Before I start with what you're going to be reading momentarily, I want to elucidate some things to you so some of this will make more sense. This will only take a moment. For anybody who is not familiar with the word "paramnesia," that is a disorder of the memory or the faculty of recognition in which dreams may be confused with reality. Your understanding of objective experience and fantasy are distorted, and you begin to get lost in your own world. I don’t know how long this has been going on in my life. It’s been with me since the moment I can even remember anything. And that was after a coma. I apologize in advance if you're disturbed as well as the length of what you're going to be reading now.

When I was younger in elementary school, I was recluse. I had no friends, no one to make me feel safe, my parents were never home so I had to nurture myself as I grew up. Being anti-social grew to be a problem for me. Communication was difficult, due to the fact that I didn't know how to speak to anybody. As well as the fact that I was taking ELL classes because my English was poor at the time since I was from a foreign country. So since things like that were peculiar to people, it made it more difficult for me to find a place to be.

Around this time, I began to notice that something was off. I had a lot of trouble sleeping and had to go to therapy because of the kinds of issues I was having. There would be nights where I would not sleep, nights I would wake up sweating and screaming. I would have vivid nightmares that I would wake up and see hallucinations of demons or dark figures temporarily. I now come to realize that these figures I saw might have been the effects of sleep paralysis. But you'll see why I don't believe that theory. The main thing that would concern me is that a lot of nights or times during my day it would seem as if time skipped and I would be somewhere I wasn't the second before. Sometimes, I'm doing something but then suddenly I'm somewhere else with no recollection of how I got there. I grew a confusion because a lot of the times I questioned if I was awake or if I was dreaming. I was scared because I didn't know what I should have done and I thought this would cause me to be in so much shit. I was right.

I heard a voice in my head. “Wake up.” Was I dreaming? My eyes opened, and I had no idea what was going on. The last thing I remember doing was riding my bike around my school. How did I get here? I sat up and I looked around to figure out where I was. It was night and I was lost somewhere in the woods I presumed, noticing all the trees. I’d never gone alone at night and I didn’t recognize anything I saw so I just had to go one way and hope I didn't trap my self in the depths of this darkness.

I walked slowly and patted the ground with my foot before I took my next step so I could make sure I don’t fall into anything and get hurt. I was getting anxious to get out and was scared I wouldn’t find anyway to get home. Something I heard changed the way of how my prolonged plan was going through.

**Snap… crunch… snap**

I stood still and didn’t move. That noise made my entire body surge with a cold chill. I couldn’t see anything around me and something was coming towards me. Without any second thoughts I started running as fast I could without turning around. I got cut up real bad from running and hitting branches and tripping over things I couldn’t see. But none of that bothered me. I just wanted to be home. I kept running until I stepped in the wrong spot and tripped, hitting my head on a fallen tree. It knocked me out. I heard something though, a distant voice, but loud enough to understand as it faded away. “Wake up.”

My eyes shot open as I was screaming but something made me stop. I was in my room. How is this happening? I ran to my bathroom and vomited. I laid back against the bathtub that sits in front of the toilet in my bathroom not paying attention to anything else except trying to understand what happened. As I looked at my cuts and scratches sitting in the bathroom everything seemed to make less sense. Because if I was lost in the woods, how am I here? My efforts made me fall back asleep.

I started making connections later in my life but I still didn’t get it. Some events made more sense now because at first I thought I must have just been having hallucinations or some after effects of sleep. Something reasonable. But I began to realize it was more than that when these things started to hurt me. At some point in my life when I was young, there was a night when I started struggling with insomnia. That made things more obscure. When I was young, there was this night when I got up around the middle of the night thirsty. I was already nervous from previous events to leave to go anywhere in the house that isn’t my room. So I always have this bat I take with me anywhere in the house if it’s night time. It’s a habit. I noticed something weird when I was walking down the hallway on my way to the kitchen. I have this routine of closing all the doors in the house before the lights go out, even now, because I just feel more safe. Because of that very reason, I started tingling when I saw that the door that leads to the basement was open. This obviously terrified me because it was an unintentional act of insanity. So I hurried quickly to my kitchen to grab some water. It was better to hurry than to take any chances. Except, I made the mistake to turn my back to that door and I heard it creak. I froze and turned my body to witness the door opening slowly.

What I saw next was indescribable. A dark figure, long claws, half its head for a mouth with sharp long teeth, cracking and twisting in abnormal ways, towards me. I was so confused and frozen, thoughts spinning through my mind, what if the world really isn’t what it seems? What if these are the things that are hidden from us? But I’m here looking at it. My intuition punched me in the stomach and my adrenaline shot out. **RUN!** I dropped the bat, turned around, and sprinted for my room. Except, on my way there I tripped hitting my head against a piece of furniture cracking my skull. Now I was dizzy watching the blood fall on the floor but I picked myself up and continued to run. You see, the thing is, I’ve heard stories where things like this happen and the person ends up making it and it’s over. Another happy ending right? No, not this time. As I started to charge for my room I hit something in the middle of the hallway. I knew that it was over. I slowly looked up, I can’t even describe to you what I saw without wanting to puke. It made me cold and fall on my back. Every sound, every hope for life around me faded away into a darkness as I watched the creature crawl closer until everything went black, and knowing I wasn’t gonna wake up. I was gonna die.

