal circumstances. It was round and white like the moon but had a green blinking light, and what looked like a small speaker. It’s a smoke detector. It’s my smoke detector. The smoke detector Dorothy made me hang right above the bed, even though I said the light would keep us awake. Wait, I’m in my bed. Oh, thank God, it was just a dream.

I looked over towards Dorothy and there was a space, and then another bed. I’m in a small twin-sized bed in a room with a stranger. I look the other direction and I see her. It’s Dorothy. Well, maybe a crude drawing of her. I’m not the best artist. Maybe I didn’t really have a house and a bed with a smoke detector above it. Maybe Dorothy is just someone I made up. Maybe it is all in my head. What if it’s real. What if I’m not supposed to be in this room.

I look back to the bed next to me, I see the stranger squatting on the edge, viciously masturbating his flaccid penis, making kissing faces, while simultaneously shitting in his other hand. I feel the vomit creep into my throat. The world spun, reality blurred. Was this the nightmare, or was the nightmare still to come? The taste of bile lingered in my mouth.