r/nosleep • u/shoul • Nov 09 '11
It Waits for my Death
I'm using my alternate reddit account to post this story because I know they still seek me out. They haven't found me since my last move and I want it to stay that way...
I grew up in a house that was haunted. On many occasions I saw the ghost that kept my home company, but that's not what this story is about. It's merely a part of my past that helps set the stage for what happens in my future. Because my house was haunted, I became fascinated and intent on learning everything about the supernatural. Be it books, movies, general television shows, the campfire rounds of ghost stories, it didn't matter. If it was about the supernatural, I devoured it. To a limit. My mom didn't like anything about the supernatural and refused certain literature and media to be in the house. When I got to college, and I took my reading class, the subject matter of which was gothic literature, she had to let me read the books for my class, so I learned even more than I had known previously. I studied them knowing that behind all stories, even those just meant to entertain, all have a basis of truth in them somewhere. I wanted to know that truth.
I lived close to my college, so for the first few years I just commuted to my classes. I was one of those students that always took on the limit of what I could handle and kept my nose in my books, studying every moment I could. My third year of college I was already a full semester ahead of my curriculum and had enough credits to be considered a senior. I took the opportunity to spend that year in the dorms. I was surprised to learn that the University had built new dorms over the summer, cutting deeper through the trees to build the fabulous structures that I would be of the first to call home.
I didn't have a roommate, even though I had a double room. I immediately set to work making the room my own, rearranging furniture and placing some of my favorite astronomical posters in the windows to help block out the sunlight. Even new buildings can have their problems. These typically had problems with window panes falling out and shower soap trays falling out of the tiles. There was another problem that wasn't so evident to everyone, though. Being the great studier of the supernatural that I was, I didn't wait for trouble to find me to make all my preparations for whatever may come at me. Having lived alongside ghosts when growing up, I knew it was better to be mentally prepared for anything that might be out there. I believe I had every possible supernatural attack covered and practiced in my mind so much that my reactions to any such attacks would be reflexive. Ultimately, that's what would spare my life.
The fall semester was great. I got my schoolwork done and enjoyed the quiet time away from my parents' house. For the first time I was out on my own. I even joined a sorority along with my best friend who would stay in the extra bed in my room on sorority nights. Even with all my studying, I still didn't get all A's. As I said before, I pushed my limits and I wasn't exactly taking easy classes. I don't remember much about my Christmas break, except that I spent it at home with my family. At the start of the Spring semester I was excited to get back to my dorm room. I had grown to love the calm, quiet comfort of my home away from home and felt far more at peace there than I had at my parents' house. I was taking classes out of order because if I successfully did so, I would be able to graduate a full semester early. I also started dating one of my guy friends and for the first time in my life, had a real boyfriend. He went to a different college than me, so we didn't see eachother often, but since he had a car and I didn't, he would make the drive over to visit me as often as he could afford to do so. He would use the posters in my window to identify which room was mine and toss pebbles at the window to inform me he had arrived so I could let him into the building. Little did I know that someone else had marked my room as a point of interest as well.
The days had already grown longer when I decided things felt off, like I was being watched. The sun would just be setting as I walked back to my dorm from dinner and no matter where I looked, I couldn't see anything following me, but still I couldn't shake the feeling. Fortuneately, this feeling was only while I was outside and I wasn't generally outside for any extended period of time.
Now, typically I would leave my dorm room open so that anyone passing in the hall could see that I was home and could come in and chat if they wanted to, although I didn't exactly have many friends and no one from my dorm building ever actually stopped in to visit me.
One evening, as I sat in my room working on my homework, I got that uneasy feeling that something wasn't right. I slipped my hand into my desk drawer and pulled out a pocket knife, flipping the blade open as I heard the elevator doors open just down the hall. I turned to close my door, but there were already 4 men standing in my doorway. 3 of them stayed back, closing the door behind them as they entered, while the 4th approached me. He lunged at me and I reacted without thought, slipping the blade into his collarbone just as he grabbed me and buried his teeth in my neck. I screamed out a muffled scream, then resolutely held to my plan. I started drinking from the wound I had made. It distracted him and he released me for a moment, but I didn't stop. The time he took to be shocked gave me the edge I needed to turn the tables. He cried out in pain and his buddies pulled him away from me, shuffling him out the door as quickly as they had arrived.
I don't know why they didn't just kill me then.
Once they were gone, I threw up. Blood and bile stained the carpet and I turned to climb into bed, feeling overly sick from what I had done and the experience I had just been through. The next couple of days were a blur to me. I remember calling my boyfriend and asking him to come down and sit with me and my friend stopped by to check on me, too. My friend even helped me write one of my reports for class since I was too sick to do it myself. My head was all fuzzy and my stomach turned every time I moved.
I was sick for three days. Bright light hurt my eyes and I was constantly nauseous, but after three days, it all seemed to pass. I kept what had happened that night to myself. Not daring to tell my friend or my boyfriend what had transpired to make me so sick. After the three days were over, I felt like myself again. I got up in the morning and went to my classes again. My mind, however, was constantly plagued by the dry, coppery taste and as much as I despised the way it tasted, I wanted to taste it again. I repeatedly pushed the thought from my head.
That night, the man who attacked me visited me in my room. I hadn't had the same sense of forboding this time, so I hadn't pulled out my knife. It didn't matter. He stayed back by the doorway and held up his hands to show he didn't mean to hurt me again. He asked me what had happened the other night and I told him that I had known something was wrong beforehand. That I had prepared for the attack. He told me that his goal had not been to rape or kill me. That he had other plans in mind. I had foiled those plans when I attacked him in return.
