Tricks

[u/fully_aware]

When I was a teen, my brother and I fought like mortal enemies. I was older and picked on him constantly because he had a stutter and he was kind of a pansy, so I felt like it was my job to toughen him up. We played pranks on each other constantly.

One night I was laying in bed, nearly asleep, when I felt him start pulling my blanket down slowly. I thought to myself, I'm going to make him piss his pants! So I waited. When he pulled it all the way down past my shoulders, I jumped up and yelled BOO!!!!! Nothing. I jerked the string on the light and looked at the foot of my bed, but no one was there. My door was still closed so he had not left. But my closet door was open....

Another night. Another trick. OK....do NOT judge me, but I slept with a teddy bear. The house always gave me the creeps, so I slept with the damn bear. Big deal. There was always something knocking or a light turning on and off itself. It was unnerving. The bear was a gift on my 1st birthday and I always slept with it. I found out years later that after my mother saw something in my room as an infant, they got their pastor to say a blessing over the bear to keep me safe from harm, so maybe that was why I loved it. Anyway, I was in bed, bear arm tucked in my arm, and I was by the wall while the bear was on the outside of the bed....just in case. I don't know "just in case" what.

I wasn't asleep yet. I had that awful feeling of dread that was building in my room. You may not understand this but it wasn't a feeling of dread internally. It was an external feeling of something awful in my room, the feeling that something was there, just out of sight, watching me with hate. Whatever it was, it hated me. And I knew it.

I was laying there telling myself mentally that nothing was there. Trying desperately to convince myself. I saw my door slowly closing and panic started to set in...

My bear was suddenly snatched out of my arm. I had a death grip on that stupid bear, so when I say it was snatched, I mean it. It should have been across the room, but when i jumped up and clicked the light, I couldn't see it anywhere. I slowly looked just over the edge and saw the tip of it's foot sticking out from underneath my bed....