In this darkness, I'm counting, 1...2....3.... how long have I even been here? Am I dead? Is this what it's supposed to be like? 57...58....59..... I feel nothing. That was the worst way to go. Young, alone, not happy. I lost count, so I just sat here in silence. But wait, I feel something. Or am I just imagining things? No, this is real. A warm pulsing sensation everywhere. I keep hearing this voice in the distance. Muffled but it sounds like someone calling out. After what seemed like eternity, it was time to go to wherever I was supposed to be. But something caught my attention. The muffled scream faded in and I realized something. ***"BRYYYYYYANNNNNN!"*** I wasn't dead. I don't know why but I didn't have time to think. What I saw from the moment I woke up to recovery was all a blur. Parents screaming to rush me to the hospital----everything slow----they pick me up I saw the pool of blood I knew I was in trouble-----in the car-----yelling----darkness. In the hospital-----people rushing me and yelling----blood everywhere-----screaming. They are going to put me under----doctor tells me it'll all be over soon----I get a sinking feeling in my stomach. I grab his arm to say something but it's too late. Everything slipped away. Im gone.

In the blink of an eye I awoke. How long was I asleep? I had long wounds all across my body. It hurt just to twitch but I tried. After I managed to sit up I noticed something strange. The hospital was completely dead. Where was everybody? There was no noises but this popping noise I just heard but I couldn’t tell what it was. There was a curtain blocking my view to see anything. I started to get scared again and fell into a state of nostalgia, wishing my parents would come to my rescue. That nostalgia soon turned into trepidation because sitting there silently made my gut tell me that help wasn’t coming. I was mentally unstable because things kept repeating itself or confusing me and I was lost in my own mind. I had to get up.

After forcing myself to get up I moved the curtains to investigate that distant popping sound I heard a little bit ago. After moving the curtains, I had a clear view to the very end of the hall stopped by doors. What I saw shook me. I saw flickering lights all the way to the end where that middle section with double doors is and behind those doors was darkness. Along the walls and on the ground all the way to the doors was large streaks of blood and chunks of flesh. Things were broken and thrown around the hall. I panicked and stood there frozen staring all the way to the end of the hall wishing I knew some way I could get out of this. I was wondering if other people were hurt because of me. Another pop at the end of the hall caught me by surprise. Watching the glass fall on the ground that light went out. The darkness getting closer to me, I was scared. But I just sat here and watched. Another light exploded and engulfed that part of the room with darkness getting closer to me. The doors were out of my sight at this point but I wasn't even thinking about them anymore although I felt eerie about them. I couldn’t see anything. I started to hear my heartbeat from the inside of my ears. The light closest to me exploded. I screamed and fell back. My body ached from my wounds. As I was laying there every light left in the hall exploded all the way to the end until it was just me and the dim light of my room.

I stood there, numb and throbbing staring into the darkness that looked like it never ended. I was sitting there acting like the police or somebody was going to come help me but the sinking feeling I had came back wiped away any of those well-timed moments I was desperately hoping for. My thoughts ended when I heard the doors I saw earlier slam open against the walls to their sides. At Least, that’s what I think it was. I stood there blankly staring, thinking to myself, I think this is really the end this time. Just as I thought this a little light, very far to the end of the hall, farther than I had a view of earlier started flickering. I could just barely see it. I started to lean forward but I stumbled back again when I realized how bad of an idea that was. That light stopped flickering and I was confused. But then the next light closer to me started flickering. The light was making its way to me. Light by light, flickering, it slowly crawled its way up to me acting as if it was going to take me away. It carried on like this until it made it to the doors, and then it got much worse. When It reached the doors everything went black and then it was just me and the light of my room again. I started to hear these noises, in the darkness. These noises sounded like cracks. I could barely hear it but the cracking and snapping got louder but quickly stopped. The next thing I heard is when I broke. Something evil, something so Hell like it still disturbs me now, *growled.*

I remember that my reaction of the growl sent me falling back screaming and the injuries my body had carried started burning from the contractions of my screams as I laid helplessly hearing the growling and screeching of this *thing* running towards me very quickly. It got closer and closer until it suddenly just stopped in front of the door and then the silence came back. I sat there helpless. Why does death have to be so dreadful? For a few minutes I was just sitting until I managed to stand up and slowly stepped towards the darkness of the door. I had to get out of here. I slowly kept stepping until I was a foot away from the hallway. Seconds felt like minutes of processing and contemplating what I should do. That’s when the last light separating me from the darkness exploded in my room and I had no room for choices.

I held my breath and shut my eyes in total fear anticipating the worst to happen. A while passed and nothing seemed to happen so I decided to go grab anything I might have had with me here in my room and leave. When I turned around though I noticed something strange about my room I didn't before. In the back part of the room in the corner farthest from me I noticed a blackness that didn't seem to fit with the rest of the room. It was distorted and lanky but I couldn't figure out if this was just that my eyes have not adjusted to the darkness of the room. I stared at it for a few moments and then… snap. It snapped as it twisted sharply to face me directly. It sprinted towards me with that cringing screech from earlier. As it sprinted towards me I screamed and fell as it was ready to take me. That’s when right then and there when it hit me I was once again demented.

I felt as if I was resurrected and I woke up again screaming but this time in a bed with my parents in chairs sitting next to me. They went pale seeing me wake up. “Bryan! We thought you-” “Tell me something only you would know.” I said. Interrupting what she was going to tell me. “What’re you talking about? The doctor-” “Answer me now.” I interrupted again. When she saw the serious expression I had on my face she leaned in and she told me about the time me and her went to buy me and my dad a fathers day gift to later on break on our way back to the house. I knew I was really awake this time and I asked them, “What happened?” My mom replies, “I don’t know, we found you on the ground and we thought you left us.” She kept going. “The doctor thought you weren't going to wake up.” I asked her, “How long was I asleep?” There is a pause and then my mom replies, “You were asleep for over two weeks.” “The police have investigated but they couldn't find anything. It’s like whoever broke into the house just vanished. Do you remember anything?” I was in shock I couldn't even answer. “Bryan?” She broke my silence. “No… nothing.” After that I laid back down to think about what I experienced and tried to understand how two weeks could have gone by like that.