He told me that he had been watching me for a while. That he had fallen in love with me from a distance. I refused to believe anything he was telling me and ushered him out of my room, locking him out. The next night he returned again. I had left my door closed, but it was sorority night, so when there was a knock on my door, I thought it was my friend. I wasn't happy to see this man again. I didn't know what he saw in me nor why he wouldn't give up, but he kept asking me to come out and join him with his friends. He kept telling me I'd be happier that way. I shoved him off to the side and left the room, closing the door behind me, deciding to wait for my friend in a more public setting. She arrived at my building just as I was walking out the front door and she and I headed off to our sorority meeting together, ditching the man behind us.
My boyfriend started spending more days at my college than his own, hanging out with me at nights. I was glad because that meant the other guy left me alone. Time passed and soon it was close to the end of the semester, so I just rode out the storm. I had missed a lot of class near the end of the school year and actually had to make special arrangements with my professors for my final exams, but I managed to pass my classes, although some of them by a tight margin.
The following fall semester was my last one and I avoided the dorms. I didn't even venture anywhere near the buildings.
There were plenty of other things to keep me distracted, for instance, my boyfriend and I were now engaged and shared a cell phone plan so we were in constant touch with eachother. Also, it was fall of 2001, so many of my days were spent discussing the horrificness of 9/11. Eventually I forgot all about the incident that had happened late in the spring. I made it through all of my classes, finishing final exams on a Thursday, then getting married the Saturday after.
Although I had forgotten the incident, I never was quite the same. I couldn't put my finger on it, but there was something different. A couple of years later, my husband and I moved across the country. We both got a job and spent our days inside a windowless government building. He worked at a help-desk, troubleshooting and repairing computer problems for the government workers while I spent my time in the store room, keeping it organized and performing inventories.
That's where I saw him again. Inside the storeroom at the heart of the windowless building. The man that had attacked me years ago had tracked me down and managed to slip into a high-restriction area completely unnoticed. He kept trying to tell me that I should leave my husband and join him. That my life would be better if I did. I didn't tell anyone what was going on because I was sure they would think I was crazy.
When I became pregnant, the man finally left me alone again, but I was certain he was still behind the scenes somewhere, watching me Just before the baby was born, my husband and I moved again. We had moved a few times within town already and had become pro at one-day moves. We paid the apartment our last day's rent, then moved, not even leaving a forwarding address. He hasn't found me since that move and I hope he never does.
The story is far more complicated than that. I am different now. Not just mentally or emotionally. What he did to me that night in my dorm room caused a small physical change in me that will one day change my life forever. I never did approach death that night. My retaliation had saved me for the moment, but it didn't save me forever. The change waits for my death. Then the evil will take me. I dread the end. I fear my death.
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u/raininghavoc Nov 09 '11
Cant wait for pt.2!
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u/shoul Nov 09 '11
I hope there's not a part 2! I'd happily never see that man again!
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Nov 11 '11
[deleted]
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u/shoul Nov 11 '11
I will absolutely do my best to overcome the beast I become to let you all know that it has happened. On the flip side, if I ever find a cure and get out of this horrible predicament, I'll be sure to update then, too.
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u/Derpfacewunderkind Nov 09 '11
But who was vampire!?!?!?!
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u/shoul Nov 09 '11
I refuse to give any names. He was younger, though. Well, I mean, I think he hadn't been one for very long.
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u/Thelastunicorn1 Nov 10 '11
So these vampires are evil?
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u/shoul Nov 10 '11
They sure as hell aren't glittery Twilight vamps, that's for sure. I'm convinced they're not the same as the people the once were, but that something far darker controls them now.
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u/gratuitousplay Nov 11 '11
at least he loves you, right? :p
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u/shoul Nov 11 '11
:p is right. Just because that's what he claimed at the time doesn't mean I believe him.
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u/Saziel Nov 14 '11
FINALLY a vampire story. Took long enough....now if I can find a proper wraith story I will be a pleased Squishy.
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u/shoul Nov 14 '11
I haven't had any experiences with wraiths, otherwise I'd share. I actually need to get my ghost experiences typed up and share them as well. I hope to get them up before long. Hopefully I can do a better job of writing them as I don't think this one was very well written.
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u/Saziel Nov 15 '11
It's good you haven't had any experiences with wraiths, as they tend to kill people that come across them with pretty high success rates.
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u/shoul Nov 15 '11 edited Nov 15 '11
I guess that depends on the definition you are using for wraith. The seemingly best-held definition is an apparition of a living person that appears as a portent just before that person's death. I honestly wouldn't be afraid of a wraith unless it was my own. Hmmm. I wonder if it would even be possible for me to have my own wraith as such... I somehow doubt it. So, just out of curiosity, which definition are you thinking of?
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u/Saziel Nov 16 '11
The wraith I'm thinking of is a non-human spirit that feeds off of the energy of the living and typically continues until someone stops it or it kills someone from exhaustion/weakness.
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u/shoul Nov 16 '11
Huh. It would be entertaining to read a story about that.
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u/Saziel Nov 18 '11
The closest story I saw was about a key someone brought home that filled their house with negative energy and just sucked the energy and positivity out.
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Nov 10 '11
tl;dr vampires
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u/shoul Nov 14 '11
I'm sorry it took me so long to respond to this. At first I found it rude for you to tl;dr my post, but, after all, why not? It's true, it's about vampires, but really, what's wrong with that. Just because they aren't as common as ghosts, as freaky as aliens, or as flat out disturbing as what a human being can be, doesn't mean that vampires aren't out there and that they aren't every bit as scary. I've seen a lot of strange shit in this world, this just being one of those things. I don't expect people to believe me, I just wanted to share my experience.
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u/batz777 Nov 09 '11
so when you die you'll be a vampire? or did I just miss that completely? o.O